Mindbender

by David A. Wells

Alexander shook his head. “We have to kill the one that bit me. Otherwise, I’ll turn into one of them.”

  “That might be a problem,” Anatoly said. “We’re trapped down here and we’ve heard the scream of at least one more revenant from the chambers below.”

  The ground shook again, showering Alexander with a coating of dust.

  “And the wizard hasn’t given up on us yet. How are you feeling?” Anatoly asked.

  “I’ve been better,” Alexander replied as he sat up. The wound on his neck still hurt but what worried him more was the feeling of numbing cold spreading from the bite into the rest of his body.

  Chloe flew up and hovered a foot from his face. “I’m worried about you, My Love. I can feel the darkness growing within you.”

  “Me too, Little One,” Alexander said. “It’s supposed to take a month for the transformation to run its course. Hopefully, the soldiers or the wizard out there will kill the revenant for us and solve my problem.”

  “If they don’t, what then?” Anatoly asked.

  “It doesn’t like the light, so it’ll look for another way back underground before dawn,” Alexander said. “I doubt it’ll abandon its lair so easily. My guess is we’ll have another run-in with the thing. Hopefully, it won’t get the best of me next time.”

  Jataan returned with Boaberous in tow. “It’s good to see you awake again, Lord Reishi. We’ve searched this level and found several rooms that look like they were once libraries or workrooms, but everything has long since turned to dust. There’s a staircase leading to another level below but we thought it best not to venture too far.”

  “Good, I want to take a look at those rooms,” Alexander said as he got to his feet. He was weak and chilled and felt sick but he forced himself to focus on the task at hand in spite of the magic working to transform him into a monster. “We’ll be back in a few minutes.”

  Alexander raised his vial of night-wisp dust to illuminate the narrow corridor. It was made from stone blocks cut carefully and expertly set without mortar. The place was ancient but fresh revenant tracks were visible in the dust covering the floor. Alexander quickly evaluated the other rooms with his second sight for some hint of anything magical but saw nothing. They were exactly what Jataan said they were, the broken remains of long-abandoned workrooms.

  On their way back to the room nearest the collapsed entrance, the old man in robes stepped out of one of the rooms they had already inspected and faced Alexander with a look of appraisal. Jataan stepped forward but Alexander stilled him with a hand on his shoulder.

  “Who are you?” Alexander asked. He could see the man with his eyes but his magical sight told him something very different. There was no aura of life or magic. To Alexander’s second sight, the man wasn’t even there.

  “Are you worthy?” the man asked, then shimmered out of existence.

  “I guess we’re going to find out,” Alexander muttered.

  When they returned to the others, Evelyn was awake and sitting up. Alexander appraised the weary looks on the faces around him and decided that his quest for knowledge about his calling could wait. Everyone was exhausted and they were in as safe a place as possible, given the situation.

  “Everybody get some rest,” Alexander said. “Place a vial of night-wisp dust in the hall outside the door and make sure that the person standing watch has one as well. The soldiers can’t get to us without making enough noise to wake the dead, so the revenant in the lower chambers is the real concern.

  “Also, keep an eye out for the illusions we’ve been seeing. Jataan and I just saw that man again in the hallway. I don’t know what he has to do with anything, but I do know he’s not really there. Don’t let him lure you away from the group.”

  Alexander slept fitfully, waking frequently with dark and menacing nightmares. He’d never suffered from terror in his dreams before. He was starting to dread the idea of sleep because he knew it would bring the fear. It was different than real, rational fear. This was the all-encompassing fear of a dream that offered no escape and no means of resistance.

  Just after his turn at watch sometime in the middle of the night, the lightning strikes stopped and the room fell quiet save for Lucky’s gentle snoring and the rhythmic breathing of everyone else.

