Dark Warrior Rising

by Ed Greenwood

  “Thank you, Clael,” Lord Maulstryke said gently.

  Clael gasped, astonished that his Lord even knew his name.

  “However,” Maulstryke added calmly, “this trail will be followed, and the bearer of the Orb at the end of it found. Or not one of you will leave this room alive.”

  [Orivon, you can trust me. And I’ll prove it.]

  Orivon stiffened. The whisper in his mind was Taerune’s. He turned his head, in time to see her open her eyes. She looked at him, not smiling, and then rose, tugging her boot off her blade and putting it on.

  Leaving their cloaks and the robe he’d stuffed her boot with lying tangled, she took his hand and started leading him silently through the sleeping Ravagers. They were heading toward the side cavern again.

  A spellrobe reeled, bright-eyed, and blurted out, “I—I’ve found it! Many magics, Orb-cloaked, but—yes!”

  Maulstryke was suddenly standing over him, and turning to calmly command one of the junior wizards: “Map.”

  The wizard nodded excitedly, waved a hand, and the floating spell construct drifted smoothly to a spot just above the desk of the spellrobe who’d made the trace.

  Smiling, he plunged both hands into the wraithlike sphere of caverns and winding tunnels. It flared red around his fingers as he and the junior wizard locked gazes, smiling, and the spellrobe felt for control over the map-spell.

  The floating map wavered, sank and drooped for a moment as if about to collapse, and then glowed more brightly as the spellrobe’s fingers started to trace new caverns and passages, drawing them with his forefingers and extending the map rapidly.

  The junior wizard started to sweat and tremble, and a spellrobe beside him took his shoulder and drew him down into an empty chair. The map steadied, growing new caverns and passages more rapidly—and then, suddenly, was done, the spellrobe withdrawing his hands and pointing at a large cavern that was still glowing.

  “There!”

  Maulstryke nodded curt thanks, and then turned to look at all the other spellrobes. “Do all you can,” he ordered, “to see if anything of my heir lives. His sentience trapped in a gem or a cage-worm, his brain kept alive by an enemy spellrobe hoping to learn all he knows; you know the possibilities.”

  The junior wizard grimaced, and then dared to ask, “And if … if he does not?”

  “We destroy everything and everyone in that cavern. Of course.”

  “Now what?” Daruse muttered to Lharlak, as they watched the Evendoom-she leading her human off into the side cavern, and rose to follow. “Don’t humans ever sleep?”

  Lharlak had only one eye to wink with, but he knew how to use it, and did so.

  A pale spellrobe ran hands that trembled with weariness over his face and said reluctantly, “Nothing, Lord. No trace at all.”

  Lord Maulstryke nodded, his face still expressionless. Again he looked around at all the spellrobes looking silently back at him, pointed at the glowing cavern in the floating map, and said softly, “You know what to do.”

  Across the chamber, spellrobes nodded, moved apart from each other to gain enough space, arranged their powders and vials, wriggled their fingers, drew deep breaths—and began their castings.

  The most junior wizards were already clustered around the spellrobe who’d traced the cavern, aiding him in expanding it to float high at one end of the room, where all the spellrobes now weaving death could see it, and concentrate their spells on it.

  “Maintaining the focus will consume much magic,” Clael stammered, fear in his eyes as he looked at Maulstryke questioningly—and extended his hand to one of the old spellblades that had belonged to a Maulstryke of Turnings long, long ago.

  Lord Maulstryke nodded, his eyes two holes of darkness, and the junior wizard shivered as he shakily smiled his thanks and turned hurriedly away, to put the sword delicately into the hands of the tracing spellrobe. Where it flared into a bright glow—and started to melt away, slowly but steadily.

  Lord Maulstryke stood as unmoving and watchful as a sunderbeak perching on a high ledge waiting for prey, as battle spells took shape and sizzled, thundered, and flashed past him, into the glowing image of the cavern, where they were swallowed.

  Great tumbling spiked boulders of wraithlike force, crackling nets of stabbing lightnings, hungry tongues of fire … spell after spell, the Maulstryke wizards shouting their incantations and waving their arms in wild flourishes, with no foes to hurry or menace them.

