Corpse Cold (Immortal Treachery Book 3)

by Allan Batchelder

  “You’d have to dig. That was – what? – three thousand years ago?”

  “We could dig. The three of us,” Eoman proposed.

  Beesmarch held up a hand. “First things first. We’ve got some Svarren to kill.”

  “And before that, we’ve got to see these girls to safety.”

  “Humph! With Zillia? They’d be safer in a porcupine’s den!”

  Karrakan had a good laugh at that. “We’d best get moving, if we mean to go at all.”

  *****

  Arune, the Castle

  They would be expecting an escape attempt the first few times they visited her chambers, and so Arune did nothing. And she continued doing nothing every time they came by – with food, reading materials or anything else. She hoped to lull the Queen’s staff into complaisance, and then make her move when they’d forgotten how dangerous she was. Accordingly, she did her best to act hopeless and defeated whenever her door opened, and not only then, but also around any object that might be used for magical spying. She’d been given a mirror that made her especially suspicious, although it occurred to her that the Queen – Alheria – might also wish to torment Arune with her new goblin’s body. Whenever the Shaper looked into that mirror, she didn’t have to try hard to appear depressed.

  One evening, she heard the telltale signs of her door being unlocked. Arune moved close by, in the event an escape seemed possible. But as the door swung open, a massive wave of energy pushed her backwards, and Her Majesty stepped over the threshold and into the room.

  Arune stumbled over her goblin’s feet trying to compose herself.

  Her Majesty chose not to remark on the Shaper’s acrobatics. “You’ve been rather quiescent, haven’t you?” Without waiting for a response, the Queen continued. “I’d have expected something altogether different from Vykers’ former Shaper.”

  “That was a marriage of necessity,” Arune mumbled.

  “Ah, but whose necessity?”

  “It was mutual.”

  Alheria smiled. “And now?”

  “Clearly, the Reaper does not need me.”

  “But I do, as it happens.”

  Arune made a quick study of the still-open door and the corridor behind it: no guards. What was the Queen after?

  “I understand you served as a battle mage under that old miscreant, King Orstoth.”

  “Fourth battle mage, yes.”

  “That seems a touch low to me…” Her Majesty opined.

  “Well, I’ve learned a great deal since then. And, of course, I’ve been dead.”

  “Indeed.” Alheria looked about, as if she would sit down, but found nothing worth sitting upon. Disappointed, she went on, “Fourth or First, I would like to employ you within my own cadre of Shapers. I have temporarily lost one of my better magicians, and I need someone to fill that vacancy. I will promote one of the others into his place, but I’ll want you to take the last spot.”

  Arune could not believe her good fortune, which in itself gave her pause. “What are the terms of this employment?” she asked.

  Her Majesty looked at her with obvious amusement. “You do what I say, or I kill you.”

  Arune bobbed her head as if this was perfectly reasonable. But she’d had no cause to expect anything else. “As you say, Your Majesty.”

  “It is always and ever so, Shaper.”

  ~ TEN ~

  Mardine, In Gandy

  Mardine’s magically-induced remembering was traumatic for everyone. The moment she recalled Esmine’s abduction and her own apparent death, the giantess shook off the various enchantments laid upon her, leapt to her feet, and set about packing her things for imminent departure. Her many friends were shocked and devastated by this unexpected turn of events, and although they tried to convince Mardine to slow down, to think things through and at least wait until the morrow to leave, she’d have none of it.

  “My baby is out there somewhere!” she exclaimed in a near-sob. “Alone, in a frozen wilderness. I’ve got to find her!”

  Some of the other women were weeping, along with one or two of the men. Almost everyone was searching, frantically, for answers, a solution, anything that would calm their giant friend and delay her departure.

  “I’ll go with you, Mardine,” one of the farmers proclaimed. “At least for a day or two’s ride.”

  “Me, too!” someone else said.

  “And me. I’ll go along!”

  Before another hour had passed, Mardine and her humble escort were on their way out of the little village.

