The Last Garrison (Dungeons & Dragons Novel)

by Beard, Matthew

  A cracking of thunder occurred in the sky overhead. “My master,” said Nergei.

  “He is lost to you, child,” said the revenant. “Utterly lost. He must die.”

  “I cannot kill him,” said Nergei.

  “Of course not!” said the revenant with a laugh. “Who are you? You, though,” he turned and stared at Sten, “and your partner. You were engaged to protect Haven. Killing the old man will do so. Go to it.”

  “Why should we believe you, shadow creature?” asked Spundwand. “Who are you to tell us any of this? Perhaps we should seek out the old man and join with him to kill you.”

  The revenant laughed again. “You will find the old man quite beyond the reach of reason, dwarf. You may attempt to ally with him, but it is unlikely he will accept any overture. Even from his ward, here. But, by all means. Speak to the man yourself. I will help you find him.” The revenant clapped his hands together and rubbed them. The shadows on the ground grew and filled the floor, and then crept up the bodies of the five of them. Darkness surrounded them utterly, and the world around them again winked out. But this time, there was no vertigo, no loss of consciousness, no feeling of stretching and pulling in their bodies. Instead, they were simply covered in a cold darkness that rose around them, and then shrank back to the floor.

  When the shadows dissipated and crawled away across the floor, they found they were again moved, no longer in the tower above the fortress version of Haven. Gloomhaven, the revenant had called it. Instead, they were in a large structure, an open hall. It was twice the size of the gathering hall in the town of Haven, but shared its shape. No table in the center, though. Instead, a dark, robed figure stood, a stream of words pouring from his mouth. And to his sides, kneeling and doubled over, pale-armored and shivering, two figures with black hair and, where it peeked out from the plates of armor on one and the heavy sections of leather of the other, rot-gray skin. The figure in the center had his back turned, but seemed to sense an intrusion. He stopped his muttering. He cocked his head and turned slowly. His skin was a throbbing blue pulse. His beard had gone from white to an eggshell blue ribboned with dark blue streaks. His eyes had gone entirely black. White breath poured from his nose. He appeared decades younger but still an old man, still the Old Stargazer. Nergei knew him immediately, as did the others. “I am safe here,” he said. “I do not allow you in my sanctuary.”

  “Master,” said Nergei, shouting to be heard over a powerful rumbling in the wooden floor below them. “We have come to help you.”

  “I need no help,” he replied. “I need nothing from you, child. I have my champions. I have my power. All must leave! All must flee!” At his sides, the figures extended their arms, ancient joints cracking. They flexed muscles and turned necks back and forth in unison, mirroring each other. And slowly they rose to their feet, faces drawn, eyes closed. “Kolber, the Axe of Ioun. Galsey, the Swiftest Arrow. The only two I can trust. Not the stars. Not the voices. You are not to be trusted.”

  “Master, it is Nergei. It is your servant. You have always trusted me—to feed you, to clean for you, to gather the components for your rituals. You brought me here to be beside you, as well.”

  A jet of cold breath exploded from the throat of the old man, so powerful it dropped the temperature of the room and sent shivers through the four. “No, child. In Haven the only ones I can trust are these two. My brothers in arms. All others are servants of the voices. Servants of the starbound. Leave this place! Do not return! It is no matter for me to kill you all. No small matter.”

  Nergei felt a dagger to his heart. He knew the old man’s words were offered honestly. And he knew the old man’s power was more than any of them as individuals, or all of them together collectively. Who was he anyway? An orphan. A servant. Whatever control he had discovered recently over the fire in his blood was too unpredictable, too small to have any effect on the outcome of combat with the old man, this dark version of the Old Stargazer.

  “Perhaps,” Nergei said quietly to his companions, “we should leave him. What are we to him?”

  Sten looked at the boy, and then to Spundwand. “We can’t truly confirm the revenant’s assertions,” the dwarf said. “We know nothing of the greater threat he claimed was connected to the old man. Why not leave him in the Shadowfell in peace? If the Raven Queen is so keen to see him die, she can deal with him herself.”