  Soon enough the flurry ceased, as wizard after wizard ran out of deadly spells, and slumped down in seats, or wandered wearily aside from those still hurling death.

  “Lord,” one said at last, lowering hands that still flamed, “we’re done.”

  Maulstryke nodded slowly, and turned to look a silent question at the spellrobe who’d made the trace. The spellblade in the wizard’s hands looked more like a long, thin dagger now.

  He lifted the still-diminishing sword as if to offer it to a spellrobe standing near. That wizard stepped forward, grasped it, and cast a careful spell with his other hand.

  The air in front of Lord Maulstryke grew a dark eye, floating at about the level of his chest. It grew as large as the Lord’s torso, blinked once, and then opened, showing everyone in the room a silent scene of chaos: a cavern strewn with fallen stalactites and sprawled bodies, where Nifl were running back and forth amid crackling lightnings and a few fading, fitful bursts of fire.

  “Ravagers,” one wizard offered.

  “Many still live,” another added grimly, as if the Lord had no eyes of his own.

  “Have my thanks. You are all dismissed, save Clael and Aumryth, who must remain here and maintain the trace. Touch no spellblades as you depart, upon pain of death.”

  The spellrobes blinked at him for a moment, and then turned and started for the doors.

  Leaving an astonished Clael standing before Maulstryke, and asking fearfully, “Lord?”

  Maulstryke drew his spellblade and put it hilt-first into the astonished wizard’s hand. Taking up Shoan’s spellblade from the table for himself, he said, “Come. We have a Hunt to go on.”

  “A Hunt? For whom?”

  “Traitors.”

  “Traitors?”

  “Anyone who crosses me, causes me loss, or hampers my plans is a traitor to Talonnorn,” Lord Maulstryke said softly. “Even if that anyone is my own flesh and blood, another Lord of a House, or Undying Olone Herself. You are quite right to fear me, Clael.”

  There was no warning.

  The air above the sleeping Ravagers suddenly glowed, every hair of those on watch stood on end, they opened their mouths to exclaim—and the air sprouted lightnings.

  Bright bolts washed over the cloaked sleepers, tumbling some of them and hurling others stiff-limbed into the air—in time for them to be caught in sudden spheres of bursting flame that spat streamers of fire in all directions.

  By then Ravagers were shouting and scrambling all over the cavern—but by then their own swords and daggers were rising up in deadly whirlwinds, the air was disgorging whorls of little disembodied fanged jaws that came into being in one moment and flew in all directions the next, snapping at still drowsy Ravagers, biting down hard, bone on bone.

  Fresh lightnings washed across the cavern, Ravagers death-dancing in their wake, and then the air was full of shadowy drifting shapes that swooped menacingly at Ravagers, plunged into disbelieving Nifl faces—and melted them away to bare bone, screams fading swiftly.

  Some Ravagers were up and running, hacking desperately at the snapping jaws pursuing them.

  Old Bloodblade came awake in his cleft in the rocks at one end of the cavern, tried to shake awake a Ravager who knew some sorcery, cursed when he found that Nifl now had no face left, and scrambled hastily along the cavern wall to another Ravager, who’d trained as a spellrobe once, before a miscast spell slew his patron’s favored son and forced his flight out into the Wild Dark.

  That Ravager was already awake but cowering. Bloodblade roar
ed into his face, shook him like a helpless child—and then thrust a sphere of ordauth into his hands.

  It was Bloodblade’s greatest treasure, and the spellrobe gaped at it for all the time it took one lightning bolt to stab across the cavern at him—and blast the magical thing he held into full arousal.

  And from it a ward rose like a black and sighing wall, all around the cavern, rising into a great dome overhead that sealed the Ravagers off from the rest of the Wild Dark.

  It did nothing at all to the fire, lightning, life-sucking wraith-things, whirling blades, and hungry jaws still raging around inside it.

  The black wall brought utter silence as it entombed them; the snapping lightnings, bursts of flame, and shouts and screams were all suddenly—gone.

  Taerune and Orivon blinked at each other, and then rolled over. The outcast Evendoom rose a little unsteadily from where she’d been lying flat on her face on cold stone and called, “Daruse! Lharlak! I know you’re hiding behind your usual rocks, to listen in on all we do. Well, what we do is going to be nothing until we know what happened back there.”

