The Paladins

by David Dalglish

  Walking into view, his ghoulish body missing large chunks from where the wolf-men had feasted, was Alex. Cyric turned and stood beside him, rubbing Alex’s bloodied face lovingly.

  “His soul will be saved,” Cyric said, pulling away. “But yours will not.”

  The wolf-men holding him howled, as if terribly amused. Alex approached, and he held no weapon. His hands reached out, and his knees bent as if he were an elderly man. When the cold fingers closed around his neck, Brute gritted his teeth and shut his eyes. Even in death, he’d deny the priest, deny him the satisfaction, deny him everything.

  “It’s not you, Alex,” Brute said while he still had air in his lungs. “I know it.”

  Stars of all colors swam before his eyes. His chest heaved in futile attempts to draw in breath. Then nothing.

  14

  The dark paladin Grevus rode toward the Blood Tower amid the howls of wolves. The sound chilled his blood, and he was not one prone to fear. Had the wolf-men of the Wedge launched another attack across the Gihon, as they had in Durham? But why such a well-fortified place as the Blood Tower? Grevus paused a moment so he could dismount. Grabbing the reins, he pulled his horse’s head low, then carefully put his fingers upon its eyes so he might cast a spell.

  “You’ve done me fair,” he said. “But I need haste.”

  When his fingers moved away, the horse’s eyes shimmered red. Mounting once more, Grevus spurred it on, his horse now blessed to see in the darkness as well as if it were midday. He felt an urgency, and he prayed to Karak he was not too late. Luther had told him Cyric would most likely be at the tower, but what if he was not? Or what if he was in danger? Would it be right to help him, or let him be? The answer might be in the scroll Luther had given him, but Grevus had not dared break the seal to read it along the way. Luther had insisted it be for Cyric’s ears only.

  Grevus had spent so much time thinking on how he would judge Cyric’s deeds, he’d not entertained notions that things might differ so greatly. He didn’t consider himself a quick thinker on his feet. More and more he prayed that he misunderstood the sounds, and that all was well. But when he neared the gates, he saw the torches there extinguished. Trusting his horse to react to any danger with his blessed eyes, Grevus rode closer. Just as he’d feared, the gates were broken, the metal mangled as if hit by a battering ram. As Grevus rode through, he realized they were twisted oddly, almost as if they had been pulled outward instead of battered inward.

  What madness has happened here? Grevus wondered.

  The sound of the wolves had grown louder, and Grevus drew his heavy blade from its sheath. He didn’t know their numbers, and if the combat had turned badly, he’d need to come riding in like a beast to change the tide, however poor the odds. The Blood Tower was before him, and he saw no outward damage, nor defenders manning the windows. Curling around toward the northern side, he saw the expanse between the tower and the wall, and it was then he stopped, mouth agape.

  Hundreds and hundreds of wolf-men filled the space, tearing through the remains of the tents, gathering together into groups and feasting on meat of a type he dared not think about. More were along the walls. Grevus saw no defenders, no corpses. Had the defenses been abandoned? He barely had time to consider this before the nearest of the wolf-men sensed his arrival. A howl went up, and a hundred others matched it. Turning his horse about, Grevus kicked his sides to flee, but it was already too late. The wolf-men swarmed to either side of him, moving with terrifying speed. They bit at his horse’s feet to slow him down, then fully surrounded him.

  Grevus lashed out with his sword, trying to keep them at bay, but they were not interested in him just yet. As his horse reared up, trying to kick two wolf-men biting at his legs, another ducked in, slashed out its throat, and then leapt away. The beast began to topple, and Grevus scrambled to launch himself from the saddle. He landed in a roll, and came up swinging. The wolf-men stayed back, snarling, watching. It was just a game, Grevus realized, a little play with their food. The black fire burned deep across the blade of his sword, and he beckoned them on. Let them do whatever to his mortal body. He’d take plenty with him, and enter eternity with his head held high.

  But it seemed eternity was not yet ready for him, for a loud cry broke through the howls.

  “Get back!”

