The Frostwoven Crown (Book 4)

by Andrew Hunter

  As he began to pull up the front of his robe, a voice called out from inside the shadowy hole at his feet.

  "Don't even think it!" the brassy little fairy called out as he poked his head up through the sewer grate.

  "Shortgrass!" Garrett gasped, quickly smoothing the front of his robe and stepping back to let the fairy climb free of the grate.

  "Blessed be!" Shortgrass moaned, scraping a clot of gray muck from his shoulder and shuddering as he flicked it away, "Through the nine bowels o' Shaeol I crawled ta find ya!"

  "Are you all right?" Garrett asked.

  "Not'in' a few weeks in a hot bath won't cure," Shortgrass sighed, "but first things first... Merciful Maker, what's this?" The little fairy plucked some sort of wriggling insect from his hair and stared at it in horror a moment before tossing it away.

  "How did you find me?" Garrett asked.

  Shortgrass shook the grime from his wings and flew up to perch on the edge of the stone bench before answering. "Yer changelin' friend's been snakin' 'round tha place, tryin' ta lay her nose on ya. She tracked ya here, but couldn' creep past the guards ta reach ya. T'was then that yer other mates talked me into climbin' up tha nethers o' this place to sort out where they was holdin' ya."

  "Lady Ymowyn's inside the temple?" Garrett asked, "What if she gets caught?"

  "Nary a chance o' that," Shortgrass chuckled, "She's a tricky one, she is. She walked in, bold as brass, tha spittin' image of one o' them worm-women."

  Garrett sighed and shook his head. "She shouldn't be here," he said, "Neither should you."

  "Yer, welcome, yer majesty!" Shortgrass growled, "but, be that as it may, we're here, and we're gettin' ya out!"

  "I can't go!" Garrett said, "If you guys break me out of here, it'll look bad for Serepheni. I don't know what they'll do to her."

  Shortgrass stared at him incredulously. "I neither know nor care to know who Serepheni is," he said, "but we're gettin' ya out, and that's nae up fer debate!"

  "No!" Garrett said, "I have to see this through. The High Priestess will know that I'm not a spy. I just have to talk to her."

  The fairy grabbed his hair with both hands, his eyes bulging. "I just engaged a water bug the size of a housecat in mortal combat, not seven minutes ago! Me left eyeball is still burnin' from whatever it was I had ta swim through for the last three feet o' tha pipe! I don't even want ta know what it was!"

  "I'm sorry," Garrett said, "I appreciate you guys wanting to help, but I'd rather you didn't take the risk of getting caught here. You're just going to make things worse!"

  "Worse?" Shortgrass cried, "boy, they're goin' ta skin ya alive, you know that? I'm not exaggeratin' there. These people are actually goin' ta skin ya! Cut ya open like a melon an' scoop out all tha juicy bits. They do that sorta thing here ya know!"

  "They're not gonna skin me!" Garrett laughed.

  Shortgrass shook his head. "I don' know why I'm waistin' my breath on ya," he said, "I knew ye were a bit simple, but I suppose there's no point at all in tryin' ta shove any sense inside yer great ugly stone of a head."

  "I'll be fine," Garrett sighed, "Just do me a favor and try to get Ymowyn out of here before she gets caught, all right?"

  Shortgrass gave him a flat look and then answered. "Yes... of course," he said, speaking very slowly, as though he were addressing a rather slow-witted dog, "That is exactly what I am goin' ta do. You wait here, and don' worry about a thing."

  "I mean it!" Garrett insisted, "I don't want you guys trying to break me outta here. It could get my friend Serepheni in a lot of trouble!"

  "Of course!" Shortgrass said with a wide smile as he took wing again, "Just lay yer little head down and get some rest now. Ya look tired. We won't bother ya again."

  "I'm serious!" Garrett said.

  "Close yer eyes and dream o' cute little bunnies and dandelion fluff," he said, buzzing back down to the mouth of the sewer grate, "I'm sure it will all work out for tha best." Shortgrass gave Garrett a little wave and then disappeared back into the wet black hole.

  Garrett sighed.

  "An' mind ya give me a three minute head start before ya go waterin' tha daisies!" Shortgrass's voice echoed up from the sewer grate.