  “I cannot allow that, you understand,” said a voice from the shadows. It was the revenant, slipped half in to the great hall through a shadow portal. “No, it’s best for you to deal with this threat here and now. We have chosen you. The queen has chosen you.” The old man had closed his eyes. His guardians—Undead? Enthralled? Formed from old flesh?—stood beside him, both gently swaying to the steady breaths of the old man, as if he inhaled and exhaled for them, as if his heart beat for them, as if his blood flowed through the veins of all three of them. They were communing somehow, and distracted by it. From beneath his cloak, the revenant pulled a small crossbow, bolt already nocked. “Now you four get to work,” he said, and without a moment’s hesitation to aim, he loosed a bolt in the direction of the old man and his partners. The bolt landed solidly in the shoulder of the revenant warrior with the axe at his side, and as one, the three bleak companions opened their mouths and howled with pain and fury. The Old Stargazer threw off his robe as the heavily armored warrior, the reconstituted figure of Kolber, pulled his axe to his shoulder and began to run at the party of four. The gray archer, Galsey, scanned the room with black on black eyes to see if he could determine the source of the crossbow bolt, but the shadow walker was gone, having disappeared back through his murky portal. He fixed his gaze on the four in front of him instead, feinted to the left, and pulled a bone white arrow from his shoulder quiver.

  Recognizing the coming attack, Sten and Spundwand readied their weapons and charged forward to meet Kolber at the center. Though exhausted from their battle with the kenku, they felt renewed, knowing they had to protect the two youths of Haven. Sten called out, “To my side, partner,” and Spundwand responded with a quiet blessing on their weapons and their armor.

  “Moradin preserve us,” he said. From deep within he felt the blessing of his god, and with a gesture, he passed that boon along to his friend.

  Sten met Kolber first, but seeing that the warrior had the timing advantage with his axe, he held his sword in both hands and lifted it up to parry the coming blow. The axe fell into the hilt with great power, but the finely crafted steel did not crack. It repelled the swing, stopped it, and Kolber’s body shook with the combined force of swing and deflection. Sten lifted his boot to the gray warrior’s chest, struck hard to his center, and pushed him back, and as Kolber was stunned, Spundwand slipped past Sten, and, running by Kolber, struck him in the flank with a passing blow. It knocked Kolber to his right, and caused him to take his left hand from the axe’s hilt to reach for the pain in his side.

  Nergei saw the archer aiming at him and Luzhon, and grabbed her. They both tumbled to the ground. An arrow flew over them and lodged in the great hall’s door behind them. The only things to hide behind in the hall were a series of stone columns on either side of the room, so he chose the closest and hid with her behind it. He pushed her against its side and held them both there.

  “What are you doing?” asked Luzhon.

  “Hiding us,” he replied.

  “Us?” she said. “Feel free to hide yourself, Nergei. I do not need to hide.” Luzhon pulled a short blade from her belt, and peered around the corner of the column. “If you want to draw the attention of the archer, I think I can get to him.”

  Nergei felt a stinging burn in his chest that spread. Was it the fire or just his shame? “We aren’t a match for these warriors. They are under the thrall of the old man. We are certainly no match for him.”

  “Sten and Spundwand protected our home. We have to help them,” Luzhon responded. “Sten taught me a thing or two about the proper use of a blade.”

  Nergei
tried to grab her and hold her back, but Luzhon had twisted free of his half-hearted grip and ran up to find cover behind a column closer to the archer, who was refocusing his attention on Spundwand, the dwarf rapidly approaching the Old Stargazer. Nergei’s blood went from a sting to a sharp throb of heat, and he saw light pulsing in his knuckles. Luzhon’s bravery was taking hold of him, too. He began to sense that with the proper concentration, he could call forth a blast of fire from his hands, then direct it. He felt deep down like he understood what doing so would mean—like the half-elf had said to him. Understanding control was first discovering what lack of control felt like, and then knowing what kind of concentration counteracted that lack of control.

