A Darkness Unleashed (Book 2)

by J. T. Hartke

  The shadows, already lengthened, faded into the darkness of night. The four men, two horses, and a raven huddled close to the stone, Tallen and Dorias forcing what little power they could find into giving it heat.

  “I should never have brought you out here,” Dorias whispered around midnight, when everyone knew that no one was asleep. “I am a damned fool for thinking I could guarantee your safety. Thank the Waters Gwelan came back when he did.”

  “It was Merl who found me.” Gwelan shifted against Shade’s shoulder. “It looks like all the humans got outmatched by our animal friends.” He stretched his neck. “I wonder what happened to my horse.”

  Tallen shifted his cloak. “And mine.”

  A plodding splash sounded not far up the gully, and everyone leapt to their feet. A few seconds later, an old palfrey wandered into the washout.

  Tallen could not help but throw his arms around the beast’s warm neck. “You are lucky I’m just glad you brought back my blanket,” he whispered in the old horse’s ear. “Or I’d make that stew I once promised.”

  The Woodsingers tried to warn the mages. They knew the spell might save us from the Cataclysm, but it would kill Lond’s Lifetrees in doing so. Would that it had killed them all. – Leolan “Lastking” Calais in a letter to Aravath the Navigator

  Darve Northtower spat a gobbet of greenish phlegm into the sharp blades of brown-gray switchgrass, right at the line where it ended. Beyond, only black and charcoal stones spread before him in a wide, descending valley. Pits of foul ooze speckled the dead landscape, a fetid stench and haze rising from their surfaces. A few bluish lichens grew on the very tops of the tallest boulders, clinging for some type of sustenance. Otherwise, nothing lived in the Haunted Vale.

  “We’ll never make it across.” Silios Vonstrass shifted in the saddle he never left these days, unless it was to change horses. “Something kills everything out there, and the horses won’t set hoof beyond the grass line.”

  Looking up at the human, Darve wrinkled his nose at the seeping yellow sore on his neck. The Bluecloak ranger was one of the few of his kind left among the Highspur survivors. There would be even less if we hadn’t found the herd.

  He stroked the shoulder of the steed on which Silios sat. “To think how much I once hated these beasts. We would not have lived had we not found them and their herders after Highspur.”

  A heaving cough broke from Silios’ chest, wet and hollow. Darve waited for Silios to catch his breath. It took several gasps before he continued. “But no…no number of horses will get us through this black valley alive.”

  A hollow nervousness growing in his heart, Darve turned to walk back to their makeshift camp. The steady beat of waves rolling in from the Lone Sea pounded against the wide sandy beach. About a hundred dwarves, elves, and humans, and about five times as many horses, huddled between the ocean and the vale.

  “Orc spears to our north and east, endless sea to the west, and death to our south.” He looked up at Silios, whose horse plodded alongside. “Which choice sounds best to you?”

  The ranger pulled his ragged Fadecloak closer about his shoulders. “I’d pick the sea if only we had a boat.” He searched the barren landscape. “Or at least a tree to build one.”

  Two figures broke from the main camp to meet them on their trek back. Ian Forstra still wore his healer’s cloak, blue trimmed in dirty yellow. Ravenna stood taller than most humans, her pointed ears peeking through a tight bun of white hair.

  “We cannot stay here much longer,” the healer said, his tired eyes matching the tone in his voice. A yellow sore seeped pus on his left hand. “The effects of the Haunted Vale will begin killing us off within the next day or two.”

  “Even my folk are beginning to feel the effects of this…” The elf leader frowned at her words. “…this valley. The horses, too.”

  Darve looked at the black desolation to their south. He could almost sense the poison radiating from it. Compared to the empty field of dead stone and stagnant pools, the switchgrass of the Wastes looked a paradise.

  Silios Vonstrass edged his steed forward. “We should head east along the Vale, where we can try to cross the Lond. If we meet any orc patrols, we charge through them.” He folded his arms. “I’d rather die fighting than sit here and wait for death to creep up on us.”

  Doctor Forstra shook his head. “That won’t do. We have to get away from this Vale. That means back north.”