  Alexander sat on a clear space on the floor and traced the outline of a magic circle around him in the dust. It took several minutes to quiet his mind. The numbing cold of the revenant bite was a constant distraction but he managed to overcome it with some effort. Once he found himself floating on the firmament, he focused on his task. The world rushed by in a blur and he found himself floating over the bed of Abel Ithilian. He was sleeping fitfully and his wife lay awake staring at the ceiling.

  Alexander drifted into Abel’s dreams and found him fighting a terrible monster that was about to devour his daughter. Alexander imposed his will on Abel’s dreams, dispelling the imaginary enemy and leaving the two of them sitting in Abel’s favorite study.

  Abel looked all around with sudden dismay and confusion. “What’s happening?” he asked.

  “Abel, it’s me, Alexander. I’m using my magic to communicate with you in your dreams. I’ve rescued Evelyn. The enemy is pursuing. Begin your attack into Grafton.”

  Abel woke with a start and Alexander found himself floating against the ceiling of his bedchamber.

  “Sofia,” Abel said excitedly, “Alexander has rescued Evelyn. I have to go speak with General Kishor.”

  Sofia hugged her husband fiercely and sobbed into his nightshirt for several moments before she gained some composure.

  “Make those bastards pay for what they’ve done to her,” she said through her tears.

  Alexander returned to the firmament and then to the room where he sat meditating quietly. Chloe sat on his knee watching over him nervously while Jack sat against a wall watching the door and listening for any hint of danger.

  He drifted out of the room and down to the level below. There was a long hall leading to three rooms, all equally dilapidated and abandoned. There were no signs of the revenant or the secrets that Alexander had come so far to find. He searched farther but realized that, even with his clairvoyance, he needed light to see some things. He knew there was probably another hidden door somewhere in one of the three rooms, but he would have to search for it with light to have any chance of finding it.

  He floated through the stone of the ruins above and into the night sky. The stars were shining and the angry clouds conjured by the wizard were gone. Alexander drifted out over the enemy encampment and saw a scene of battle unfolding that was at once terrible and satisfying.

  Two revenants flew over the soldiers below, periodically swooping down to snatch a victim from the feast arrayed before them, then carrying the screaming soldier into the night sky while feeding on his life force. With such a plentiful bounty to choose from, they didn’t bother to draw the life completely out of any given soldier, just the vitality of the moment. When they were finished, they dropped the soldier to his death, crashing into those below and spreading terror through the ranks.

  In the center of the encampment stood the wizard, casting lightning from his hands when the opportunity presented itself but missing most of the time. The single bolt of lightning that did strike home elicited a shriek of anger from the revenant but little more. Alexander knew from Malachi’s description of the monsters that they were difficult to kill, especially if they had fed recently. Judging by the number of broken bodies littering the camp, these two had fed well. It was clear that the soldiers would probably not be able to kill either of them.

  Alexander returned to his body and opened his eyes. Chloe looked up at him and smiled.

  “I’m glad you’re back, My Love,” she said in his mind. “It always worries me when you leave like that.”

  “I know, Little One, but it was necessary. I sent word to Abel to begin his attack and then I took a look at our enemies outside. The soldiers are not faring well against the revenants, which
poses a problem for me. The one that bit me needs to be killed before we leave this place and I was hoping the soldiers would do it for me. Hopefully, it’ll find its way back down here.”

  “What happens if it runs away?” Chloe asked silently.

  Alexander shrugged. “I’ll have to hunt it down. It’s the only way.”

  He lay on his bedroll and tried not to think about the night terrors as he drifted off to sleep. By morning he was not fully rested, but he was feeling slightly stronger for the few hours of sleep he’d gotten.

  They ate a cold breakfast and made ready to search the lower level of the ruined fortress. As they were hoisting their packs into place, they heard a noise coming from the direction of the collapsed entrance. Alexander went to the pile of rubble filling the hole in the ceiling where the staircase had once stood and closed his eyes. He reached out with his all around sight and stretched to see through the ceiling up to the level above but couldn’t reach far enough with his magical vision through all of the debris.