  Spundwand had passed Kolber and was charging the Old Stargazer before he realized he was unsure what he was going to do when he got there. He gripped his hammer in both hands, and knew Moradin would guide him. Hoped Moradin would guide him. At the Old Stargazer’s feet, he looked up as he drew the hammer over his head and saw stars swirling within the black on black eyes of the spellcaster. Before he could bring the hammer down on the old man’s midsection, he felt a prickling and then an eruption of pain in his chest, as if someone had reached within it and grabbed his heart with a powerful grip. The sudden pain was too much to fight through and when his blow landed, there was no power behind it. The hammer glanced off the old man’s body, and Spundwand’s hands became so weak, he dropped his weapon at the spellcaster’s feet. The grip on his heart remained tight, and he crumpled to his knees.

  Kolber had gathered himself and swung his axe back, returned both hands to the hilt, and stepped forward to face Sten. The warrior had a few moments on him, though, and gripping his hammer with both hands, thrust its head forward into Kolber’s chest. A bit of the thrust glanced off Kolber’s left arm, but most of it landed in his sternum causing him to collapse forward and spin the axe so that when it connected with Sten’s left side, instead of the blade, only the flat of the weapon hit him. It was a strong blow, and sent a shock through Sten’s body, but having the edge of the blade turned downward kept it from cutting through Sten’s armor to his body. A bruising shot, to be sure, but not a fatal wound. The momentary recognition of his luck was replaced when Sten felt a bite in his right side and saw that the archer had placed an arrow in the seam where the leather sections were tied together. The chain beneath was all that kept the arrow from entering deep and piercing his kidney.

  Luzhon had moved close enough to the archer to see something odd cross his face. He seemed to have admired the shot that had struck Sten, but at the same time, appeared confused by the feeling of admiration. Was he experiencing the sensation for the first time? Trying to orient himself to reexperiencing it? Whatever it was, Luzhon knew that it was the perfect opportunity for her, so she moved around the column to approach the archer from his left side, the arm that held the bow and not the string that awaited the nocking of the next bone white arrow. She lunged forward, blade raised, and swung it at the archer’s hand, hoping to connect and wound him, removing the fingers he needed to grip the weapon. It was a strong swing, but Galsey caught a glimpse of her in his peripheral vision, and managed to turn the bow—as bone white as his arrows—into the blade. The edge of the blade sunk a little into the wood of the bow, but it was thick and did not break. Galsey dropped back and Luzhon’s momentum made her follow him. She was off balance, and he had position, but she still managed, purely by luck, to spin away from the arrow head he thrust at her with his right hand. When they both gathered themselves, he held the arrow out like a rapier, rotating the tip to ready another thrust.

  The full implications of one-on-one combat both thrilled and terrified Luzhon anew, but when she felt a twinge or fear float through her, she swore she saw the same pass over the face of the archer. There and gone, then each stepped into the other.

  Nergei watched his hands pulse with light, and felt fiery blood reach his toes and the top of his head at the same time. His vision grew clearer, as if the gloom of the Shadowfell was burned away by the fire within him. Like parchment lit at the center, everything went quickly black, and then burst open. The dismal veil of that world went away. He saw a glowing around each figure in the room. A subdued purple around the archer and the axe-wielding warrior. An ice blue around Sten. A surprisingly vibrant blue around Luzhon. A chilling starscape around the old man. But over Spundwand, on his knees before his old master, Nergei saw a dimming gold, like a candle at the end of its wick. The old man was killing him. He had to do something, but did not know what.

  Sten parried and deflected all of Kolber’s attacks, but the revenant did not seem to tire. He appeared more vigorous, not less, after each blow. Sten knew he could not outlast the revenant, that the surge of strength engaging in the battle had given him would fade soon, while the axe would only continue to swing at him with greater force and precision. He needed to end the combat. So he allowed the next blow from Kolber to connect, a shot that cut into his shoulder. Sten allowed the power of the shot to push him, grabbed the hilt of the axe with his left hand to keep it lodged in him and by doing so, by letting the overhand swing knock him back, he made Kolber over commit. As Sten fell back prone, the edge of the axe buried in his shoulder, Kolber stumbled forward with it, tripping himself. Sten felt the bite of the blade, knew that it would hurt quite a bit more later, but when Kolber stumbled forward into him, he was already bringing his sword up to the warrior’s head. The strike connected, slicing into the left side of Kolber’s face, the force of the follow-through spinning his neck to the right, and snapping it. The axe blade was deep in Sten’s left shoulder, and gripping the hilt to pull Kolber into him was possibly the last thing that his left arm would ever do. But the gamble had paid off. Kolber fell on top of him, dead for the second time. Sten remained conscious for only a few moments before the pain in his shoulder sent him to blackness.

