Journey into the Void

by Margaret Weis

  “Why are you here?” Rigiswald demanded in a low, irritated whisper.

  Ulaf snapped his head up and blinked his eyes. He couldn’t for a moment think where he was. Then memory returned.

  “I’ve come to fetch you, sir,” Ulaf said, standing up. “Shadamehr has ordered us to leave the city. And there’s more.”

  Quickly, Ulaf whispered the news of the night’s events. He was grateful that the library was a place of enforced silence, for he and Rigiswald could confer in quiet tones and not raise suspicions.

  Rigiswald listened closely. He had been Shadamehr’s tutor since the baron was a child. A sleek, dapper gentleman, vain of his appearance and fond of creature comforts, Rigiswald was much more interested in the study of magic than the practice of magic. He claimed that spell-casting ruined his clothes. He was a skilled wizard, when he wanted to be, but he took care that he was not often driven to that extremity.

  His face held no expression. His only reaction to the dire news that the young king of Vinnengael was a Vrykyl, in league with the Lord of the Void, whose armies were at this moment marching on the city, was to lift an eyebrow, and say, “I see.”

  Rigiswald smoothed his black beard, which was always neatly combed, trimmed close to his sharp jawline. “So that’s why they took away my book. Why didn’t the fool just say so in the first place!” He glowered at the back of the Scribe, who was walking off in triumph, book in hand. He turned back to Ulaf. “And why are you here?”

  “Shadamehr asked me to come, sir,” said Ulaf, striving to be patient. “I’m rounding up our people. We’re planning to leave the city tomorrow morning before it comes under siege.”

  “Where are you bound?”

  “To Krammes, sir. Shadamehr’s going round by ship. He said that we were to travel overland—”

  “Out of the question,” stated Rigiswald. “That trip here in the company of the orks was bad enough. Now you propose that I walk a thousand miles to Krammes.”

  “It’s not that far. We have horses. I’m supposed to talk to the Dominion Lords and Shadamehr says that you—”

  Rigiswald gave a delicate snort. Turning his back on Ulaf, the elderly mage selected a goose quill from one of the jars placed at intervals around the library for the convenience of those needing to take notes. He took a small ivory scroll tube from his belt, removed the scroll rolled up inside, glanced at it, then turned it over and began to write. When he finished, he tucked the scroll into the tube and handed it to Ulaf.

  “Here is where you may find those Dominion Lords who may be of use to you,” Rigiswald said. “Use this as your introduction.”

  “This means you’re not coming with me,” Ulaf said in loud and frustrated tones that won him a dour look from the librarian. He lowered his voice. “You did hear me say that the city was going to come under attack soon, didn’t you, sir?”

  Rigiswald shrugged, unconcerned. He began to sort through a pile of books he had stacked up on a table beside him.

  “I trust they left me something,” he muttered. “Ah, here it is.”

  Deftly abstracting a slim volume bound in worn red leather, he settled back down in a chair, opened it, and began to read. After a moment, he glanced up at Ulaf.

  “You may go on about your business,” he said.

  “But Shadamehr—”

  Rigiswald raised a neatly manicured finger. “Tell the baron I will be of far more use to him here in New Vinnengael than I would be traipsing about the countryside.” He went back to his reading.

  Ulaf opened his mouth, shut it again. Shaking his head, he tucked the ivory tube into a pocket, then, muttering imprecations, stalked out of the library.

  Glancing up from his book, Rigiswald watched Ulaf depart and smiled to himself. Closing the book, he leaned back in the chair and was soon absorbed with his own thoughts, grim ones, to judge by his expression.

  Back at the Crow and Ring Jessan kept vigil over the body of his friend. The night was quiet—the sort of soft and heavy quiet that oppresses the spirit and deadens thought. Ulaf had been gone for some time. Maudie had tried to remain awake to keep an eye on these strange visitors, but the excitement and shock of events had worn her out. She was asleep in her chair.

