The Iron Hound

by Tim Akers

  It would be easy to win the day, Malcolm realized, but at what cost?

  “Open ranks, let them in,” he said. “And when those knights reach us, bring me whoever among them seems capable of explaining themselves.”

  He didn’t need to wait long. The first riders slowed as they approached the lines of Malcolm’s company, as though they might halfheartedly give charge, but when the men of Redgarden peeled apart and opened a path, they sheathed their weapons and couched their spears into parade formation. They rode in as honorably as could be managed, considering they had the blood of trampled spearmen on their caparisons.

  One man spotted Malcolm and turned in his direction. Doone growled and drew her sword, but the knight made no motion to attack.

  “What is the meaning of this, sir?” Malcolm asked. “What the hell is going on over there?”

  “The priests, my lord! The inquisitors of Cinder. They started killing one another. Without blade or spear, simply opening their skulls with words of ancient power. And then they started killing us!” The knight threw aside his sword and stumbled from the saddle, going to one knee. “I beg amnesty, Reaverbane. I beg your protection!”

  “Protection? Why do you think I can protect you from an inquisitor?”

  The man looked up at Malcolm, tears streaking his face, tear of ash and blood. Something had touched his mind, leaving a scar of madness.

  “I was at the Fen Gate, and saw your battle with Sacombre, and the spirit that rode him. That spirit has returned! It is the god of death who leads them, my lord! No man has faced him but you!” The man grabbed at Malcolm’s belt, breaking down. “Gods above, save us, Houndhallow. Save us!”

  61

  THE GOD OF nothing stood before them. The forest keened at its presence, as though a sharp wind blew unseen through the trees. Ian shielded his eyes from the emptiness that lapped at his vision, drawing in sight until only blindness remained.

  “So this is his plan,” Gwen whispered. “Crush the strength of the north here, and let the remnants fight among themselves over who’s to blame.”

  Ian glanced over at her. If she had not named herself, he would never have recognized the daughter of House Adair. She sat in rags, a thousand tiny cuts across her flesh, but from each one a scale of iron hung. The mask that gripped her face made it look as if someone had poured molten metal over her head, letting it run in beads across her cheeks before it cooled. For all the blood and iron, however, she seemed relatively unharmed. Indeed, she seemed strong. He was still looking at her when Gwen turned in his direction. Ian realized he was staring, and looked quickly away.

  “What do you think, Ian?” she asked.

  “Of what?” he stuttered.

  “Of what? The gheist, of course. Do you think we can take it?”

  “Oh, well, no,” he said. “I mean, maybe. I don’t really know. Aren’t you the expert in these things, huntress?”

  “That’s a title I have long abandoned,” she said. “But no, I don’t think the iron has been wrought in blood that could kill this god. Nevertheless, there must be something we can do.”

  The emptiness moved closer, brushing aside trees and people as it came. The remnants of the pagan force—those few who remained outside the walls—scattered like the wind. Only those inside Houndhallow remained.

  “Is this what it was like, when I fell on the Fen Gate?” Gwen asked with wonder in her voice. “Was it this hopeless?”

  “It was worse,” Ian said. “There was a Suhdrin army beating down the door, and Sacombre channeling the god of death.”

  “And how did you succeed then, Ian?” she asked, with a hint of humor. “You talked me out of destroying everything, didn’t you?”

  “Aye,” Ian said, “though you weren’t terribly interested in listening.”

  “Somehow I don’t think that’s going to work on this voidfather fellow,” Volent said from the side. The knight marshal of Greenhall squirmed uncomfortably in his saddle. “Still better than facing Sacombre again.”

  “I don’t think any of us will need to do that, ever,” Ian said. “Speaking of which, where is Elsa?”

  “I lost sight of Sir LaFey when we met this lot,” Bruler answered.

  “Gods protect her, then. Or perhaps the gods should protect whoever she’s fighting,” Ian said earnestly. “What are we to do?”

  “Pray to the gods and die heroic,” Volent said. He hefted his lance and checked his nervous horse’s skittering. “Point me to this voidfather. I will settle him, once and for all.”

  “No,” Gwen said. She put a surprisingly gentle hand on Volent’s shoulder, stilling him. “He is the master of the emptiness, and I sense a void in you as well, Sir Volent. Our wounds speak, one to the other.”

  Volent hesitated, but when he looked at Gwen and nodded, Ian saw something he had never seen on the man’s face.

  Fear.

  “Sir Volent and I are useless in this task, I’m afraid,” Gwen said to Ian. “Folam has too much power over us.”