  She turned and waved back at where the main cavern full of sleeping Ravagers had been, and a solid, smooth black wall that looked like ordauth was now. “So, what happened back there?”

  Daruse and Lharlak rose into view rather sheepishly, drawn swords in their hands, and shrugged.

  “Sudden tumult,” Lharlak offered, “and then—a full ward, just like that.”

  “Something bad,” said Daruse. “That looked like a family of wizards attacking. Never seen the like.”

  Orivon got up. “So what do we do now?” he asked, trying not to sound as angry as he felt.

  “You’re asking us?”

  Taerune shrugged. “We hope to learn things even from clever Niflghar.”

  That made the two Ravagers grin. They came a little closer, their swords still ready in their hands.

  “Suppose,” Daruse suggested, “you tell us what you so purposefully—and stealthily—came into this cavern to do. You who were so yawningly tired such a short time ago.”

  Taerune put the only hand she had left on one hip, and the flange of her new hand-blade on the other, and regarded them, lips narrowing. “I’d prefer that this have remained a private matter between Orivon Firefist and Taerune Evendoom, but perhaps it’s better that there be witnesses, at that, to tell Orivon that this is no ruse on my part.”

  Daruse inclined his head like a priestess saluting a crone. “Here we are: witnesses, two by number. What’s no ruse?”

  “An oath-swearing, before the Goddess, of my loyalty. So he’ll trust me.”

  Orivon looked at Taerune, and then at the two Ravagers. “What is this oath?”

  “A blood pact that binds Niflghar upon their honor, before the Goddess,” Lharlak replied. “Among Nifl, it’s believed that breaking such a promise angers Holy Olone, who soon strikes down dead the offending Nifl, or twists them forever into beast shape, Nifl no longer.”

  Orivon looked at Taerune. “This matters to you?”

  “Very much. If it will make you believe you can trust me.”

  “Then let’s do it.”

  It had been some time since the High Ledge had heard boasting and triumphant laughter; the surviving Hunt were scared young Nifl terrified of the next orders they might receive, that could send them out into the Wild Dark to their deaths.

  Wherefore they were sitting glumly, trading quiet gossip about the tumult they could see unfolding in the streets below, and hoping it would mean no summons to do anything before their shift ended, when a sudden spell-glow blossomed on the empty ledge in front of them, and out of it stepped two unfamiliar Nifl.

  The Hunt members rose, frowning, their hands going to their swords. Unfamiliar the two arrivals might be, but they bore glowing spellblades in their hands, and the Three Black Tears of Maulstryke on the breasts of their splendid robes. The tall one had the manner of one used to being obeyed.

  “You will take us,” this tall Nifl commanded, “to a certain cavern out in the Dark, that my companion here will direct you to.”

  The leader of that shift of the Hunt did not trouble to keep the sneer on his face out of his voice. “No Maulstryke will ever order the Hunt what to do and what not to do!”

  The air flickered, and a third figure was suddenly standing beside the other two, also holding a spellblade. This arrival was disheveled, but had a face every Hunt rider knew.

  “That’s why the order to take Lord Maulstryke out to this cavern he seeks is coming from me,” he said calmly. “And I’ll be accompanying him and his pet spellrobe. I’m missing some heirs, too.”

  The Hunt found themselves gaping at Lord Erlingar Evendoom.

  “Before Olone I swear this,” Taerune whispered, as softly as a kiss, and bent her lips to the blood filling Orivon’s palm.

  “You do the same, with hers,” Daruse muttered, from beside him.

  “Before Olone,” he said roughly, “I swear this.” And he kissed the blood in her palm. It was sweeter than he’d expected, with none of the iron tang of his own.

  Taerune smiled at him. “’Tis done,” she said lightly, “but your blood must not be wasted.” And she bent her head and lapped it.

  Orivon shuddered. I feel … aroused.

  [Of course.] Taerune’s whisper was warm in his mind. [It always feels thus. Drink mine in health, and welcome.]

  Orivon growled as he bent over her hand to do so, and Daruse and Lharlak both chuckled.

