City Under the Sand: A Dark Sun Novel (Dungeons & Dragons: Dark Sun)

by Jeff Mariotte

  But one of the raiders was standing back from the others, partially obscured by a wagon parked in the road. He was, Aric realized, performing a spell. As that raider finished a series of wild gestures, Ceadrin tossed a small bundle of sticks toward the defenders. The sticks landed on the ground and the bundle broke apart.

  The scattered sticks transformed into vipers, writhing toward the villagers, venom dripping from long, sharp fangs. Two of the villagers were bit right away. Hotak swung his sword into a serpent, cutting it in half, but the two halves each grew longer, the back half sporting a new, snapping head.

  “This is magic most foul!” he cried.

  The villagers defended themselves against the snakes, no longer paying the raiders any mind.

  Hotak was right, foul magic indeed was at work. The handful of trees and the small patches of grass decorating the square were already drying out, turning black. Dying.

  Mazzax bludgeoned one of the vipers with his maul. This one didn’t come back to life or split into two. But while he was doing so, another one reached him, slithering up his stubby leg. He saw it and screamed. If he used the maul on it, he would cripple himself.

  Aric rushed to the dwarf’s side. His iron rod had no point, but many magical creatures, he’d heard, disliked iron. He thrust an end between the snake and Mazzax’s leg, scooped the snake off him, and then ran forward and hurled the serpent back at the raiders. It landed at one’s foot, sinking its fangs into her, and the woman wailed until the venom had paralyzed and killed her.

  So they weren’t safe from their own vipers. Aric swept up another on his rod and threw it, then one more. Raiders darted away from the snakes. Aric caught one more and, making sure to keep it from climbing up the rod toward him, ran right into their midst. No raider challenged him. Finally, he tossed it at one standing between him and the wagon, then he leapt into the wagon’s bed, and off that, coming down behind the raider who had made the vipers in the first place.

  That raider started to raise his hands, no doubt readying another spell. Aric swung his iron rod at shoulder height. It caught the raider at the jawline. Bone crunched and flesh tore, and when the raider fell to the dusty street, blood from a head nearly severed ran into the dirt.

  “Now,” Aric cried. “Cut them!”

  The villagers with swords did as he said. This time, the vipers died instead of multiplying.

  The last viper to die was the one that bit Hotak.

  Hotak was chopping another in half, and didn’t see the serpent eyeing his exposed calf. By the time Mazzax saw it and shouted a warning, it was too late—the snake had buried its fangs in Hotak’s leg. The big man screamed once, then froze in place and collapsed.

  Mazzax attacked the snake with his maul, not quitting until it was pulverized into the earth.

  The raiders had been turning away, hoping to go around to some other road, but by running through them and leaping into the wagon, Aric had wound up behind those who still stood.

  One of these was Ceadrin.

  “Out of the way, half-elf,” Ceadrin said. Hatred dripped from his voice, the kind of hatred Aric had grown up knowing from full elves.

  “You’ll go through me, or you’ll die here, elf,” Aric replied, trying to put the same sort of bitterness into that last word.

  “Through you, then.” Ceadrin had a long sword with a slight curve to the blade. He took three steps toward Aric and swung it. Aric deflected it with the rod. Ceadrin swung again and again, bringing the sharp blade toward him at every opportunity. Aric defended, but couldn’t find a chance to attack. He was sure his iron rod was dulling Ceadrin’s blade, which would be scant comfort if the blade struck him.

  Sweat coated Aric’s brow, stinging his eyes. He wiped his hands on his shirt, left first, then right, switching the rod as he did. Ceadrin swung again. His sword, with its pommel and guard, was far easier to hang onto. The rod wore blisters in Aric’s hand, and his palm cramped from using it.

  Aric worked his way back toward the wagon. He wasn’t even sure why yet, just had a vague hope that it would provide cover or a chance to jump up, to change his elevation, give him some advantage.

  Ceadrin kept up the attack, striking and striking and striking. With each swing parried, Aric felt the vibration all the way up to his shoulder. And still Ceadrin came.

