Swords & Dark Magic

by Jonathan Strahan; Lou Anders

  Suddenly a bulky form appeared in the nearest window. It clung uncertainly to the sill, then flapped awkwardly into the gallery, its huge wings slapping and snapping in the sunlight, its bulk vast and white as it turned, its massive tail swinging, its long, pale neck stretched out and topped by a massive reptilian head from which blazed two eyes as brilliant and crimson as Elric’s own. The so-called red pearls, now animated with a new life-force, gazed up into the pale gold clouds passing high above. The Eyes of Hemric had returned to the possession of he from whom Addric Heed had stolen them.

  The old Phoorn’s red eyes blazed for a moment and his long, wizened snout grunted as he made his way forwards on stiff legs. At last, he stood over the body of the son who had enslaved him and suddenly all the anger left him. His great, pale wings folded themselves around his son’s remains and he lifted the dying thing in his foreclaws, a strange, soft keening coming from somewhere deep in his chest.

  “I cannot,” murmured Hemric. “I cannot.” Then he moved towards the window, still carrying what was left of Addric Heed. With considerable difficulty, he hopped again onto the sill and then he had flapped into the air, the long keening note rising as he flew low over the far forest, making a peace with himself and his kin which the onlookers honoured but could scarcely understand.

  When Elric next looked at Fernrath, he saw that she wept silently, her eyes following her father, her head on one side, the better to hear that melancholy music. Then she turned, straightening herself. She saw Elric but walked away from him, to stare through one of the tall, broken windows at her disappearing father and what was left of her wretched brother.

  When, after some moments, she looked back to glare at the albino, her eyes blazed green and the tongue, which flickered across her teeth, was not human. “He has paid a fair price for what he did. His blood and the blood of his followers shall feed the forest and soon nothing will be seen of the White Fort. It is all he deserves. But now I am the last of my kind, at least on this side of the world.” She let out a deep, hissing breath.

  “Anywhere,” said Elric. “There are none of us who are fully Phoorn and non-Phoorn at once. None who bridge the history of both races. None, save your father.”

  She sighed. All the anger was gone from her. “And now we are both avenged.”

  Hemric, most ancient of the Phoorn race; father to both Lady Fernrath and the renegade Addric Heed, who had blinded him and forced him under water to drive the last of the slaver’s ships, flew against the golden horizon, his voice still keening, deep-throated and full of the joy of flight, the anguish of death.

  “Addric Heed was ever jealous of his father,” murmured Lady Fernrath. “For years he and his fellow Dukes of the Blood plotted to enslave the true Phoorn who were not Halflings like me. And when the time came, and their eyes were stolen, I lacked the courage or the character to resist. I saw the great runes cast and the great sorcery made and then the Phoorn were robbed of their eyes and forced into servitude. First they were harnessed to the ships and made to fly just above the water, guided by sharp goads. As they grew old and too feeble for that task, Addric Heed determined how he might have ships built around them, using their wings to drive those vessels at enormous speeds, terrifying and mystifying all they claimed as prey. I could do nothing but help my brother. He swore that if I did not, then he would torture my father to death. Thus I acted between him and the slave merchants of Hizss.”

  “That is why Hizss is the only unfortified city along this coast,” murmured Elric in clear understanding. “Hizss did not defend herself because Addric Heed never attacked there. Indeed, he preferred only to prey on ships and left the well-armed cities alone as his dragon allies died, one by one. But his own father!” He spoke almost in admiration. “This is treachery even I could not match…”

  Her smile was tragic, her voice sardonic. “Few could,” she said.

  Elric watched the albino dragon as he returned, no longer bearing his son’s remains. He saw Hemric twisting and turning high above them, then diving to sail across the tops of the trees, and for a moment he envied the creature, his own ancestor, who had existed for as long as the bright empire of Melniboné, who had seen its birth and lived to learn of its end.