  “You know,” Lharlak remarked, “it really was terribly interesting over behind yon rocks. Did you not find it so, friend Daruse?”

  “Now that you mention it, I did. Let us return thither for a time, and leave these two misfits from Talonnorn to their own devices. I’m sure they’ll find something to do, while we all wait for Bloodblade to turn his little toy off again.”

  The din was deafening.

  Nifl shouting, snarling insults, screaming in agony, and slamming every sword, dagger, pot, tool, or stool they could find into each other and everything that stood in the way of lashing out at every other Nifl who stood near. The streets of Talonnorn were choked with Talonar hacking at everyone—crones, priestesses, and each other.

  “Die, motherless Olone-kisser!” a drover snarled, towering up suddenly over her with a snout-goad in his hand. He swung it viciously, splintering the door frame Naersarra Dounlar ducked back through, and roaring with rage as he shouldered through that opening and swung again.

  Naersarra had found herself in a kitchen, its floor littered with broken crockery and slick with fresh blood. The first things that came to hand were the jagged shards of a huge, shattered bowl, so she snatched them up and flung them in the drover’s face.

  The second thing was a cleaver, and she flung it into his throat while he was still cursing, half-blinded by the shards.

  He gurgled and started to die, kicking at the air as he went down. Naersarra clung to a pillar and sobbed for breath. A sudden roar of jubilation rose outside, and she heard raw-voiced rampants nearby take it up, laughing as they called, “Hear that? They got Oszrim! Hacked apart, Lord high and bloody Lorloungart Oszrim! Dead as dung! Ha-ha!”

  There was a splintering crash in another room, a scream, and then a panting crone reeled into the room, disheveled and bloody, and Naersarra found herself staring at Baerone Maulstryke.

  “Don’t—” Baerone gasped fearfully, fighting for breath. “Don’t kill me!”

  “Won’t,” Naersarra assured her, just as breathlessly. “This has—the city’s gone oriad! All this … must be stopped!”

  Baerone stared at her, nodding, and then seemed to crumple. “They’ll butcher every last one of us!” she sobbed. “They care not who they slay! I’ve even seen armed gorkul in the streets, hacking and hewing! We must stop this!”

  “Agreed! But how?”

  “Maharla’s champion?” Baerone asked bitterly. “The Dark Warrior, striding the streets?”

  “And where
is he? Or his army?”

  “He’s a fiction, and no more than that!” Baerone stormed, her eyes wild. “And Maharla Evendoom is to blame for all this! She moved the Lords from shaking their heads at the oriad Consecrated, a-slaying each other inside their temple, to being afraid they’d lead an uprising, and had to be butchered!”

  “And they were right, weren’t they? This is an uprising! I’m just afraid that the Lords will gather their wizards around them, and hurl death at us all, using spells to heap the Araed with our bodies!”

  “And destroy Talonnorn? Just what do they think they’ll have left to rule?”

  “That’s just it, Baerone: they’re Lords. They don’t think.”

  “I don’t like the look of that,” the Hunt rider muttered, as the darkwings beneath them squalled and tried to flap away. He fought it down to a claw-skittering landing in front of the smooth black barrier. “Stinks of magic.”

  Lord Maulstryke looked at Clael, saw his miserable nod, and said crisply, “This is the place. Set us all down.”

  The Hunt rider nodded curtly, and waved his hands to signal the other riders. Then he waved at the barrier. “What is it?”

  “Magic, of course,” Maulstryke said flatly, and looked at Clael again. “Any of our doing?”

  The spellrobe, who was white to the lips and busy licking his lips and peering at the dark caverns all around, shook his head. “N-no. This is beyond anything we can do.”

  “Are you saying you have no spell to shatter it?”

  “Yes,” Clael whispered reluctantly. “That’s what I’m saying. This is old Nifl magic, beyond what anyone of Talonnorn can do now.”

  “Then we’ll wait.” Maulstryke turned back to the Hunt rider. “Return to the High Ledge, and await our call.”

  The Nifl lifted a cold eyebrow, and pointedly turned to Lord Evendoom, who nodded and said calmly, “Be guided by Lord Maulstryke’s suggestion as if it was an order from me.”