  Galsey tried to escape Luzhon, to get far enough away from her to nock an arrow and fire, but she stuck close to him, keeping him from the advantage his bow gave him from only a few feet away. Nergei knew Spundwand needed him, but felt drawn first to help Luzhon, and as she and the archer thrust forward and dodged away from each other’s weapons, he readied his nerves, tried to shut out everything going on around him, and ran to them.

  Luzhon saw Nergei coming and shouted, “I can’t keep up. He’s getting better, faster.”

  “Remembering,” shouted Nergei. The young man felt fire, a shuddering of it in his belly like a burning wave. He channeled it, willed it to run down his arms, into his palms, and it erupted from the center of his hands in a cone that engulfed the left side of the archer’s body. The archer’s black hair burned up and his skin scorched and bubbled, and he screamed in the rasping voice of a man who had not used his voice in a long time. The pain caused him to drop his bow, burning, and he lowered the arm holding the arrow, giving Luzhon an opening. She took it, swinging her blade at the archer’s neck, biting deep into it. The scream withered as it sputtered from the gash in the archer’s neck. Galsey dropped to his knees convulsing, and Luzhon, though disturbed by her first kill, finished him with a blade thrust through his chest. Blood did not pump from him, as it had not with Kolber, but it was there, seeping and spilling down from the wounds.

  When Nergei and Luzhon turned, Spundwand was already dead. The Old Stargazer—in his dark, corrupt form—had squeezed the warpriest’s heart until it had burst within him. Blood bubbled from the dwarf’s mouth and coated his beard. He lay prone at the old man’s feet. The Old Stargazer looked to Luzhon and Nergei. As he turned, he kicked the dwarf’s body aside, as unconcerned about it as he would be a stray rag. “I can bring those two back,” he said, gesturing at the bodies of Kolber and Galsey. “Can you bring back yours?” The Old Stargazer’s eyes shone. Stars swirled within them. “I will allow you to leave, boy. You and the girl can go. I will give you this last chance to live.”

  Nergei hesitated, but Luzhon did not. She rushed forward to the body of the dwarf, tear
s welling in her eyes. “Monstrous old man!” she screamed as she kneeled over him, trying to figure out where to touch him, how to turn him over, what to do with him. Nergei followed her, moving more slowly.

  “Master, please. You are not in control. You are lost here. Fight through the corruption. Let us help you.”

  “I grow weary of this, boy. Weary. The pain of it all throbs in my hands. Let us make the pain go away.” The old man flicked his wrist at Luzhon and a charge, a bolt of energy split into a dozen stars, shot into her body. She shrieked and scuttled back away from Spundwand’s body. “Come back, child,” said the old man, and with another flick of his wrist, another starshine bolt flew out and struck Luzhon. She shrieked again, and bit her tongue, spit blood from her mouth onto the floor. Nergei felt as if he shared her sudden pulses of fear. Fire burned in his blood, and leaped from his hands in the direction of the old man.

  With another wave, the flame bounced away from the old man and struck the wall. “Foolish, laughable orphan,” said the old man, a booming in his voice. “Servant. Cook. Fetch the hyssop for morning tea. Call fire forth to spark a blaze in our hearth. Starborn! Dragonblood! Who are you to me!”

  Nergei felt the fire build and directed it, again, at the old man, but again it was turned away harmlessly. “Sweep the great hall, fatherless child. Motherless boy. Annoy me no more! I will return you to the woods where I found you.” The old man flicked his wrist at Luzhon again, and that time, a shower of lightning and star cinders crackled over her back. The hair on her head stood up and her body shook. “Fetch a bird from the villagers and clean it, boy. Cook my supper. Fill my cup! Empty the pan from beside my bed!”