  Shaking his head, Darve spat into the grass again. “We won’t get five leagues without being swarmed by orcs. Besides, it’s the wrong direction entirely.”

  Silios’ horse stamped with the same frustration on his master’s face. “Then do you plan to build us boats from stones, Master Dwarf?”

  Shifting his weight on his aching knees, Darve snatched a blade of grass. “I have no idea what to do, Captain.” He looked at Ravenna. “How wide is the Haunted Vale?”

  Darve had never seen the look of fear so clear on an elven face before. Ravenna cleared her throat. “The Vale of Amgedon was known to be about two and a half leagues. The mouth of the Lond is almost a mile of that.”

  “None of us humans will survive crossing it.” Doctor Forstra kept his voice flat. “Some of the elves might, but they will be sick for weeks afterward.”

  Chewing on the grass left an astringent taste in Darve’s mouth. He kept chewing, the bitterness of the grass driving away some of the sourness of his thoughts. He watched the waves of the Lone Sea roll against the white sugar-sand beach. Standing there, the sound of the surf and wind in his ears, Darve felt a moment of peace, something he had not known since his nephew betrayed Highspur. And it was Bran, not Brax! What happened with those boys? Why have I so failed my family, friends, and allies?

  He cleared his throat to stop the threatened tears. “I don’t know…”

  The others stood silent, each studying their own distant nothing. A hollow pit reopened in Darve’s heart, one he had scraped a bare cover over since leading a desperate charge through the orc horde at the end of Highspur’s fall. I cannot fail these last few the way I failed those we left behind.

  The maw in his heart did not close, and his senses collapsed into it. It threatened to swallow his conscious mind and drop him down into a pit of madness. He clung to the edge, staring at the sea, hoping it might find a way to wash his soul clean.

  A figure rode up from the beach where it met the edge of the wasteland. A blue cloak trimmed in red fluttered out behind the rider. The horse thundered up right to where Darve stood, its hot breath blasting against his forehead.

  “Forgive me, My Lords.” Magus Delan Stanton pulled back on his stomping mount. His voice carried above the breeze in the most excited tone Darve had heard in weeks. “I think I’ve found a way through. The sea – it seems to have cleansed the land near the beach of most of this poison that pervades the Vale.” He gestured back the way he had come. “A thousand years of pounding surf has changed the landscape. The upper layers of poisonous earth are mostly washed away.”

  Ravenna looked at him with skepticism, while Silios scowled. Doctor Forstra gestured for Magus Stanton to lead him. “Show me. Let me examine it with my Talent.”

  Darve and the others followed, slowed by his aching knees. I have to find a smaller horse. I guess that is one sick advantage of lacking feed for them. They are all getting smaller. Makes for less to eat when they die, though.

  Where the foamy water rolled up onto flattened sand, Doctor Forstra splashed out alongside Stanton. He closed his eyes and reached out with his hands. Darve stared intently at the human, his face stretched thin with exhaustion. He willed the doctor to find a way through – a way out, just like he and Marrax had found in their final mad charge. May you rest well, old friend. Thank you for your sacrifice.

  Excitement flashed across Forstra’s face. He stood and ran back to the others, heedless of the sea water sloshing from
his boots. “He’s right! It’s cleaner than the grasslands.” He waved one hand at the coastline as he neared. “If we keep as close to the water as possible, even wade in it, we should be safe.”

  Ravenna allowed a moment of hope to appear on her features before replacing it with concern. “But we will need to cross the mouth of the Lond River. The humans, some of the dwarves, and many of the horses are weak already.”

  Silios shifted his Fadecloak more squarely onto his shoulders. “I grew up in Avaros, at the mouth of the Voyar. I cannot tell you how many gold marks my uncle spends every year to dredge the estuary so that it is deep enough for ships to pass.” He edged his horse forward as if he were ready to start the journey now. “I can scout sand bars and shallow passages. If we tie the sickest men to the strongest horses and keep the herd together, we just might be able to do it.”