  “I’m sorry about the walls,” Mardine said to the man on her right.

  “Ah, we’ll manage,” said he. “It’s mostly done now, anyway.”

  “How will you find your girl?” the baker’s wife asked.

  “I don’t know. But find her I must.”

  It was already night time when they set out, and every last one of them suffered for the cold, despite their heavy coats and furry hats and thick gloves and boots. Mardine felt the cold, too, but worried more about its effect on Esmine than on herself.

  The group was still pushing forward, valiantly, when the sun came up. The blacksmith convinced Mardine to call a halt so he could start a fire and summon up a hot meal.

  “Can’t recall a winter like this is years,” he said.

  And it was true. The cold seemed a thing with a will of its own, an entity that loathed humans, giants and other such warm-bodied beings. It was as if it took offense at their presence in its domain and wanted to punish them all to death – not instantly, of course, but by degrees: cold, colder, oblivion.

  The fire pushed it back a ways, but could not subdue it forever.

  “I figure I can go another day with you, Mardine, but then I gotta head home. And I’m hopin’ I won’t have to make the trip alone,” said the man who first volunteered for the journey.

  Mardine smiled at him. “Of course,” said she. “We all have folks depending on us, don’t we?”

  Everyone allowed as that was so. Mardine could only hope it was still the case for her.

  Because they’d started out at such an unlikely time of day, they were all ready for sleep by mid-afternoon. Mardine wanted to keep moving, but couldn’t endanger her friends any further. Too, this might be her last day of company for some time. With mixed feelings, she helped them set up their meager shelters around the fire and watched as, one by one, they settled off to sleep.

  Tired as she was, the giantess was restless, tormented by the memories of mistakes she’d made, people she’d wronged, and, as ever, her wonderful husband and miraculous child. It was probably this restlessness that saved the rest of the group when the wolves attacked.

  First, Mardine thought she saw a glint of light in the distant underbrush. Looking more carefully, she noted another glint several feet to the left of the first. In time, she saw a number of flickers and knew them to be eyes. In her peripheral vision, she saw a shadow slink by on her right, some twenty paces out. Instinctively, she glanced in the other direction and, yes, saw two more shadows attempting to outflank the little camp. Wasting no time, Mardine yelled “We are beset!” and grabbed a brand from the fire as a weapon.

  Her companions awoke with shrieks and shouts of defiance, emerging from their shelters with hostile intent.

  Loud snarling and howls presaged the wolves’ attack, whilst also revealing them to be merely wolves. There were many worse possibilities. A large gray bounded from the bushes and launched himself at Mardine. Rather than brain him with the flaming log, she reached out with her left hand and caught the beast around the throat. A strange familiarity came over the whole scene then, as if Mardine had fought this very battle before. The wolf in her grip thrashed its hind legs in a bid to shake free of the giant’s grip, but Mardine was unyielding. She squeezed her hand as tightly as possible and gave the wolf and good shake. Before she could cast it away, another wolf went after her legs.

  All around her, Mardine could hear the sounds of combat – the snarling of
wolves and humans, the yelps of pain from either species. It was, Mardine knew, a fight to the death for one party or the other. Either the wolves would feast, or their prey would have new pelts with which to warm themselves. There would be no middle ground, no stale mate.

  Mardine dropped the dead wolf in her left hand and began bashing upon the other at her legs with her still-burning branch. The wolf’s fur was wet from melted snow, but his whiskers caught easily enough, eliciting a high-pitched yip of pain from the creature. Seeing the branch would never do sufficient damage, Mardine gave the wolf a tremendous kick, sending it backwards into the fire. Still, its fur would not ignite, though its paws, nose and ears suffered considerable damage. The pain-crazed beast rolled off the flames and limped rapidly away into the shadows. Mardine stole a glance about herself and saw that the baker’s wife was down, pinned by a large beast that held her face in its slavering jaws. It was too late for the woman, so the giantess looked elsewhere and found the blacksmith holding two more wolves at sword’s length. Mardine rushed up behind them, grabbed both by their tails, and jerked them as hard as she could towards the fire. One of the tails came off in her hand, with a woeful howl from its former owner. The other wolf turned and snapped at Mardine’s hands, only to be impaled from the front by the blacksmith.

