by Tara Janzen
“Llynya!” he cried out, her name the one talisman to which he clung.
And she was there, holding him to the ice against the force of the thread, holding the sword with him, a black hellhound at her side. Her hair was flying out in all directions, braids and knots and twists, her leaves trembling in the draft of the funnel cloud’s wake. Her face was streaked with icy patches of white, but her eyes were green. Green and fierce.
She lifted her voice into the wind, shouting in an elfin tongue, and the black flame wavered above them. The light from the tomb became a piercing disk of brightness, forcing the darkness higher.
With a mortal groan, the smoke wound itself tighter and tighter, dragging its loose thread back into itself, until ’twas naught but a frenzied, twisted cord, humming with its own furious power. In an instant the cord unraveled, each strand flying off to disappear in the cavern.
The white light ebbed, and Mychael fell to the ice. Llynya removed her hand from the sword grip and caressed his face. He thought he heard her sob. He felt so strange. The hound moved in close to nuzzle him where he lay.
“Elixir,” he murmured, raising his hand to the dog’s sleek coat. Lavrans had told him of the hound, how it had fought hard and to victory in the Battle of Balor and had helped save Ceridwen’s life—much as he had saved Llynya’s from the Dangoes bones.
“He is called Conladrian by the Quicken-tree,” she told him, her voice a strained whisper.
“And Numa?” he asked, looking to the tomb. The white bitch had been Ceridwen’s boon companion when she had stayed in the Hart Tower with Lavrans before coming to Balor as Caradoc’s bride. The hound had died in the final moments of the battle, holding the enemy at bay on the sands of Mor Sarff.
“She is Rhayne,” Llynya said. “I—I didn’t know he’d brought her here.”
“When I heard the howling, I thought ’twas death itself, and the growling... ” His voice trailed off. It had been such a vicious sound. He’d thought Llynya had met her end in some cavern beast’s jaws.
“Death was here,” she said simply, and another sob broke free.
Aye, death had been there.
The river of blood he’d so long feared was as naught compared to the dark night he’d seen. The skraelings would die, hundreds by his sword alone, dull as it was, too dull to cut a dark thread, yet sharp enough to cut down skraelings. Their blood would run like a river. The Dockalfar would die, the Sha-shakrieg... and the Quicken-tree, he thought with a pang of despair. The Red-leaf and Wydden, the Daur and Ebiurrane, the Kings Wood elves—any and all who answered Rhuddlan’s summons would die. Men, too, would die in droves, overrun with plague and pestilence. Every creature of the forest and the water would die in the darkness. And when naught else walked upon the land or swam in any ocean, the trees would die and with them every last green living thing.
This was what he’d seen in the heart of the darkness, a void that ate life down to the last spark of light.
He would fight. ’Twas what he’d been born to do. And the dragons would come, Ddrei Goch and Ddrei Glas, for ’twas what they’d been born to do as well—to fight the darkness. But would they come to him? He had not the blade to rule them, only a weak edge that could not cut through a tendril of smoke.
They had been conjured for this one deed, the three of them. Blood of their blood, he needed them as he’d always known he did, for without them his fate was sealed. He would die.
He was so cold. He hadn’t realized it afore, but he ached with the cold. The way was clear before them now, the smoke gone and the ice free of bones. They should be leaving the Dangoes.
He struggled to his feet with Llynya helping him and Elixir pacing back and forth at his side.
“Will he come with us, do you think?” he asked.
“Nay.” Llynya shook her head and wiped the back of her hand across her cheek. “ ’Tis a vigil he keeps for his sister.” She was crying.
He wanted to touch her, to comfort her, but felt strangely removed from his surroundings. He bent down to pick up his sword and halted with his fingers outstretched. His hand was deathly pale, his skin tinged blue. The hair falling over his shoulders was frost white. Even his weir stripe had been transformed, dulled to a rusting iron gray.
’Twas a destiny he had not foreseen, that he would be so changed, and it gave him a moment’s pause to see his flesh limned in shades of icy death. But the moment passed, for in truth it did not matter. He had been born to fight, a dread warrior conceived not in his mother’s womb, but in an ancient past. All else was as naught.
Except Llynya.
She was a loss he would mourn.