  Jessan was grateful to Ulaf for having provided him with an occupation, a means of being of service, of use to someone. He could not have accepted Ulaf’s offer to travel with them otherwise, for he would not be beholden to anyone, not even to this friend of the baron’s. Many Trevinici hired themselves out to travelers to serve as guards in return for food and shelter along the way. Jessan might have suspected that this job was being offered him out of pity, but he had seen respect in Ulaf’s eyes and heard it in his voice.

  Jessan knew himself to be valued for his courage and his skill, and the thought brought a modicum of comfort and warmth to him as he stood alone in the howling, frigid, darkness of his grief and his desperate desire to return home.

  Jessan had been eager to go out into the world, eager to prove himself as a warrior. Bored with his humdrum life in the village, as the young are often bored, he could not understand the joy felt by his uncle and the other warriors on returning home after a long absence. How could they trade a life of adventure, danger, and excitement for a life of digging in the fields and minding children? Jessan’s thoughts winged to those same ordinary and oft-despised comforts with a longing that ached and burned in his heart.

  Jessan remembered even his crazy aunt Ranessa with compassion. He wished that he’d been kinder to her, more understanding. She was family. She was part of the tribe, and that made her welfare important to him, a sacred trust, as Bashae had been a sacred trust.

  Jessan did not blame himself for Bashae’s death. His conscience was clear. He had done all he could to protect his friend and save him from the Vrykyl. As he had said, to blame himself would take credit from Bashae. The pecwae could have dropped the Sovereign Stone and fled, but he’d made the choice to fight for it, valiantly overcoming all his instincts to remain loyal to the task given him by the gods.

  “I honor your courage, Bashae,” said Jessan softly. “But part of me wishes you had run away. That same part is angry that you didn’t. You left me here alone and friendless. I am sorry for my weakness. I hope you understand.”

  “He does,” said the Grandmother. “Where he is, he understands everything.”

  The time passed, long and heavy. The Grandmother stared into the fire. Jessan’s thoughts retraced the footsteps of the remarkable journey that had carried him into foreign lands, introduced him to a kite-maker, the Nimorean Queen’s daughter, an elven Dominion Lord, and a madcap baron.

  Jessan was thinking how each had made its mark upon his life when he heard the creaking sound of door hinges. He jerked around, his hand going for the weapon that was no longer at his side. He realized then, seeing the gray light outside the door, that dawn was near.

  “It’s me,” said Ulaf softly.

  He crept across the floor, not wanting to disturb the slumbering Maudie.

  “I have found most of our people,” he said. “I’ve left messages for the others. They’ll catch up with us on the road. I have the horses—mine and Alise’s and Shadamehr’s. He’d never forgive us if we left his horse here to be eaten by the taan. Are you ready?…”

  He glanced askance at the body of the pecwae, lying with limbs composed, eyes closed, before the fire. But for the whitish blue pallor of the skin, Bashae might have been asleep.

  “We should wrap the body in something,” Ulaf suggested uncomfortably. “Otherwise…” He fell silent, not certain what to say.

  Jessan looked to the Grandmother, who roused herself from her reverie. Rising to her feet, she smoothed the folds of her skirts, setting the bells to tinkling softly. Closing her eyes, the Grandmother began to sing.

  She sang an ancient song, a song taught to the pecwae in a time when elves were newborn creatures wandering the continent with wonder in their eyes, a time when the orks left their broth
ers who swim in the vast oceans to live upon the land, a time when the dwarven young rolled on the ground with wolf cubs, a time when humans used their magic to wrench stones from the earth and fashion them into weapons.

  As the Grandmother sang, she spread out her hands. Strands of silk flowed from her fingers. The silken threads wrapped around Bashae, spun a cocoon around his body. Every so often, at set intervals in the song, the Grandmother would tear one of the stones from her skirt and toss it among the twining threads. Her tears flowed at the song’s beginning, but the ancient mantra that sped the soul of the dead upon its journey to the sleep world also brought comfort and solace to the living. With the end of the song came an end to tears.

  “We are ready to go,” the Grandmother said to Ulaf. She was dry-eyed, stiff-chinned. “His soul is departed, and the cocoon will keep his body safe until we place him in the burial mound.”