  Finally, the wagon was at Aric’s back. He parried two more swings, but let his weariness show. That was no act; he was growing tired of all this. A gleam showed in Ceadrin’s eye as he sensed his opponent’s weakness. He brought his sword up and down in a slashing arc, straight toward Aric’s head.

  Instead of blocking it, Aric ducked.

  Ceadrin’s sword bit deeply into the wooden side of the wagon.

  It only stuck for a fraction of a second, but that was time enough. Aric came out of his crouch, thrusting with the rod. It caught Ceadrin in the gut, and the elf bent over, air blowing out of him. Aric swung the rod again, first down, smashing it into Ceadrin’s knee and hearing the satisfying sound of the joint popping, then up into Ceadrin’s throat.

  Finally, Ceadrin fell to the ground, and Aric lifted the rod high and drove it straight down, through his heart, pinning the elf to the road.

  The few remaining raiders ran past Aric as fast as they could. The defenders followed, picking raiders off as they went. Only Mazzax stayed with Aric, who was breathing heavily, still leaning on the iron rod that pierced the elf’s chest.

  “He’s dead,” Mazzax said.

  “He had damn well better be.”

  “Not him,” Mazzax said. “Him. Hotak.”

  Aric released the rod and straightened up, although it pained him to do it. “I’m sorry. I never meant for that to happen.”

  “You tried. You slew those who slew him.”

  “I did, at that.”

  “And you saved me.”

  “Likewise true.”

  “You have my thanks, stranger.”

  “Are we still strangers, Mazzax?”

  A broad smile creased the dwarf’s tanned face. “No,” he said. “We’re smiths!”

  4

  The raiders retreated.

  The villagers, as Mazzax had warned, had lost much of their enthusiasm for having strangers in their midst. There were many dead to bury, and more wounded to tend.

  They shot the visitors angry glares, and more than once Aric and the others heard muttered conversations that ceased abruptly when they came near. But no one told them to leave, and when they raised the idea themselves, villagers pointed out that their scouts saw signs of raiders still in the area.

  Then Mazzax invited Aric into the shop.

  “You’re a smith,” the dwarf said. “I’m only apprentice. A smithy needs a smith.”

  “I can’t stay here, Mazzax,” Aric explained. “I have to get home. Soon.”

  “You leave now, raiders will kill you.”

  “That is a distinct possibility.”

  “So stay. For a while. Work in the shop.”

  “Well …” Aric said.

  “Ha! See? You want to. It’s in the blood.”

  That was, Aric thought, probably true of every smith. With as many times as they were cut, there was probably nearly as much metal as blood flowing in their veins. “I have been wanting to craft a sword.”

  “Good.”

  “For myself. A fine steel sword.”

  “Good,” Mazzax said again.

  “But I really can’t stay here.”

  “We’ll work night and day, make it fast.”

  “Just the two of us?”

  “That’s not enough?”

  “If Ruhm helped us …”

  “The goliath?”

  “Yes. He works in my shop, back home.”

  “Apprentice?”

  “Journeyman.”

  “Lucky.”

  “I’m sure you’ll be a journeyman one day, Mazzax.”

  “Not if I stay here. No more master.”

  “Well, someone else will co
me, perhaps.”

  “You came.”

  “Yes, but …” Aric was reaching the conclusion that arguing with a dwarf was a pointless pursuit. With this dwarf, anyway.

  And they couldn’t leave yet. They had to get to Nibenay, but if they were slain by raiders on the way then their message would never get through. If they took a few days, let the raiders tire of waiting for them, the result might be better.

  “Very well,” Aric said. “I’ll get Ruhm. We’ll make a sword.”

  Mazzax clapped his thick hands together once. “Good!”

  5

  They began the following morning. Mazzax stoked the fire high while Ruhm gathered materials and tools. Aric worked through Hotak’s stores of metal, pulling out each piece of promising size and holding it in his hands, letting it speak to him. He saw mines and smelters, and he saw bits of Hotak’s life, as well as Mazzax’s. The dwarf had been married for a time, and had a child. His wife and daughter were both killed by a gaj, and after taking his revenge on the creature, Mazzax had come to the village, where Hotak took him in and taught him a trade.