  The elf put her fists on her hips. “Then the sooner we begin the better. It is almost five leagues before we reach the grassland again.” She looked at the black vale stretching inward from the sea. “And rumor tells of dark things still at the heart of the Vale.” A visible shudder went up her back. “But the grass should be much better beyond.”

  Forcing any doubt from his tone, Darve looked at the others. “Then we will try it.”

  The sun wore toward midmorning as the hundred dwarves, humans, and elves gathered their three hundred horses. Darve spat from his modified saddle, annoyed at the time it had taken. Silios and Magus Stanton took the lead, closely followed by Forstra and Ravenna. Darve hung back with the bulk of the remaining soldiers, all their gazes hollow and haunted regardless of their race.

  Following the line of the beach offered little difficulty. The horses and the soldiers seemed to enjoy the spray and water. To their right, the blue stretched into infinity. To their left, black stone scattered across a dead landscape, broken only by a few charred stumps of ancient, forgotten trees. Most of the procession kept their focus to the right, avoiding the steadily worsening destruction.

  For many, breathing became more difficult. A sore broke open to ooze yellowish pus from Darve’s hand. He wrapped it with the cleanest cloth in his saddlebag, the ache of it sinking down to his bones. One human soldier fell from his steed and had to be tied to his mount. Still the company moved onward.

  Miles passed, and far sooner than he feared, Darve glared down at the mouth of the River Lond, wide and slow, and choked with sandbars and islets. Grass grew on some – the same gray-brown switchgrass that gradually reclaimed the Wastes. A few even held stunted, oddly shaped trees.

  A few yards ahead, Silios Vonstrass pushed his steed into the flow of the first neck of the river and splashed across to the first sandbar.

  “So far, so good,” Darve whispered to his horse.

  For almost a mile they passed from islet to islet, twice entering water deep enough that the horses were forced to swim, and only once having to turn back at Silios’ prompting. In a deep spot a horse lost its footing and fell, taking two more with it out to sea, but as they approached the far bank, Darve counted no men lost.

  “Yet, you old fool,” he grumbled to himself. “Don’t count your diamonds before they are mined.”

  Silios Vonstrass led the first few riders and horses up a slope toward the top of the far bank, when a low, hollow howl echoed up from deeper within the Vale. It crawled up Darve’s spine and nearly set his teeth to chattering. Most men froze, even those pushing onto solid ground. A few horses bolted upriver through the shallows.

  The howl sounded again. This time it felt louder and closer, and it settled in Darve’s bowels. “Move!” He waved his reins in the air and urged his mount forward. “Whatever it is, we will be better facing it on solid ground!”

  The group surged up the far bank. In the scramble, many of the horses tripped and slid in the mud. One with a weakened human strapped to his back went under, coming back up with no rider. Darve searched the water, but the sick Bluecloak never surfaced.

  Building up to a deafening roar that emanated from what seemed to be the heart of the Haunted Vale, the howl spread across the mouth of the Lond in visible ripples along the water’s surface. Elves covered their pointed ears, while the stronger humans urged their steeds to greater speed.

  Darve watched two horses that had broken from the pack and headed upstream. They neared an ancient twisted tree trunk, blackened by time and the destruction during the Cataclysm. Against the wind and against all of Darve’s logical senses, the dead tree reached out its tortured branches to snag one of the mares. With a sudden, violent wrenching of bone and sinew, the tree ripped the horse in two, cutting off its gurgling scream of fear. Another branch lashed out to pierce the second mare, skewering it like a haunch on a spit. Blood fountained outward, and the tree’s roots shifted toward the liquid, draining the crimson pool as quickly as the horse’s emptying veins could fill it.

  With a deep breath, Darve pulled his ancient family sword from its sheath. Many of his fellow dwarves followed suit. The surviving Bluecloaks redoubled their efforts to get the herd up out of the river, but that task seemed impossible, as the smell of fresh blood on the air had driven many of the animals near to madness. Ravenna and her fellow elves could only stare at the tree, jaws hung open, aghast at what they saw. Vinda, a young woman with yellow hair and great skill in battle, vomited from her saddle into the frothy water below. Darve fought to avoid joining her.