  Garrett considered pretending that he hadn't heard that last part. He was starting to wish that Mrs. Veranu had picked a different cage with which to test his abilities.

  An hour later, as Garrett lay stretched out on the stone bench, considering exactly what he was gong to tell the High Priestess when he saw her, he was startled from his thoughts by a low rumble coming from the corner.

  Garrett rolled off the bench with a muttered curse and hurried over to investigate the sounds coming from the drainpipe. He rubbed his hand over his eyes and gritted his teeth as he heard an all-too-familiar yelp of pain following a particularly loud crash.

  "Diggs," he sighed.

  "Shut up, you idiot!" hissed another familiar voice.

  "Warren!" Garrett groaned.

  A low hammering noise echoed up the pipe now.

  Garrett cast a fearful glance toward the door and then crouched down above the drainpipe and whispered as loudly as he dared. "Guys?"

  The hammering continued unabated.

  Garrett stood up, stamping his boot on the grate itself, hoping to draw the attention of the burrowing ghouls below.

  "Guys!" he cried out again, louder this time.

  Then his blood went cold as he heard another sound, a low grating noise, coming from the hallway outside.

  Garrett's eyed bulged as he rushed to the door, seeing a dim light flickering against the stone wall opposite the door in the hallway, a light that was growing brighter by the moment. He heard muffled voices and footsteps growing ever closer.

  Garrett put his hands on his head, trying to think of something fast. He rushed back to the sewer grate in the corner and kicked it a few more times, but the ghouls kept tunneling somewhere in the sewers below.

  Garrett groaned. The footsteps in the hallway were louder now. At any moment, whomever it was might hear the noise of the burrowers beneath. His eyes darted back and forth from the grate to the door, and then he had an idea.

  Garrett let out a loud, anguished moan, hoping to cover the sound of the would-be rescuers.

  "Why!" he cried, "Why am I persecuted so?"

  He turned toward the door as he heard the sound of a key scraping in the lock.

  Another crash sounded from the sewer grate.

  "Whoooo has come to torment me now!" Garrett howled, "My life is filled with woe and... and misery!"

  The swollen oak door wrenched open then to reveal a half dozen armored Templars eyeing him warily beyond the door.

  "Nooooo!" Garrett cried again, drowning out a muffled boom that just then sounded from the grate, "Why have you come, oh, men... of the temple?"

  The Templars shared a confused look before coming in. They held their cudgels at the ready, watching Garrett for any sign of resistance.

  "Uh..." Garrett floundered for something to say to cover up the rhythmic pinging racket that was steadily growing louder in the corner, "I swear my innocence! I can prove it in fact! Take me to the High Priestess, and I will throw myself on her mercy. Take me there at once... at once!"

  Garrett fell silent then at the mocking laugh of a familiar voice.

  "I would not waste her Holiness's time with your foul lies!" Matron Shelbie said as she entered the room, keeping safely behind her wall of Templars. She carried a small jade bottle cradled in her hands.

  Garrett stared back at her in wordless rage for a moment before the sound of crumbling masonry stung him to action again.

  "Waste her time?" Garrett said, forcing his voice up in affected indignation as he jabbed an accusing finger at the Matron, "It’s not me who’s wasting her time, but you... with your lies... not mine!"

  "Enough!" Matron Shelbie barked, "Be silent, or I will have you silenced!"

  Garrett held his tongue, grateful that, for the moment at least, the gh
ouls seemed to have paused in their labors.

  "I have come to tell you that sentence has already been passed against you," Matron Shelbie said, "You are to be executed tomorrow morning as a public spectacle... Your flesh will be torn from your body in front of the people of the city as an example of what happens to those who betray the Eternal Mother's trust!"

  "No," Garrett whispered, "That's not right." A cold, tingling sensation spread through his chest as he stared back at the gloating Matron in disbelief.

  "Matron Serepheni has been humiliated by these revelations, and..."

  "What revelations?" Garrett demanded, "I haven't done anything wrong!"

  "Oh," Matron Shelbie said, feigning a look of shock, "Haven't you?"

  "No!" Garrett cried.