  After a few hours, Aric had the combination of metals he wanted. He wanted strength and elasticity in his blade, and he wanted it to hold a keen edge. He settled on a mixture of long bars of iron, bronze, and silver, stacked them together, and put them into the forge. While they heated, he looked for the materials he wanted for the furniture—the grip, the guard, and the pommel.

  After some time, he looked into the forge. Hot, but not hot enough. “Bellows!” he called. “More coal!”

  Mazzax scrambled. Ruhm pumped the bellows while Mazzax fetched charcoal. Aric worked on designing the hilt while the forge heated up. He checked again, withdrew the metal, sprinkled it with flux, a powdery substance Mazzax had collected from an ancient lake bed. Then he put it back in. “Hotter!”

  Aric measured his own hand, made some calculations, checked again. The metal bars were the same color as the forge’s interior. “Here we go!” he said. He and Ruhm drew the hot bars from the fire, folded them, and did it again. More times in and out of the fire, folding and welding. More time passed. Aric removed the bars, now seemingly a single piece, and worked them on the anvil, he and Ruhm each with a hammer, one striking and then the next in a steady cadence. This way they welded the metals together in the sequence that Aric wanted. They sprinkled on more flux, put it back in the fire, brought it out later and did it again, working from the other end.

  When he was finally satisfied that the different metals were joined permanently, Aric and Ruhm used a hot cutter, striking the chisel end with a hammer to shave off the unwanted metal. They heated it again, then brought it out and pounded it flat. More heat, and they held it at an angle against the anvil while they gave it edges and a point. More heat, and quenching in clay.

  Night had long since fallen by the time they had crafted a blade the shape and size Aric wanted, with a long tang at the end that would run through the grip to a threaded pommel. They left Mazzax in the shop, filing the edges.

  In bed that night, Aric could still hear the ringing of the hammer in his head, still taste the metal filings in his teeth, feel the minute burns on his arms from the sparks.

  But he thought he had a good start on his sword. It would, he knew, be the best he had ever made.

  The steel told him that, and he always listened to steel.

  XVII

  THE WAY

  1

  Siemhouk had been relaxing in a cool tub, soaking in water sprinkled with flower petals, when Kadya tapped her.

  Where are you? Siemhouk had asked. You should be here by now.

  We are still days away, at least. Perhaps longer. Getting all the metal out of the cavern proved difficult, and there have been other … issues, since then. We were attacked by beasts and lost an argosy, so had to redistribute its load among the others.

  I have no interest in excuses, Kadya.

  Of course not, my sister. I am not excusing, merely explaining. We are en route again and making good time.

  Then why are you in touch with me? What can’t wait until you see me?

  It’s Aric.

  The half-elf?

  The same.

  What about him?

  He ran away. I’ve been searching for him, but haven’t seen any sign. He may be headed for Nibenay. If he gets there, he’ll be full of false stories, filling our husband’s head with lies.

  What kind of lies? Siemhouk was beginning to lose her trust in Kadya. If her sister templar accused someone of lying, Siemhouk suspected that person must be telling the truth.

  There was more, too. Siemhouk had, when that undead mercenary visited, felt the presence of someone else, close by, guiding her. That presence had been powerful and comforting, persuading Siemhouk that she was doing the right thing. Since Kadya had begun extracting the metal from its underground vault in Akrankhot, though, that presence had grown dim, like a shadow paled by the sun’s rays, and now it wasn’t there at all. She found that she missed it.

  Kadya’s response was hesitant, reinforcing her certainty that her sister was lying. Stories about me, I’m sure. I don’t know exactly what he’ll say, but I know it won’t be the truth.

  You should have killed him.

  I know. I meant to. Somehow he must have figured it out.

  I’ll set things right, Siemhouk told her. If he makes it back here, he will not have the reception he desires.

  That’s good, sister. I knew I could trust you to do the right thing.