  “I have kept the warrior’s watch,” Jessan added. “I introduced Bashae to the fallen heroes of our tribe and told them of his valor, so that they will accept him among them and honor him.”

  Ulaf had a momentary picture of the diminutive pecwae walking into the halls of heaven, to be greeted as a hero by the likes of such Trevinici legends as Bear-Mauler, Skull-Basher, and He-Who-Dines-on-the-Brains-of-His-Foe. Ulaf added his own silent prayer, hoping that Bashae would be honored by them, but also trusting that the pecwae would soon be able to make good his escape and go running freely in the meadows, to bask in heaven’s eternal sunshine.

  “We should hurry,” Ulaf said. “No sign of the taan yet, but it’s just as well to be away from here.”

  Removing some coins from his pouch, he laid them on the table beside the sleeping Maudie. Jessan wrapped the small, cocooned body in a blanket and carried it out to the waiting horses, where Ulaf helped him lash the body onto Shadamehr’s steed. The horse was usually restless and ill-tempered, but the Grandmother spoke to the animal, told it the nature of the burden it bore. The horse stood quietly, with head lowered.

  That done, the Grandmother looked around at her sleep city, at the tall buildings, just starting to emerge from the shadows of night, and smiled sadly.

  “When it is my time, I will come back,” she promised.

  Jessan picked her up, set her on the back of his horse. “When it is your time, you will join the heroes, Grandmother.”

  She heard the sorrow and loneliness in his voice, felt it echoed in her own heart. Each was all the other had left now.

  “Bah!” she said briskly. “They’d just want me to cook for them.”

  Jessan smiled, as she had hoped he would. Mounting the horse, he made certain that the Grandmother was securely settled, then they rode off through the gray dawn, following Ulaf’s lead.

  AFTER FLEEING THE ILL-FATED FIASCO IN THE PALACE, DAMRA and her husband Griffith had made their way through the slumbering city without difficulty. A member of the Wyred, that mysterious sect of elven wizards, Griffith had the ability to transform himself into an airy being who could pass through the streets as lightly as a breath of wind. Damra was not a wizard, but she could call upon the magical power of the armor of the Dominion Lords to cloak herself in the black wings of the raven. Thus the two elves were able to escape the vigilance of the Imperial Cavalry, who had orders to arrest them, along with the outlaw Baron Shadamehr.

  Damra had been to New Vinnengael before, on those rare occasions when the Dominion Lords were summoned to conference. She recalled that all streets in the city bore names that had to do with their location. They had only to find River Street, which would lead them to the docks. Since it was a major thoroughfare, it was not hard to locate. Patrols passed them by without a glance, a tribute to their powers of magic. On reaching the docks, the elves were just starting to search for the orken ship they’d been told would be waiting for them when they heard a blast and saw a lurid, orange glow light the sky.

  “A building has caught fire,” said Griffith, his voice seemingly coming from thin air, for he remained concealed by his magic. “I wonder if that means the taan have entered the city?”

  Damra watched a moment, waiting for more fires to break out, waited to hear screams and shouts. All was silence, except for some noise made by a nearby patrol, who had seen the flames and were wondering if they should go find out what was going on.

  “I don’t think so,” Damra replied. “Why do I have the feeling it has something to do with Baron Shadamehr?”

  “Because trouble follows him like a stray dog?” suggested Griffith.

  Damra smiled and looked in the direction of her husband’s voice. “I wonder how we’re supposed to find that ship? There are undoubtedly several ork ships in port. I’m not sure how we figure out which one is the one we’re looking for. In all the excitement, I forgot to ask the baron the ship’s name.”

  “Would there be that many?” Griffith asked dubiously. “I thought the orks and humans were practically at war.”

  “Orks never let politics stand in the way of profit,” Damra replied. “There are always several orken ships moored at the docks of New Vinnengael, and a good many orken traders to be found in the city markets.”

  “I hope we locate the right ship quickly,” said Griffith somberly. “My strength is giving out. I’m not certain how much longer I can hold on to this spell.”

  “And I hope that the orks will help us,” said Damra, sounding dubious. “I do not like having to rely on creatures who are so unpredictable.”