  "Well, putting aside your ties with the Neshite cultists, one of whom has already named you as his accomplice, we have the testimony of a Templar captain and his men that you refused to follow orders in apprehending these same cultists... that you, in fact, were found to be carrying one of their unholy weapons when apprehended..."

  "Apprehended?" Garrett scoffed.

  "Putting aside all of that, all of that!" Shelbie shouted, "forgetting that any one of these crimes would be sufficient to condemn you to death, we still find your treason to be the least... the least of your crimes!"

  "What are you talking about?" Garrett said.

  "Did you really think that we wouldn't notice your calling card from your recent foray into our most holy sanctum?" she roared, "Did you think that we wouldn't find the small metal canister of poison with which you sought to profane the most sacred site in the world?"

  Garrett fell silent, remembering the essence flask that he must have lost during his escape from the worm pit.

  "Yes... you remember now, don't you?" Matron Shelbie laughed, "Damned you are by your own stupidity! You are damned, and now you will die for it!"

  "You're a monster..." Garrett rasped hoarsely.

  "You are the monster, you little freak!" Shelbie shouted, spittle flying from her lips, "You and your kind twist the laws of Death itself, perverting them to your sick pleasures. Did you think that the Eternal Mother would look the other way forever? Did you think that you would escape justice?"

  Garrett's eyes fell as he considered her words. Had she really won after all?

  "Yes, now you know you are doomed," she said, "Now you finally come to accept your just fate!" She paused a moment to relish the hollow look on Garrett's face before continuing. "And yet, even now, the Eternal Mother would offer you one final mercy..."

  Garrett narrowed his eyes as he looked at her again.

  "Your public execution," Matron Shelbie said, "while it would serve the purpose of instilling righteous fear in others who might otherwise consider following in your footsteps... It would be an embarrassment to the Church, in particular to young Matron Serepheni."

  Garrett stared at her without speaking.

  "She will be punished, of course," Shelbie sighed, "stripped of her status as a Matron and scourged clean of her iniquities, but she may yet be redeemed... if we can avoid the public spectacle of your execution and the inevitable cries for further retribution from the angry mob..."

  Garrett's eyes fell on the small green bottle in the Matron's hands as she lifted it before her.

  "On the other hand," Shelbie sighed, "You could do this one last service to her... and yourself. One drink from this bottle, and you will fall into an eternal sleep... a quick and painless end which will not only spare Serepheni the public shame of your discovered treason, but will spare you as well... from an agonizing and lingering death."

  "You want me to kill myself?" Garrett asked in disbelief.

  "You are fortunate indeed that we would offer you this final chance at solace!" she said, "I caution you not to turn down this last gift of leniency! Spurn it, and your final moments will be ones of unbearable pain and humiliation. You will die slowly, screaming for the very mercy that you rejected before... screaming in vain."

  "You sick monster..." Garrett said.

  "Drink it or you will live long enough to wish that you had!" Shelbie screamed, "It matters not to me! I assure you that I would very greatly enjoy watching you flayed... and seeing Serepheni publicly disgraced for her stupidity in trusting you!"

  Garrett stared at her, trying to understand what could drive a person to such depths of cruelty. He shook his head slowly. "No," he said, "I want to talk to Serepheni... I want to talk to the High Priestess."

  Several of the Templars shared worried glances, and Matron Shelbie's lips began to tremble with rage.

  "No, that's it, isn't it?" Garrett said, a slow smile spreading across his face, "You won't let me talk to the High Priestess, because you know she'll see the truth... You may have beaten that poor guy from Shadetree until he was ready to swear to anything you wanted him to say, but you know she would know it was a lie... Your whole case against me only works if I really am a spy, and you just figured out that I'm not who you're looking for after all."

  It was Shelbie's turn to stare back at him in cold silence.

  "I might get in trouble for what I did," Garrett laughed, "Serepheni might even be embarrassed by it, but that's not enough for you is it? It has to be treason, because you told everybody it was treason... If it turns out you were wrong, then you look like an idiot, and, if the High Priestess ever talks to me, she'll find out that I'm just a stupid necromancer who screwed up and went somewhere I wasn't supposed to. Maybe I'm a rotten Templar too, but that's not treason, and you know it."

  Shelbie glanced at her Templars as if to reassure herself of their presence.