  He looked around. The two priestesses stood a few steps back behind Elric and the others. They watched the old Phoorn’s flight in disbelieving wonder.

  “We have to thank you, ladies, for your intervention,” said Elric. “But might I ask what price your patron asked for her help?”

  The acolytes of Xiombarg exchanged glances. “It was something not strictly our right to offer her,” said one.

  “But the needs of the moment seemed to dictate our agreement with her bargain.” Nauha stepped forward, the better to watch the wheeling dragon. “She knew it was in your house, Lady Fernrath. I knew it was your property…”

  “It was all she would accept in exchange.” The other priestess seemed a little embarrassed. “That said, the Balance has been restored and Chaos brought to her rightful place in this plane’s grand cosmology! That was the will of Xiombarg. For as you serve Duke Arioch, my lord Elric, so we serve his cousin, his rival and his ally.”

  “Ah,” said Lady Fernrath in quick understanding. “But it was already promised, I think. By me.”

  “We had no choice.”

  “It was, I take it, a white sword.” Suddenly weary, Fernrath glanced round her at all the destruction.

  “Aye.” Moonglum was surprised she had guessed so easily. “There was nothing else Xiombarg would accept and time was pressing.”

  They all seemed stunned by the next sound.

  Even when Stormbringer was drawn and he was engaged upon his joyful work of destruction, Elric had never been heard to laugh in that particular way before.

  * * *

  TIM LEBBON was born in London and lived in Devon until the age of eight. His first short story was published in 1994 in the indie magazine Psychotrope, and his first novel, Mesmer, appeared three years later, in 1997. Since then he has published over thirty books, including 2009’s The Island and The Map of Moment s (with Christopher Golden). His dark fantasy novel, Dusk, which came out in 2007, won the August Derleth Award from the British Fantasy Society, and his novelization of the film 30 Days of Night was a New York Times bestseller. His new novel, Echo City Falls, is due out in 2010. A full-time writer since 2006, he now lives in Goytre, Monmouth-shire, with his wife and two children.

  * * *

  THE DEIFICATION OF DAL BAMORE

  A Tale from Echo City

  Tim Lebbon

  Jan Ray Marcellan wished they could just nail the bastard to the Wall. She hated venturing beyond Marcellan Canton and into Course, where the people were rougher, less educated, poorer, harsher, and more likely to aim abuse at a Hanharan priestess. It was outside the norm, and even the complement of thirty Scarlet Blades could not make her feel completely safe. She thought the air smelled different out here, though of course that was a foolish notion. It was simply her discomfort getting the better of her.

  But Dal Bamore had to be transported to Gaol Ten prior to his trial, even though his death sentence was a foregone conclusion. And she had chosen to accompany him.

  She parted the curtains on the front of her carriage, looking between the driver’s feet and the bobbing heads of the four tusked swine hauling it, and saw Dal Bamore staked naked on his rack. Six Scarlet Blades pulled the rack, Bamore’s heels dragging across the cobbles and leaving bloody streaks, and now that they were outside the wall, the crowds were throwing rotten fruit and stones. The Blades raised their hoods and hunkered down, though few missiles struck them. Marcellan soldiers were greatly feared. Fruit exploded across the condemned man’s body, stones struck with meaty or sharp impacts, and he barely moved his head.

  Jan Ray smiled thinly. With everything they had done to Bamore to extract his confession, she’d be surprised if he opened his eyes even when they drove in the first nail. She dropped the curtains back into pl
ace and settled into her cushions, sucked on her slash pipe, and sighed.

  A scream came from outside, and the thud of something hitting the ground. She froze, fingers touching the curtains again but not quite opening them.

  The crowd, blood-hungry, frenzied, Blades on edge, and that’s Bamore out there, Bamore, one of the most dangerous—

  The curtain was tugged aside and Jave’s face appeared. Her most trusted Blade captain. And he had fresh blood splashed across his cape.

  “Wreckers. Stay here.”