He turned to her, understanding now her tears, but having nothing to offer—for certes not his ice-riven hand.
“Come,” he said. “Battle awaits.” ’Twas the only thing he knew.
Elixir led them up out of the Dangoes and took them to where a rough path began its switchbacks up to the causeway. The hound whimpered and yapped while Llynya knelt by his side to say good-bye. He licked her face, and she sang some elfin song into his car. When the song was finished, the hound turned and descended back into the cave.
The climb was steep and grueling, but the temperature around them gradually rose. At the top, they were finally free of the ice. Pools of seawater marked the track, and beyond the track, they could see ships, elfin ships. Their silver hulls rode the black waves of Mor Sarff. Their sails were full with the wind, marked with runes proclaiming them of the Daur-clan. Their decks were aglow with dreamstone light, the daggers of three ships’ crews held brightly to light the way across the subterranean Serpent Sea.
Llynya was cheered to see the small fleet and used Ara to signal them. Hundreds of blades were lifted in return and a chant taken up by the sailors. When the words reached them, Mychael saw her face pale.
“What are they saying?” The words were in a language he didn’t know, though its rhythms were purely elfin.
“They are Daur,” she said, giving him a brief, tearstained glance before returning her gaze to the sea, “And they are calling for a Dragonlord. They are calling for you.”
~ ~ ~
Caerlon marched his army south from the Kasr-al Loop and caught sight of three Daur ships sailing away from the Dangoes and rounding the southern point of the deep dark.
They were on the run, and none too soon, he thought with grim satisfaction.
If they’d thought to attack him from the shores of Mor Sarff, they were too late. He’d barely made it the last stretch off the Loop himself. Any skraeling who dawdled wouldn’t make it at all. The wretched smoke was seeping into every cave and tunnel. His last reports out of Deseillign had the whole desert basin filled with the stuff. Not only was it pouring out of Kryscaven Crater through the southern Rift at a much faster rate than he had planned, it was also finding its way over the northern Rift and back-washing into Rastaban.
The boy would be lost, and Ailfinn.
Any plan he’d had to return had to be abandoned. There was time now only for winning the Weir Gate—and damn little time for that.
He turned, and with a lift of his hand signaled the skraelings to begin launching the ships, save for Slott’s barge. The Troll King would bring up the rear.
“Grazch!” The Dockalfar started the skraelpacks down to the sea, each pack rolling its own ship.
A wisp of smoke wafted by him, making for the open water. ’Twas rotting stuff, the herald of Dharkkum. Thick as it had become, the fell darkness could not be far behind.
He stepped forward with his whip and lashed the nearest skraelings, exhorting them to greater speed. Before the coming battle was over, the gates would be the only safe place left on Earth.
Chapter 25
Rastaban was deserted. A fouler place Rhuddlan had never seen nor smelled since the last time he’d been there, and it was growing ever fouler with the invading wisps and scent of Dharkkum’s dread smoke. His scouts had reported a large movement of skraelpacks to the south, but a few str
agglers had been captured by the Liosalfar. A few more had been caught deserting from the main force. Loyalty was not a skraeling attribute.
Nor did they talk much. Grammar being a gift from the gods, ’twas not surprising the godless skraelings could barely speak. Wei knew their ways well enough though, and with Owain’s ax hanging over the beastly men’s heads, the two had gleaned as much information out of the skraelings as could be gotten.
Ships, the beasts had said. The packs had rolled a fleet’s worth of halvskips through the tunnels to Mor Sarff, anticipating a great battle.
Caerlon, they’d also said, the name coming up again and again, revealing Rhuddlan’s foe and the cause of so much calamity. Tuan’s court-mage, the twisted fool who had killed his king’s people, had apparently not partaken of the draught himself. Clever Caerlon.
Yet not so clever and far worse than foolish to have used his skills to break the Prydion enchantment on the crystal seals. What did he hope to gain by unleashing such destruction on the earth? Rhuddlan wondered.
As to the nature of the spells he’d used, Rhuddlan had only one guess—the Elhion Bhaas Le. With the Indigo Book of Elfin Lore and five hundred years to study it, even a half-taught mage like Caerlon could have set a blight on Riverwood and conjured another army’s worth of skraelings and—conceivably—cracked the damson shafts holding the earth against Dharkkum and destroyed the enchantments binding the Troll King in stone.