  "The only way to make it work for you," Garrett said, "is if I'm dead, and it looks like I killed myself outta guilt or something... Then you can say whatever you want about me, and no one will ever find out the truth."

  He grinned at Shelbie and shook his head. "No, I don't think I'm thirsty after all," he chuckled.

  "Hold him," Matron Shelbie commanded.

  Garrett leapt back as four of the Templars moved forward, reaching for him. Two of the men hung back, sharing a worried glance with one another.

  "You know," Garrett sighed, "After yesterday, I didn't want to hurt anyone ever again... I'm not so sure about that now."

  One of the Templars lunged for him, grabbing at Garrett's arm, but he spun and drove an elbow into the man's temple. The impact of bone against the man's helmet sent a shockwave of pain through Garrett's arm, but the man staggered backward, dazed by the blow.

  The other three men charged, grappling with Garrett as he struggled to escape. Cold rage surged through his veins, and his roar of defiance escaped as an icy mist from his lips.

  "Demon!" Matron Shelbie cried, pointing at Garrett with horror, "Seize him!"

  The two Templars who had hung back nodded at one another and then sprang forward, one man hefting his copper-headed cudgel, the other drawing a slim dagger from his belt.

  The man holding Garrett's left arm suddenly released his hold. He cried out, clutching at his head where the cudgel-wielding Templar had just whacked him from behind. The man holding Garrett's right arm screamed a second later as the other Templar slipped the point of the slender dagger through the armhole of the man's cuirass, and pushed the blade into his chest.

  The man holding Garrett from behind cried out in horror then as the dagger-wielding Templar's face melted away to reveal the grinning fangs of a wild-eyed fox woman.

  The cudgel-wielding Templar hammered another two-handed blow down upon the crown of the stunned Templar's helmet, driving the helm down over the man's eyes as he cursed and fought to recover from the surprise attack.

  Garrett spun around, trying to shake free of the man choking him from behind, but he couldn't break loose.

  The man that Garrett had elbowed now joined battle with Lady Ymowyn. The fox woman dodged lithely clear of his swinging mace as her illusionary armor flickered and faded to reveal that she wore the stained and threadbare
work clothes that Warren had given her beneath the illusion. The bloody knife in her hand was no illusion however, and she scored a nasty cut across the man's cheek as he overextended himself in the strike.

  Garrett caught a glimpse of the look of utter confusion on Matron Shelbie's face just before she turned to flee from the room. She paused at the threshold and hurled the bottle of poison at Garrett's head. It shattered wetly against the Templar's back as Garrett spun again, still trying to throw the man before he could cut off Garrett's air supply.

  The Templar on Garrett's left tore the helmet from his bruised head and cast it aside with a seething curse. The cudgel-wielding Templar who had hit him from behind paled visibly and fell back, holding the weapon defensively before him with a look of fear in his eyes.

  Lady Ymowyn cried out as her opponent landed a solid hit on her left shoulder, staggering her. She brought her knife up as she pirouetted clear of a killing blow aimed at her head.

  Garrett hissed with rage as the big man on his back managed to close his elbow lock around Garrett's throat. The man squeezed hard, and it felt as if Garrett's head were going to burst from the inside as his vision swam with stars. The man screamed directly in Garrett's ear, a wordless howl of bestial rage that drowned out every other sound. Garrett could not hear the noise of shattering stone as the floor in the corner of the cell ruptured upward and a pack of slavering ghouls poured up from the earth below.

  A furry, brindle-colored paw casually broke the fingers of the man holding Garrett's throat, and air surged back into Garrett's lungs as he turned to see the Templar bounce off the ceiling as Scupp tossed him like an unwanted toy.

  Warren ripped the mace from the hand of the man attacking Ymowyn and proceeded to pound the Templar into the floor with it, raining blow after blow down onto the man, crumpling his polished armor like a battered old pie tin.

  Diggs and another ghoul grabbed the bareheaded Templar by the arms and used him like a battering ram against the far wall. Garrett felt a strange twinge of disappointment as he watched the carving of the devouring Worm Mother crack and crumble as they drove the man’s head into it. Garrett had gotten rather attached to the grim piece of art during his brief stay in the dungeon.