  “Here!” the man said, thrusting the hilt of the sword in Mardine’s fist. “I’ve got another in my tent!”

  Mardine went berserk, hacking and slashing at the wolves until none that were still within the fire’s light survived, and those outside were mortally injured. The blacksmith came to the giant’s side and started pulling bits of wood from the fire, which he then tossed into the darkness, expanding the light’s reach ever so slightly. Mardine added more wood the fire to offset what had been thrown away and then turned her attention to her companions, praying to Alheria with every breath that they hadn’t lost anyone more than the baker’s wife.

  And they hadn’t, although one or two of the men had sustained injuries that could prove worrisome if they didn’t make it back to their village in the next day or two.

  “That’s it,” Mardine declared. “You folks need to go back home now. You’ll not take another step in my company, or lose another drop of blood on my behalf.” She started to cry then, and only the blacksmith could get her to stop.

  “You didn’t force us to come, Mardine,” the man said. “We came of our own choosin’. None of this here’s on you.”

  “Still,” the giantess answered, “I won’t lose another one of you.”

  “She’s right,” said one of the others. “But let’s get these pelts, first, and wrap Bidrea for proper burial.”

  “Wolves don’t normally attack people like that,” one of the women observed. “Why do you s’pose they did this time?”

  “I’ve heard rumors ‘o Svarren hereabouts,” the blacksmith replied. “Might be, they’re competin’ for the same food.”

  Svarren. Just the thought of them was almost enough to make Mardine turn around and head back with the others. But that might leave Esmine alone with the foul things. Better to die in the jaws of a wolf than whatever it was that Svarren did to their kills.

  It was several more hours’ labor skinning the wolves, bandaging the injured and repacking the gear. Daylight was still a long ways off, but the villagers, reenergized by fear, could not wait to begin their return journey home.

  “You’re sure she’s out there?” the blacksmith asked at parting.

  “I…need her to be out there.”

  If that answer was unexpected, the blacksmith showed no sign of it. With a farewell pat on Mardine’s arm, he gathered his friends and started heading back the way they’d come but a few hours earlier.

  Mardine watched them go until they were completely gone from sight. She couldn’t remember feeling more lonely, even when she’d first climbed out of the ground, nameless and lost. Loneliness was not putting her any closer to Esmine, however, so she pulled her own collection of pelts and blankets tighter about herself and took the first step in what she hoped would be a journey of rescue, reunion, and salvation.

  *****

  Long & Company, On the Trail

  The worrisome thing was that it had been days and the other lads were still drunk. Not falling down, soiling-themselves drunk, but noticeably impaired. Long was not, but he was too concerned about his friends to ponder this little discrepancy. After all, they had so many challenges still ahead of them, and it was doubtful they’d succeed in full possession of their faculties. But drunk? The captain couldn’t envision any scenario in which they found and rescued Esmine in their current conditions.

  To make matters worse, the boys were behaving like children! Spirk had wandered off into the dark to relieve himself and discovered, through some process Long dared not think on, that he could cause his prick to glow just as Long’s sword and Ron’s arrow had earlier. More, he could make his piss glow as well, in an array of festive colors. The sound of him hooting with laughter out of the fire’s reach sent chills up and down Long’s spine. It was as if he were a captive witness to his friends’ descent into madness. Naturally, Spirk’s giddiness attracted Ron, and even Yendor ambled over on his surprisingly functional legs.

  There was something about that liquor, sure. But Long could not allow his men to drink any more until their current intoxication wore off – assuming it did wear off. And what were they to do if they came under attack by brigands or Svarren or something even more sinister?