  The wolf-men obeyed, their ears flattened and deep growls emanating from their throats. Through their opened ranks approached a man who must have been Cyric. Deep down, Grevus knew he should feel relieved to see the priest coming to his aid, but instead his anxiety only increased. He’d been ready to give his life killing the wild savages; what did it mean if the wild savages served Cyric?

  “You must be the one I seek,” Grevus said, standing tall and nodding his head in greeting. He kept his sword unsheathed.

  “Many will seek me before the world’s end,” Cyric said, and he smiled. Grevus took in his pale skin, his carefully brushed hair, and his vibrant eyes so bright a brown they almost looked red. He was a handsome man, almost seemed to gleam with life. Grevus’s worries deepened. The words the priest spoke were familiar to him, and oft-repeated in the holy scriptures housed in the temples.

  “And cherish the rare man who finds him,” Grevus said as a test. Would Cyric then and there declare himself Karak? Would he state himself the man the world sought in its darkness, yet seldom found?

  “Indeed,” Cyric said, his smile growing. “Warfang, please give my guest some space. He is to be treated with the respect of his station.”

  One of the larger wolf-men beside him snarled, and with a few quick barks, the rest of the wolf-men retreated further into the complex, leaving the dark paladin alone with Cyric.

  “You’re not in danger,” Cyric said, stepping beside Grevus and putting a hand on his shoulder. Grevus sheathed his blade, and then with the same hand, grabbed Luther’s scroll from the pouch at his hip.

  “Forgive me,” Grevus said. “Seeing so many of the beasts puts me on edge. My name is Grevus, and I come from Mordeina.” He gestured to the wolf-men. “I must ask…do they serve you willingly, or have you enslaved them with magic, perhaps beaten them into submission with Karak’s might?”

  “It is a little of all three,” Cyric said. “Some serve for power, some serve for loyalty, and some out of fear. It matters not. The wolf-men obeyed Karak in the beginning times, and it is right they do so again.”

  “Some priests say their kind should be extinguished, their blight removed from the land.”

  “All because they no longer serve?” asked Cyric. Grevus nodded, eliciting a chuckle from the priest. “Amusing, then, that they judge these heathen creatures of the wild more harshly than the wicked men of the cities.”

  “Are you saying we should show the wolf-men leniency?”

  Cyric looked to Grevus as if he were a simpleton.

  “I say we hold man to the highest of standards, not the lowest. Wouldn’t you?”

  The priest turned back to the broken entrance, and Grevus took step after him. He thought he should read the message now, but he wanted to see more. He wanted to gain a feel for the strange man. His looks were pleasing, his voice charismatic and aflame with faith.

  “I would not consider myself intelligent enough to say either way,” Grevus said. “Karak gives his word to his priests, and sometimes to me in my most heartfelt prayers. I will obey orders, without question. Let those smarter than I decide the rest.”

  “In your humility you show wisdom,” Cyric said. “Come with me, and do not open the message you hold just yet. I would show you something.”

  At first Grevus was surprised, but realized he shouldn’t be. Given Cyric’s activities, he would surely expect some sort of message, be it blessing or reprimand, from the priests in Mordeina. But did Cyric realize the message was not from them, but from Luther only, made in secrecy? Grevus didn’t know, but the way the priest looked straight through him, as if he were barely a shadow compared to his light, it made him wonder.

&nb
sp; Cyric led him to the gateway, then stopped. Walking in rows, over a hundred in number, were men, women, and children. Grevus immediately sensed the power of Karak about them, intermixed with an unmistakable aura of death. It was necromancy he sensed, and although he had been in its presence rarely, he didn’t need the blessings of a paladin to know it. The men and women walked with vacant eyes, slack jaws, and gaping wounds across their flesh that did not bleed.

  “What is the meaning of this?” Grevus asked. “Why do you make the dead walk?”

  “They walk because I command them to walk,” Cyric said. “And I command them for I would save them.”

  Grevus looked at the rotting horde, walking in perfect, orderly manner, and fought down a shiver.

  “Save them?” Grevus asked. “How? From what?”