  “I can go see what is happening above, My Love,” Chloe said in his mind.

  Alexander was a little chagrinned that he hadn’t thought to enlist her aid in the first place.

  “Thank you, Little One,” he said with a sheepish smile.

  She spun into a ball of light and was gone.

  Alexander closed his eyes and linked his mind with hers as she floated up through the stone of the ceiling and the mound of rubble covering the entrance. As he looked through her eyes, it reminded him of how it felt to use his clairvoyance: a disembodied presence able to see but not be seen.

  She surfaced amid dozens of soldiers working feverously to clear the rocks and debris. It was just after dawn and the revenants were nowhere to be seen. The soldiers looked weary and exhausted from such a long night of defending against the onslaught from the sky. Their efforts to clear away the rubble were poorly directed and seemed more focused on finding some hint of where Alexander had gone rather than a deliberate effort to clear away the passage to the level below. Alexander breathed a sigh of relief. They still had time before the enemy poured into the underground chambers beneath the ruins. He meant to make good use of that time.

  They descended into the chambers below with deliberate caution. Alexander expected that the other revenants had returned underground, although he had no way of knowing if they’d found another lair to hole up in or if they had another way into the chambers beneath the ruins.

  It was cold and quiet but with the light of the night-wisp dust, they could easily see the tracks left by the revenants’ comings and goings. The two rooms to either side of the long corridor were empty and abandoned but the room at the end of the hall had a multitude of revenant tracks leading to and fro. Alexander took a few minutes to inspect the two side rooms but came away empty-handed. Both rooms were vacant of anything of use or interest, having been exposed to the ravages of time for so many centuries.

  The room at the end of the hall looked like it had once been a large study, though the furniture was nothing more than dust stains on the bare stone floor. There was a hearth on the far wall and evidence that once, long ago, the walls had been lined with bookshelves.

  The floor was marred by the clawed footsteps of the revenants all leading to a place on one wall and then to the right of the hearth. Alexander inspected the wall carefully but found nothing, even with his second sight.

  “I don’t understand,” he said with frustration. “It’s obvious they came through here and it looks pretty clear that they came to this place in the wall and then went through a hidden door over there.”

  “Why not just cut your way through?” Conner asked. “You had no trouble getting through the wall to Grafton Keep. This not-so-hidden door shouldn’t pose a problem for the Thinblade.”

  Alexander nodded. “The thought occurred to me, but we’ve got an army trying to find its way down here. The longer we can delay them the better our chances of escaping without a fight. If we can find a way to open the door, we can keep them looking that much longer.”

  “Perhaps a fresh pair of eyes might help,” Jack said.

  “Have at it,” Alexander said, stepping aside for the bard.

  Jack carefully inspected the wall, looking closely at each stone. He poked and prodded until he found a stone that moved ever so slightly when he pressed on it. Nodding, he held the stone down and carefully inspected all of the other stones near enough to reach. After several minutes of very systematic inspection, he found that another stone near his left foot pushed in just a slight bit as well. With both stones depressed, he began the process again, balancing on his right foot, until he found another stone that gave under pressure with a loud click. A section of wall next to the hearth swung inward, revealing a dark passage leading to a spiral staircase cut into the stone.

  “Nicely done, Jack,” Alexander said as he drew the Thinblade.

  “You aren’t seriously going to go down there, are you?” Evelyn asked.

  “We all are,” Alexander said. “The enemy is digging through the rubble looking for us. It’s only a matter of time before they find the passage and clear the entrance. I’m not leaving anyone behind and I need to see what’s down there—so we all go.”

  Evelyn started to say more but Conner put his hand on her shoulder and shook his head.

  Alexander looked to the rest of his companions and nodded his approval as, one by one, they indicated their readiness to proceed. Jataan led the way, followed by Alexander with his light held high. Anatoly brought up the rear and closed the door behind them. Slowly and cautiously, they made their way down the winding staircase as it corkscrewed through the stone of the mountain, taking them ever deeper. They stopped every twenty steps or so, listening for the revenant. It was obvious from the clawed footprints on the stairs that the unnatural beasts had passed this way frequently.