  As Jave disappeared and more screams rose up, Jan Ray lay back and wished they’d finished Bamore down in the Dungeons.

  She only ever visits the deep dungeons if it’s something important. And right from the very beginning, she’s suspected that they have never tortured anyone as important as Dal Bamore.

  He has already been in his cell for three days by the time she goes down to question him. The chief torturer has been instructed to loosen his tongue, but not to risk his life. Anything he says must be taken down—there is a scribe beside the prisoner every moment of the day and night—but he must remain lucid and conscious for whenever the Marcellans decide to question him themselves.

  Jan Ray is always eager for this sort of duty. It gets her away from the daily grind of running the city as part of the Council, and the way she spends most of her waking time as a Hanharan priestess is dictated by generations of tradition and protocol. She understands its importance, but sometimes it becomes tiresome.

  Down here in the Dungeons, she can be herself, just for a while.

  There are no screams as she approaches. No sighs or grunts, no pleas for mercy. She is almost concerned, but when she reaches the door and the Scarlet Blade on guard opens it for her, those concerns evaporate immediately.

  Bamore is hanging upside down from the ceiling. He is streaked with blood and feces. Beneath him, there is a large bowl collecting all the fluids that leak from him. She can tell that it has already been emptied over him more than once. A thin gray man sits on a chair some distance away, an open book propped on his knees, a pen in his hand. The pages appear completely blank.

  “Trivner,” she says, and the fat man in the corner hauls himself upright. Rolls of flab sway beneath his loose robe.

  “Priestess!” he says, bowing low. “An honor to see you down here with us lowlifes.” She can hear the smile in his voice, but forgives him that. He’s their head torturer, and it takes someone of particular skills and tendencies to perform the job competently. He has been employed down here for longer than she has been a priestess, over forty years. Some say he has never seen the sky.

  “So tell me what he has to say.”

  “Nothing, Priestess,” Trivner says.

  Jan Ray raises her eyebrows in surprise. Bamore seems to be looking at her, but she cannot be sure. The light is poor down here, his eyes swollen almost shut.

  “Nothing?” she asks, glancing at the thin scribe. He shakes his head.

  “I started with air shards,” Trivner says, and she knows what is coming. Many times she has heard his delighted recitation of the tortures he has performed. It’s like listening to a poet’s expression of love for the one thing in life he can never let go. “Into his knees and elbows, then both shins. The first I slipped only into the flesh, but the last selection I pushed through his bones. They’ll never come out. Any movement is agony.”

  “Delightful,” Jan Ray says. “Hurry with this, Trivner. And then perhaps I can get some answers from him where you’ve failed.”

  The torturer blusters for a moment, but then breathes deeply, calming himself. Remember who you’re talking to, Jan Ray thinks. His voice becomes more businesslike.

  “After the air shards, some more basic forms of persuasion. Fingernails extracted. Cuts filled with powdered swine-horn. Fire ants into every body opening.” Trivner’s confidence seems to falter, and the lilt drops from his voice. “No one ever gets past the fire ants.”

  “But still nothing,” Jan Ray muses. Bamore turns slightly on the rope and it creaks, wet from his blood. He coughs and vomits something black.

  “Leave me with him, both of you.” Trivner goes to protest but she holds up one hand, eyes closed. He knows better than to argue with a priestess.

  “I’ll wait right outside,” Trivner says, as if that will be a comfort.

  “By Hanharan’s will, he will tell me what I need to know,” Jan Ray says. But as the fat torturer and the thin scribe leave the stinking chamber, she feels a slight shiver of something she does not quite understand.

  Soon, she will know it as fear.

  Stay here, Jave had told her. Like talking to a child. He had been her most trusted captain for some years, and they had developed a rapport that bordered on friendship, though any hint of closeness between priestess and soldier was vehemently discouraged. But still she felt a tingle of anger at his brusqueness.