  “Let me present you a simple parable,” Cyric said as he looked over his undead like a parent would his offspring. “There are two doors. One leads to happiness, the other to death by fire. Before the doors stands a child. He must choose, one or the other, for not choosing would also lead to death by fire. You know the correct way, but the child does not. Tell me, Grevus, what would you do?”

  “I would show the child the way,” Grevus said. “For that is our role in this world.”

  “Yes, you could show him,” Cyric said. “But the other door is covered with gold, and its way is easy, and from the other side come whispers of temporary pleasures. The child may not listen. What then?”

  Grevus shrugged his shoulders.

  “Then the child will have made his choice. Not all are meant for peace in the eternity.”

  “No,” Cyric said. His voice thundered over Grevus, and within it the dark paladin felt a furious certainty that set his heart racing. “That is a coward’s way. Wash our hands of the blood while calling it fate, or destiny, or the free will of man. It is wrong, paladin. It has always been wrong and it will forever be so. You say you would instruct the child, then let him make his choice? You give him power he should never have. You put the weight of his soul in his foolish, impulsive hands.”

  “Then what would you do?” Grevus asked as Cyric walked over to one of the undead and caressed its pale cheek with his fingers.

  “I’d do what is right,” Cyric said. “I’d nail the other door shut.”

  That was it, then, exactly as Luther had described. Even worse, he already had an army to do it. What if Luther was right, and other paladins and priests of Karak joined his side, swelling his ranks? Grevus swallowed, and he reached for the message.

  “I bring word,” he began, but Cyric ignored him.

  “Their souls are still here, you know,” the priest said, pushing a finger against the forehead of the walking corpse of an elderly man. “Right here. They refused to bow, Grevus. They refused, shouted angry, ignorant denials. Some, like this man here, were even worse. They professed a faith in Ashhur, as if that would save them. As if that meant something. He thought by going to the Golden Eternity he would be safe from my grasp. But he doesn’t understand. He isn’t safe from me there. No one is. I’ll ascend, and on a glorious day tear down those gates. Order must be made above all things. I will find and judge every soul, even the ones that flee to Ashhur.”

  “You speak as if you are Karak himself,” Grevus said, such blasphemous words bitter on his tongue. He looked to the rows of undead, thinking of the torment the souls must be enduring within. Did Grevus think shallow obedience in a desiccated form would lead to their salvation?

  “Why such serpentine words?” Cyric asked. “I know what you wish to ask, so why not ask it? Are you afraid of the answer, paladin?”

  “There are only two possibilities,” Grevus said. “You are who you say you are, or you’re a blasphemy against our god. You cannot be both, and you cannot be neither. Let me hear the words from your own tongue, Cyric. Let me judge for myself.”

  Cyric smiled, but for once that glow about him faded.

  “Then let this be my answer; you cannot judge me, Grevus. No one in this world can.”

  For a moment it seemed time stopped in that dark night. Grevus heard his heart thundering in his ears, and his mouth turned dry as sand. There was power in Cyric’s words, and whether they were true or not, the priest fully believed them. But how could he speak such blasphemy yet not be condemned by Karak? That the dead followed his command showed Karak had not abandoned Cyric, nor turned his back to him. What did that mean? What other choice did he have?

  “I bring message,” Grevus said. “Let me read from Luther’s hand, and then I will decide what it is I believe.”

  “If you must,” Cyric said, but Grevus could tell he was irritated by the mention of Luther’s name.

  Pulling out the scroll, Grevus looked at the seal, and with trembling hands he broke it. Slowly unrolling the parchment, he saw the priest’s handwriting, and something about it calmed him. Luther was a wise man, brilliant both in the ways of the world and of gods. He’d know how to reconcile the apparent contradiction in Cyric’s power remaining amid such blasphemy. Because Cyric was not Karak made flesh. Despite all his confusion, Grevus was certain of that one truth. Because if Karak did come to the world, Grevus knew he’d fling himself to his knees in worship the moment he saw him. Cyric did not inspire that devotion. Cyric didn’t inspire devotion at all. There was a tantalizing promise to him, though. A nation devoted to Karak, one sworn to the proper way…how many of his brethren would rally behind that ideal?