  They descended for nearly half an hour before they heard the scream of a revenant reverberate through the bedrock of the mountain. It sounded distant but still too near for comfort. Alexander reminded himself that he needed to kill the one that had bitten him or all would be lost. He steeled his resolve and nodded for Jataan to continue. The stair led down for another hundred feet or so. They were now deep within the mountain. The stone was cold and the air was still. Alexander idly wondered to himself what the ancient adept wizard who’d created this keep could have possibly wanted so deep within the stone of the mountain.

  Jataan signaled that there was something just around the next turn in the stairs, and they heard the scream of the revenant again. It was concentrated and focused by the stone of the staircase and sent a chill of terror coursing through Alexander. He froze in place for only a moment before the creature came around the corner. With one wing it shielded its eyes from Alexander’s light as it snatched Jataan and escaped back down the stairs. Alexander broke free of the paralyzing fear and darted down after the dark creature.

  Alexander held up his light to illuminate a circular room with a domed ceiling thirty feet across. There were three exits aside from the staircase. Jataan had broken through the paralyzing fear of the revenant’s scream and was struggling to free himself from its supernatural grip. He was on his back with the beast pinning him to the ground. He had one arm free and was stabbing the revenant repeatedly in the side of the chest, but with each new wound, the previous injury quickly healed over. The revenant was struggling to keep control over Jataan while shielding itself from the glare of the light.

  Alexander swept into the room and slashed at the beast in a diagonal arc, slicing one wing in half. The severed portion of membranous batlike wing fell over Jataan and covered his face, making it difficult for him to judge the aim of his knife as he repeatedly stabbed the revenant. The revenant shrieked in pain even as the severed edge of its wing began to heal over. In the face of the light and the sudden assault, the revenant started to release Jataan in preparation to retreat, but Alexander was faster. He brought his blade back up and across the creat
ure, slicing cleanly through its shoulder, across its body below the neck and out the top of its other shoulder. The revenant fell into pieces on top of Jataan who quickly thrust the remains of the creature off him.

  The battle mage gained his feet and drew his sword in one fluid motion searching for an enemy. Failing to find one, he composed himself, drew himself up to his full height of five and a half feet, and nodded his thanks to Alexander.

  A moment later Boaberous entered the room ready. He surveyed the scene and took a position watching the far door without even a grunt for the carnage that lay in the middle of the room. Everyone else entered on his heels.

  Anatoly gave Alexander a grim nod of approval and a clap on the shoulder as he went to stand guard at the nearest door while motioning for Conner to take the third and final exit to the little room.

  Conner headed for the door with a quip for his sister, “Told you they can be killed.”

  As if in answer, another revenant screamed from somewhere down one of the passages leading from the entry hall.

  “Are you injured, Commander P’Tal?” Lucky asked.

  “Not seriously,” he replied as Lucky handed him a towel to wipe the dark blood of the foul beast from his face and hands.

  “Take a minute and get cleaned up, Jataan,” Alexander said. “There’s no telling what their blood might do to you and I’d rather not find out.”

  Jataan frowned, then nodded as he unslung his pack and started changing clothes.

  “Why do you think the wizard who built this place went so deep underground?” Jack mused as he looked all around the entry hall for anything of note.

  “I don’t know but I don’t like it down here,” Evelyn said as she poked the dead revenant in the eye with her sword. “I do feel better knowing these things can die though.”

  “Unfortunately, I don’t think this is the one that bit me,” Alexander muttered.

  “How can you be sure?” Lucky asked.

  “I still feel the cold seeping into me from the bite,” Alexander said.

  “Well, there’s at least one more down here,” Anatoly said. “So either you’re right about there being another way in or there are a lot more of these things than we first suspected.”