  “He’s concerned, you fool,” she murmured, and the sounds from outside grew more startling. Shouted orders and screams of pain; panicked cries from the people who had been lining the street; the whip of arrows and impacts of cruel metal tips on stone, wood, and flesh. They’ve come for him. She shivered and leaned forward, pulling the curtain aside.

  She had been involved in trouble like this several times before. Eighteen years ago, when Willem Marcellan was assassinated by a breakaway Watcher sect, she had been at his side in the carriage when the murderer climbed in and stabbed him to death. The killer had been moving across to her when a Blade’s sword pinned him to the carriage floor and gutted him before her. More recently, she and several other Hanharan priests had been trapped in a blood-feud riot between two powerful families from Mino Mont Canton, a skirmish that had resulted in the Marcellan Wall running red with the blood of fourteen executions over the space of three moons. Brutal, shocking, but necessary. So she was no stranger to bloodshed and the shock of violence, and fear was tempered by her faith. The spirit of Hanharan, the originator of Echo City, would welcome her down into the One Echo should she die here today.

  But her concern was not for herself.

  If they take Bamore and hide him away…

  That could not happen. He knew too much—he was too much—and the city was nowhere near ready for him and his kind. If Hanharan chose to smile upon her today, it would never need to be.

  It took her a few moments to assess exactly what was happening. The Wreckers must have been waiting among the crowd and in some of the buildings they passed by, because the carriage and its escort appeared to be surrounded. Arrows arced in from several directions, and she could hear the vicious thunk of crossbows being fired. Three Blades were already down, writhing on the ground and flailing for the arrows or bolts piercing them. One of them screamed. How unbecoming, Jan Ray thought. It seemed not even Scarlet Blade training was perfect.

  The four tusked swine were also down, their tough hides spiked with many arrows and bolts. Two of them still moved, kicking feebly, the network of ropes and timber supports tethering them to the carriage twisted and useless. The first thing the attackers had done was to make sure they couldn’t move.

  The crowd was panicking and trying to retreat from the scene, but others behind them pushed forward to see what was happening. The resultant crush denied them any hope of escape, and she saw very quickly that this ambush must be fought and won here. Gaol Ten was two miles away, but might as well have been twenty.

  Buildings lined both sides of the street—taverns, a chocolate shop, a street café where several jugglers cowered in colorful terror among scattered tables and chairs. Some of the upper windows were open, and she saw movement here and there as Wreckers inside aimed and fired at the Blades pinned down in the street below. Over the rooftops to Jan Ray’s right rose the looming mass of the Marcellan Wall, and she so wished she were back behind it now.

  But Jave had acted quickly, and their position was far from hopeless. A dozen Blades surrounded Dal Bamore where he bled on his rack, their billowing wire-r
ich capes pulled before them to divert incoming arrows. Their archers fired back, and she knew that they were the finest in the city. Even as she watched, she heard a scream from the upstairs window of a tavern, and a shadow fell away inside. Several Blades were lowering the wooden shutters around her carriage, striving to lock her in and protect her from danger. Jave was one of them, and he glared angrily when he saw her peering from the carriage window.

  “Inside!” he shouted.

  “Have you sent—”

  “Of course!” There would already be several pairs of Scarlet Blades infiltrating the surrounding buildings, working their way toward concealed attackers. And there were also several combats occurring in the street, Wreckers clashing swords with Blade soldiers whom they had very little hope of defeating in one-on-one combat, and that confused Jan Ray. Wreckers were far from suicidal. Resorting to this strategy so early in the ambush meant that they were desperate, or…

  “Jave, they shouldn’t have come forward so soon,” she said.

  He dropped the final wooden shutter, trapping it with one hand just before it cracked into the priestess’s head. “I know that,” he said impatiently. “They’re stalling for something. We’ll be ready.”

  “Make sure they don’t get him, Jave,” Jan Ray said, and even she was shocked by the tremor in her voice.

  Despite the shouts, screams, and smells of battle, he paused and gave her a questioning stare. “Who is he?” he asked.