  Always, dear sister, Siemhouk said, then she broke their mental connection.

  From the research Dhojakt had turned up, she knew the presence she had felt from the dead man was a vestige of Tallik, the demon imprisoned beneath Akrankhot. It had come to the city in the undead man’s head, then moved into hers, which was no doubt far more welcoming and pleasant.

  But since Kadya had dismantled the demon’s prison, he had been gone from Siemhouk’s mind. Tallik had found someone powerful, but closer, who he could possess more fully. Now he came toward Nibenay, in Kadya’s body. Kadya had an agenda of her own of course, and always had, but that agenda would have been altered by Tallik’s presence, his guidance.

  Together, Tallik and Kadya would be a powerful enemy. Siemhouk had to play this carefully, to use them without antagonizing them. At least until she could wrest the demon away.

  She believed she was in a good position, though. The metals Kadya brought back would be valuable in their own right, and because Siemhouk had sent a templar loyal to her, but of a lesser station, Siemhouk, not Kadya, would be credited with the riches. The Shadow King would be grateful to her. In the Shadow King’s case, profound gratitude often came with increased power.

  With that power, she was sure she could either bind Tallik to her, or bend Kadya and Tallik both to her will. Either way, she would wind up with so much influence that she would be the only logical choice to succeed her husband and father—should anything happen to him. And these were perilous times for sorcerer-kings, everybody knew that.

  So perilous, in fact, that for his own good, she might just have to exercise her newfound influence to force him from his throne. If, of course, that was the only way to protect him …

  She chuckled, and splashed her bathwater. It was getting too cold. Time to get out, and let the water dry on her skin in the warmth of the day.

  2

  Dhojakt had been on his way to see his sister. He liked to visit with Siemhouk every day or two, because although he had his spies in her quarter, they couldn’t always read her like he could. She was skilled at keeping secrets, at disguising her deepest thoughts. In person, however, Dhojakt was able to lightly probe, and although she thought she could control her expressions, her tone of voice, in reality they always betrayed her just enough.

  Before he had reached her, this time, he sent a psionic probe to check on her mood, and he caught bits of a conversation she was holding with Kadya, the ambitious templar she had sent to Akra
nkhot in her stead. Because Siemhouk was distracted by the effort of maintaining that mental link, she didn’t detect Dhojakt’s presence, allowing him to listen in, to the discussion and to some of Siemhouk’s thoughts surrounding it.

  It was all most intriguing. Especially the part about deposing their father and taking the crown of the Shadow King’s court for her own.

  At that revelation, he withdrew from her mind. He didn’t want her to know he had that information. He would keep away from her for a day or two, just to be sure she didn’t realize he’d been around.

  At any rate, it had suddenly become urgent that he paid a visit to their father. He found Nibenay in a shadowy corner of his residence.

  “Dhojakt, my son,” Nibenay said when he shambled into the chamber, his many legs clicking against the cool marble floor.

  “Father, I’m glad to have found you.”

  “And I to see you. I’ve heard disturbing news.”

  “What is it?”

  “My friend and ally, Ta’ak Enselti, has been slain.”

  Dhojakt knew Enselti, a noble merchant with great landholdings surrounding the city, a supplier of much rice to the kingdom. “Slain? By who?”

  “This is the hard part,” Nibenay said. “By another acquaintance, the son of Myklan, of the House of Thrace, a simpleton by all accounts but still of noble blood.”

  “They had a rivalry?”

  “Not that I’m aware of. I didn’t know they had ever met. No business interests in common. The story Djena told me is that Ta’ak was taking an elf woman for his consort, and the simpleton, Pietrus is the boy’s name, stabbed them both to death.”

  “An upsetting business, to be sure,” Dhojakt said. In truth, he hadn’t the least concern about humans or elves being killed. They were bothersome, for the most part, only worthwhile as long as they paid their taxes and didn’t get in his way. “I’ve heard something upsetting as well.”

  “What is it, my son?”

  “That half-elf you sent on the expedition to Akrankhot?”