Aye, but mayhaps the fool’s cleverest deed had been keeping the Indigo Book hidden from Ailfinn for five centuries.
She had been there. Rhuddlan could see signs of her in the Eye of the Dragon, the Troll King’s court. Stone did not speak to him as it had to Tuan, but the mage’s presence and her power had left marks on the rock. Caerlon would not have taken her without a battle, and the walls and pillars in the Eye were flashed with fire scars underscored with a brilliant vermilion luminescence, Ailfinn’s signature blend of metallic vapors.
He turned to Wei. “Do they know of any prisoners?”
“They had one,” Wei said, his voice tight. “Shay. But they say he died on the trek to Rastaban. He shouldn’t have died, Rhuddlan. The boy was not sorely wounded when the skraelpack cut him off from the rest of us. They say their captain delivered the body to Caerlon.”
Despite the grievous note of the tidings, Rhuddlan felt a flicker of hope. He remembered Caerlon’s habits, and from the look in Wei’s eye, so did the elf-man; and any who remembered Slott’s penchant for tylwyth teg would know the only way to get an elfin boy by the Troll King would be as carnage, real or faked.
“If he lives, time can heal the other,” he told Wei. The Liosalfar nodded in agreement, though anger hardened his gaze.
“And Ailfinn?” Rhuddlan asked.
“They’ve seen no one else, but many of them were called to Rastaban barely a month past. Some have only been here a fortnight.”
Rhuddlan stepped to the nearest pillar, a granite column a full twelve feet around incised with serpentine scales. He laid his hand on the long fire scar flashed up its length. ’Twas as cold as the stone it marked. Ailfinn’s fire was powerful magica, burning two days at full strength before beginning to wane, the heat of it lasting much longer. That the vermilion-edged soot retained no detectable warmth meant at least a month had passed since she’d been in the Eye, and mayhaps much longer—too much longer.
“The dungeons?” he asked.
“We’ve found naught in ’em so far, but there’s three levels, and the Liosalfar are still searching.” ’Twas Owain speaking.
“Four levels,” a voice said from behind Wei, and Varga stepped forward out of the pillar’s shadow. “ ’Twas rumored during the Wars that Rastaban possessed an oubliette, a ‘forgotten place’ carved out of its darkest depths. If it exists, it would lie on a level separate from the other cells.”
“Did the rumors say where these dark depths were? Or tell of a path?” Rhuddlan asked. Varga had come with them willingly, knowing he couldn’t be left in Carn Merioneth except under heavy guard. For himself, Rhuddlan had seen him fight, and the Sha-shakrieg was welcome as an extra sword.
“Only that ’twas a well-hidden cold box and that none had ever escaped it or come out of it alive. The Sha-shakrieg feared it almost as much as they feared Rhuddlan of the Quicken-tree.”
A cold box, Rhuddlan thought with disgust, ignoring Varga’s wryly delivered praise. Given the nature of a troll’s appetite, ’twas not surprising no tylwyth teg had ever ascended in one piece. That Slott and his brood might have eaten their allies with the same gusto as their enemies was oddly unsurprising.
He looked to the ceiling of the Eye. Smoke was collecting in its corners, thickening even as they stood there. Soon ’twould taint all the air in Rastaban, the hall and the tunnels alike, and begin taking its toll on his soldiers.
He shifted his gaze to the pillar and the flash-mark traced ’round with vermilion. Ailfinn had been there, and might yet be in Rastaban. No matter how faint the possibility, it took the decision out of his hands. He could not leave the Troll King’s demesne while there was a chance the Prydion Mage was locked somewhere in its depths. For certes Wei was not leaving without overturning a few boulders in search of Shay.
He checked the smoke again and estimated ’twould be half a day before they would have to retreat. Yet he dared not hold his army that long with Caerlon sailing down the Serpent Sea toward the Weir Gate.
“Treilo,” he called to the Lord of the Wydden, and gestured for the others to leave him.