  “Keep moving!” he shouted. “Up onto the bank!”

  The tree cast aside the drained horse corpses, leaving them to bob along like empty sacks in the current, and unfurled its roots from the islet where it stood. They stretched forward and stabbed down into the muddy water. The blackened trunk edged forward, as its newly rooted feet dragged it into the current toward the nearest cluster of men.

  Shouts of fear sounded from behind Darve. He turned back to see a half dozen smaller trees uproot themselves and begin to crawl toward their rear. One lagging horse tripped, and the shambling trees lurched forward, swarming on the fallen beast. They tore it apart, splattering blood across their gray branches. The blood disappeared, sucked up by their desiccated bark.

  “Ravenna!” Darve pushed his horse over to the elf leader, who could not pull her eyes from the wading, thrashing trees. “You must move! Get your folk up on the banks. We are almost there. We have to make a run for the southern grass!”

  Ravenna looked at him, the fear on her face masked by confusion, as if she did not recognize him. Then the fear returned. Despite the horror in her expression, she turned her head to call at her fellow elves. “We cannot face these abominations of Amgedon, but we must survive to bring back word of them.” She spurred her horse at the bank, which most of the herd had already surmounted. “Come on!”

  The other elves reined their horses around with her, pushing them up the muddy incline. Darve came last, dwarf warriors guarding his rear. Why do they still care at all for my life? I brought the betrayers into our midst. I brought on the death of Highspur.

  His horse slipped during the climb, and a sinking twinge of fear pulled at Darve’s heart. But the animal found its footing and made it to the top. The black landscape matched the far side of the river, and the men and the horses milled about along the edge.

  “Move, you idiots!” Darve waved his sword over his head. “Head for the ocean and run south until you find grass!”

  Following his own advice, Darve spurred his horse toward the sound of surf in the distance, where the outflow of the river no longer drove off the waves. The lifeless estuary there gave way to sandy beach again.

  The howl roared over the edge of the riverbank. Horses screamed and already pale men drained further of their color. They charged as one for the water’s edge, most heedless of those who fell behind. Darve urged them on as best he could, but on a glimpse backward he saw roots grasping at the top of the bank, and long, blackened branches waving in the air. They snapped forw
ard to spear a dwarf through the chest and pull him away, his limbs flailing like a shaken doll.

  To Darve’s left, several more broken trees crawled toward them, wading through the stony earth like it was a shallow sea. The distance between the trees and his men closed far too rapidly. He gave more spur to his horse.

  “Fly!” he shouted. “Fly for the shore!”

  The lead riders splashed into the waves, Silios’ Fadecloak fluttering among them. They did not stop, but churned their way down the beach. Darve pushed after them, urging the riders around him to follow.

  One of Ravenna’s elves jerked on his horse’s reins. The animal reared, throwing its rider to the ground before rushing to follow the others. The elf stood up quietly and brushed himself off, a cold, emotionless expression on his face. He turned and strolled toward the onrushing dead trees as if he had chosen to take a walk in a park.

  “They are the children of Amgedon,” he said in a loud, clear voice. “They are the descendants of the first Lifetree. We must embrace them.”

  “Vaelon, no!” Ravenna turned her horse. The animal danced in a mad circle, rolling its eyes and trying to flee. She did not lose her seat, but struggled to hold the steed. “Come back!”

  Vaelon walked right up to one of the moving hulks and reached out as if to touch its blackened trunk. Long before he neared it, the monster skewered him through his belly. Vaelon made no sound. A beatific smile spread across his lips and he spread his arms to embrace the creature.

  Another of the trees grabbed Vaelon and they tore him in half, spraying blood across their seeping bark. The crimson spots drained away, and two more trees joined in the frenzy, fighting over the corpse like starving wolves.

  “Ravenna!” Darve reached out to grab her elbow. “Come on.”

  The woman turned with him and gave her struggling steed his bit. The horses broke for the waterline, where now most of the others worked their way south along the coast at as full a speed as they could manage.