  Forcing the thoughts from his mind, Grevus read the scroll aloud.

  “My dear pupil, Cyric,” it began. “I have heard of your exploits in the North. I know of Willshire, and of your schemes at the Blood Tower. Reports so far say otherwise, but I fear Sir Robert is dead, for that proud man would never bend the knee to Karak. Did I not tell you he could be of use to you, even if his faith was lacking? But you have never seen the world as I have. You see it in a light that has never existed. You see a past far more glorious than it ever was, and view our growing understanding of Karak’s wisdom as nothing more than perversions of the original truth. And now, worst of all, you claim yourself Karak made flesh. You speak blasphemy, Cyric, and there is only one penalty. I would ask you to repent, but your soul is scarred too far for that. Karak forgive me for not stopping you in time to save you.”

  So far Cyric had said nothing, done nothing, only stared at him with an amused smile on his face. But there was one sentence left, and it was written not in ink, but in blood. Grevus read the words aloud, knowing their pronunciation even though they were nothing but gibberish, a sentence of strange, archaic words. It was the language of magic, Grevus realized, even as he felt a fever overcoming him with each word leaving his tongue. Powerful, ancient magic.

  The sound of the Lion’s roar echoed throughout the Blood Tower. Grevus dropped the scroll and clutched his arms to his chest as he felt his mind being ripped in two. His knees shook, and then the fire began to swirl about him. Red light shot from his fingertips, and from behind his eyes he felt Luther peering out.

  At last that smile left Cyric’s face.

  “What is this?” he asked. “Who are you really, Grevus?”

  Luther’s power enveloped him fully now. His muscles felt as if they were made of stone, his armor the lightest of cloth. In the back of his mind he heard a constant hymn, sung by voices whose words were indecipherable. The darkness about him was suddenly bright, and surrounding the hundred dead were auras of a deep red. Around Cyric he saw ethereal fire of a royal blue, burning without consumption. Grevus drew his sword, whose fire burned so great not a hint of steel could be seen.

  “Our house must not be divided,” Grevus spoke, but the words weren’t his. “Your way is wrong, and would lead to our destruction.”

  “Do you think I fear your puppet?” Cyric asked. “I am your master. I am your god.”

  “No god. Once my student, now just a man. That’s how you lived. That’s how you’ll die.”

  His sword arm moved without him thinking i
t. The blade rose, then fell, the black fire trailing behind. It should have cleaved through Cyric’s skull, but the priest lifted his hands. A shimmering translucent shield appeared before him, and Grevus’s sword smacked into it as if it were hardened steel. The paladin tensed his muscles, and power flooded through him anew. It was as if Luther stood beside him, lending every bit of his holy strength. The shield sparked and cracked, unable to endure the force.

  “Once a student,” Cyric gasped, his fingers locked tight and his hands shaking. He fell to one knee, gasping as the sword descended closer and closer to his skull.

  “Once a man.”

  He looked up at Grevus, and their eyes met. It was strange, but Grevus knew it wasn’t him that Cyric saw, but Luther. The shield strengthened, and Grevus pressed further. He waited for another surge, just that slightest bit needed to finally crush through Cyric’s defense and put an end to his blasphemous claims. But Grevus sensed Luther’s strength wasn’t quite complete. A strange pain filled his chest, as if he’d been pierced by a dagger or an arrow. His breathing came shallower, and with desperation he tried to realize the kill.

  “No longer!” cried the priest.

  Cyric stood, and with a wave of his hand a shockwave rolled out, knocking Grevus back and the sword safely away.

  Panic spiked in Grevus’s heart, and he knew only part of it was his. He rushed the priest, sword pulled back for a wide swipe. Before he could swing, Cyric pointed a finger. A tiny ball of darkness shot out, its spherical form outlined with white lightning. It struck Grevus in the chest, punching through his armor and into his flesh. The pain was extreme, and the power flooding through him wavered, the link between him and Luther starting to wane.