A man clad all in gray broke from the ranks and gave Varga a long look. Tall and lean like a Quicken-tree, the man had blond hair with a distinct reddish cast. He’d been in the Wars and still showed the brand of the bia-steeped thread that had caught him across the face.
“You’ll take the troops to the gates of time,” Rhuddlan said when Treilo reached his side. “Two forced marches through Riverwood will see you there. Tell Llyr of the ships and Caerlon. If the Dockalfar and skraelings are not already at his throat, they soon will be. When you reach Riverwood, send a runner to Carn Merioneth. Of the three clan-troops left to guard the keep, have two descend. If we can’t hold the Weir Gate, we’ll not hold Merioneth.”
The Wydden lord nodded his assent. “And you, lord?”
“Wei, Owain, the Sha-shakrieg, and I will search for the oubliette.” Although his word was law, Varga was safer with him than with a troop of tylwyth teg, many of whom had served in the Wars.
Treilo gave the smoke on the ceiling a brief assessing glance and returned his gaze to Rhuddlan. “Be sure and watch your back.”
“And you yours. There may yet be skraelpacks in the tunnels or awaiting you in Riverwood.”
“Aye,” Treilo acknowledged, hesitating a moment before continuing. “I fought by your side in the Wars, Rhuddlan, but we’ve neither one of us dealt with this.”
“ ’Tis why we need Ailfinn, and why I’m staying to find her.”
“We need more than Ailfinn,” the other man said succinctly. A faintly purple line ran through the eyebrow he lifted in question. The bia scar ran onto his eyelid and continued diagonally across his nose and cheek to his jaw. In the other direction it crossed his forehead before disappearing into a sleek fall of reddish blond hair.
Rhuddlan met his eyes, unwavering. “Have Naas light her fire. If the Druid boy doesn’t come out of the ice, I will call Ddrei Goch and Ddrei Glas.”
The Wydden was still unsatisfied. “It’s been more than fifteen years since the dragons have broken the waves of Mor Sarff, Rhuddlan, and this is war, not the normal cycle of the dragons’ lives.”
“Aye,” Rhuddlan said, sharpening his gaze. “Out with it then.”
“You are a dragon keeper, lord, but will they fight for you? This is what the other elfin lords ask. And what of the Magia Blade?”
Rhuddlan knew what the lords asked. He’d asked himself the same questions a hundred times since he’d returned from the Dangoes to Merioneth and found Mychael
gone. He’d yet to come up with an answer to the first. No one had fought with the dragons since Stept Agah. The way of it had been lost to time. Ailfinn would know, if she could be found, for the dragons were of the Prydions’ making, or mayhaps Naas had seen a way somewhere in the past of bending them to his will, but that was no assurance that he would succeed.
As to the Blade, there would be no druaight sword for him or any other warrior to wield. The truth of that had awaited him in Rastaban.
“I fear Deseillign is falling,” he said to Treilo. “The smoke is coming in strongest from the passages opening onto the Rift. The desert must be choking in it, and with the desert lost, so are the forges of the Sha-shakrieg. There will be no Edge of Sorrow for us to put to a dreamstone hilt.”
The Wydden lord agreed with a curt nod, revealing that he, too, had drawn the same conclusion, but he would have an answer to his other question. “And the dragons?”
“They were ever beasts of war,” Rhuddlan conceded, “and with Dharkkum arising, they’ll have the bit between their teeth. If Mychael ab Arawn hasn’t survived the Dangoes, and if I can’t bring them to heel—and if we defeat Dharkkum”—his mouth curved in a chiding grin—“then you’ll have years of glory ahead of you, fighting dragons.” He reached out and rested his hand on the Wydden lord’s shoulder. “Safeguard the Weir Gate, Treilo. ’Tis the crux. We’ll be no more than a half day behind you.”
Treilo held his gaze but a moment before making his obeisance, and he held the bow he made before his lord a moment longer than he’d held Rhuddlan’s gaze—a wise decision.
Without waiting for Treilo to begin his march, or even to rise from his bow, Rhuddlan signaled for Wei, Owain, and Varga to follow him up the giant’s staircase on the east side of the great hall.
Caerlon’s solar had been gone through and naught of great interest had been found, except for a pile of worn and dirty clothes. Wei took one sniff of the rags and declared the owner.