  “They are not ‘creatures,’ dear,” said her husband, mildly rebuking. “They are people, the same as us.”

  “Orks are not the same as us,” returned Damra severely.

  Griffith said nothing, wanting to avoid a quarrel. Damra kept silent for the same reason.

  Arriving at the docks, the weary elves were astonished to find only one ork ship in port, swinging at anchor in the middle of the dark river.

  “That’s strange,” said Damra.

  “Not really,” her husband replied. “The orks have warned their brethren of the approach of the taan. The rest of the orks have fled.”

  The orken ship was distinctive for her painted sails, featuring crude images of whales, dolphins, sea serpents, and seabirds. The ship was the Kli’Sha, orken for “seagull,” and she was aglow with light, her nervous crew keeping watch.

  The rest of the harbor was quiet, except for the occasional patrol. The orks were not the only sailors to have word of the enemy, apparently. Those Vinnengaelean merchant ships who could put out to sea had done so immediately, taking with them family and friends.

  “Where is the Vinnengaelean fleet?” Damra asked suddenly. “Vinnengael is known for its navy. I am surprised that they are not here to defend the city.”

  “The king ordered them out to sea about a month ago in response to a rumor that a Karnuan fleet would attempt to attack New Vinnengael from the south. The fleet has not been heard from since,” Griffith said. “The baron believes it possible that they were lured to their doom by the Lord of the Void.”

  “Speaking of that fell lord,” said Damra, “look there, on the far shore.”

  Narrow and swift-flowing at this point, the Arven River glimmered darkly in the half-light of a waning moon. Damra pointed across its rippling surface to where pinpricks of bright orange light could be seen ranging up and down the riverbank.

  “Bonfires,” said Damra.

  “Yes,” Griffith agreed. “Dagnarus’s troops are massing on the riverbank.”

  “He will attack with dawn.”

  “I am not so certain he will attack,” Griffith said. “Dagnarus is a cunning man, a genius when it comes to warfare, according to legend. He went to the trouble of insinuating his Vrykyl into the Royal Palace. Why would he do that if he meant to level the city. I believe he has other plans for New Vinnengael.”

  “The gods help them,” said Damra, “And us. Here comes another patrol. Try to hold your spell a little longer, my husband.”

  They needn’t have worried. Th
e soldiers paid little attention to their duties. They stared across the water toward the flaring bonfires, every man knowing well what they meant.

  Once they were gone, the two elves made their way to the pier, where the ork captain paced and muttered to himself in orken, occasionally saying something to a companion, who lounged at his ease on a coil of rope.

  Griffith ceased his spell-casting, letting go of the magic with relief. Damra threw off her magical raven’s cloak.

  The orken captain gave a violent start at the sight of two elves materializing out of the night almost under his nose. He grabbed his sword. The first mate leapt up from the ropes and Griffith found the point of a long, curved-bladed sword at his throat while Damra stared down the blade of a wicked-looking dagger.

  “Baron Shadamehr sent us,” Griffith said hurriedly, using Elderspeak, for he knew very little Pharn ’Lan, the orken language. “He told us we could gain passage on your ship. You must recognize me, Captain Kal-Gah. I am Griffith. I’ve lived with the baron the past month. This is my wife, Damra, a Dominion Lord.”

  The orken captain lowered his sword, but only to Griffith’s chest. Lifting a lantern, he thrust the light into Griffith’s face, peered at him intently, then shifted his penetrating stare to Damra.

  Tall and slender, his movements graceful, Griffith wore the traditional black robes of the Wyred, which set them apart from all respected members of elven society. He wore his black hair smoothed back from his face, bound in a long braid at his back. Damra had discarded the magical armor of the Dominion Lord, so as not to look intimidating. She wore a blue silken tunic, bound around her slim waist with a crimson sash and over that the tabard of the Dominion Lord. Since she, too, was considered outside the pale of proper elven society, she eschewed the restricting dress of elven women, choosing instead to wear long, flowing silk trousers. She cut her hair short, wore it tied back in a club.