  With as much authority as he could muster, Long barked at his friends to return to the fire. They couldn’t walk a straight line between them, but somehow they made it back. The captain wanted to scold his men for their carelessness, but he’d drunk the liquor, too, hadn’t he? Were his men to blame that he was made of stouter stuff? Of course, that had never been the case with that devil’s elixir, Skent, but to each his poison.

  “Boys,” he began, “I don’t know why you’re all takin’ so long to sober up, but I need you to do it already! Mahnus knows what’s stalkin’ us in these woods, and that ain’t countin’ the task ahead of us.”

  In response to this plea, Yendor broke into song.

  A man’s got two eyes and two ears and two nostrils,

  Two nipples, two balls and one wick!

  If you heat the thing up it’ll spout such a flame,

  It’ll scorch the old huswife but quick!

  Predictably, Ron and Spirk cackled with laughter. Before Long could staunch the flow of nonsense, Ron, quiet old Ron, took his turn with a song.

  Dee ba dim champers

  Dee ba dim champers

  Dee ba dim champers

  All day long,

  First with the Mayor’s wife,

  Then with the rag witch

  Last with the draft horse

  Good and strong!

  “Foh!” Long exclaimed. “None o’ that, now!”

  No one was listening to the captain, though. When Spirk’s turn came, he was so excited that he bounced up and down on his log near the fire.

  Oh, Molly, my lady… “Naw, that ain’t it,” Spirk muttered. Oh lady, my Molly…”Not so, neither. Is it…” Oh my lady Molly? “Oh, dash it all! Perchance it ain’t Molly a ‘tall!”

  The young Shaper continued to wrangle with his memory of the elusive lyrics until everyone else had fallen asleep. And that meant that he had first watch. First watch was better’n second, but not quite so nice as third. Usually, Long shared stretches of all three watches, because, he said, it was he who’d dragged the boys off on this misadventure, and the least he could do was look out for ‘em.

  The one thing Spirk especially disliked about being alone was the burning. It seemed to become stronger at such times, and the Shaper had taken up grinding his teeth in response. Oh, Yendor had warned him not to, had promised that life without teeth was said to be awful. The thing of it was, the burning was approaching awful in its own right. The mysterious wine they’d found helped ease the discomfort, but there wa
s only so much of that left, and Long wouldn’t let Spirk touch it for the time being.

  Looking for some way to distract himself, Spirk let his mind wander out into the night, and, as he did so, he became aware of the creatures that shared it with him. Several hundred feet behind him, for instance, a raccoon sat in a tree, staring at the fire’s glow and wondering at it. Elsewhere, a fox hunted a chipmunk, deer nestled in a deadfall and, farther out, Svarren travelled a path perpendicular to that intended by the captain. Spirk agonized over whether he ought to wake his friend, but decided to wait until and unless the Svarren changed course and drew nearer. At the very edge of Spirk’s perceptions, something evil awakened at the Shaper’s touch and thrilled at the possibility of bloodshed. Spirk had no idea what was more evil than Svarren, and he had no desire to find out. He woke his captain.

  “Next watch, already?” Long mumbled.

  “I dunno. But there’s somethin’ out there.”

  “What?”

  “I dunno.”

  Long was beginning to feel he’d been woken for nothing. “Where?”

  “A few miles, maybe.”

  The captain was flabbergasted. “You can sense something miles away?”

  Spirk looked embarrassed. “I guess so,” he confessed.

  Long sat up, simultaneously irritated and excited. “How long has this been going on?”

  Spirk tossed a branch on the fire. “I dunno.”

  “Why do I feel like I’m playing a children’s guessing game? Is this far away thing a threat?”

  The Shaper shook his head up and down vigorously.

  “Now we’re getting somewhere. Is this thing moving towards us?”

  “No. Not yet.”

  Long reached for his sword, tested the edge. The little group didn’t have much left in the way of weapons, but they had a Shaper, however peculiar he might be. “I keep discoverin’ you’ve got skills that might prove useful, like that Shaper’s jump. And now, you tell me you can see for miles or some such.”

  Spirk said nothing.

  “What I want to know is, can you be lookin’ all the time?”