  “Too much… but how is that possible?”

  “Another time, Sir Blakley,” Gwen said. “This falls to you.”

  “If only Elsa were here,” Ian said. He had an uncomfortable feeling in his heart, a twisting that he suddenly realized was worry. Surely Sir Elsa could handle herself, he thought, but something about the way the god of emptiness growled across the horizon made him wonder.

  He was afraid for her, he realized. Afraid.

  “The gods cannot help us, here,” Gwen said firmly. “Whatever power he wields, Folam can cast the blessed into darkness, and the shadowed into light. This battle cannot be won by arcane power.” She nodded at Ian’s hand, still gripping his simple sword. “This must be done with blood and steel.”

  “Blood and steel, and the sweat of honest flesh,” Bruler said gruffly. The old knight lowered his visor and bowed respectfully in his saddle. “That’s as it should be. Lead on, Blakley. I’m willing to die under the banner of a son of Tener.”

  “Gods bless we live through this, but if we die, let us die as sons and daughters of Tenumbra,” Ian said. He shook aside his worry for Sir Elsa, and the resounding terror that struck him on seeing the walls of Houndhallow on fire. “Let’s not let anything else divide us.” He twisted in his saddle and stared at the shimmering gheist. It towered over the castle walls. “So how are we to begin?”

  “I will direct whatever forces I can gather in an assault against the gheist,” Gwen said. “As long as Volent and I keep some distance, we should remain effective. I don’t think we can destroy it, but it must be faced. To keep it from the castle, at least. To save what lives we may.” Gwen stretched her neck, peering among the trees. “However, you must strike the fatal blow, Ian, and it won’t be at the gheist itself. Folam is out there, somewhere, driving this thing on. That is your only chance.”

  “My place is in Houndhallow,” Ian said. “Standing with my sister.”

  “I will see Nessie safe,” Gwen said. “Volent and I will die before any harm comes to her.” Volent looked surprised at that, but after a moment he nodded.

  Ian hesitated, his eyes lingering on the tower keep. He thought he could see a flash of red hair among the battlements, maybe even hear his sister’s voice. Yet Gwen was right. He tore his eyes from the tower. It took all his will, and left a bitter wound in his heart.

  I will return for you, sister.

  “Very well,” he said. The Suhdrin knights, the remaining spears of Blakley, and a handful of pagans stared at him in disbelief. “Are you with me?”

  “The Hound!” Tenny Knox shouted. “The—”

  “Tenumbra!” Ian howled before the boy could continue. “Tenumbra, and the gods!”

  They charged into the night, and the forest swallowed them.

  * * *

  Nessie Blakley was worried. Master Tavvish had stopped answering her questions an hour earlier, and shortly after that had gone down into the tower and never returned. Her personal guard was dwindling away, wi
th spears disappearing into the stairwell, whether to check on Tavvish, add their strength to the fight below, or simply to flee.

  Only Sir Hague and Sir Clough remained. Hague was a grumpy old fellow, and he smelled like cabbage whenever he had had too much to drink the night before, but he stood grimly by and watched the castle burn without flinching. Sir Clough, on the other hand, was hardly older than Ian. Her hands seemed more fit for the harp than the spear, but as the world fell apart around them, Clough didn’t bat an eye.

  “They’re in the keep,” Nessie said to no one in particular. The sounds of fighting echoed up the stairwell like distant drums. She wondered if they’d break her things on the way up, then wondered why she cared about that at all. If the pagans reached the roof, she would be dead, Clough and Hague notwithstanding.

  “Yes, my lady,” Hague said, “but have no worry. Tavvish will be back soon, and then we’ll start the counterattack.

  Nessie didn’t answer that. She knew better, but if it made Hague happy to believe that she didn’t, Nessie could play along. She went to the edge and peered down. The gates were open, and a strange mix of people gathered just outside, talking.”

  “That’s Sir Volent,” she said.

  “Oh, it cannot be the Deadface,” Hague said simply. He shifted uncomfortably in his armor, and a plume of cabbage drifted across the roof. “Gods know where that coward is, but it’s certainly not here.”

  “She’s right,” Clough said simply. “That’s Volent, or I’m the iron hound. And there’s a whole cadre of Suhdrin knights with him.”

  Hague made a disbelieving sound, but limped to the edge of the tower and peered down. He was still muttering to himself when Clough spoke again.

  “Pagans, too, and that… gods be damned if that isn’t Master Ian.”

  “Where?” Nessie asked, failing to keep the excitement out of her voice. “Where is he? Where is my brother? Show me!”

  Clough pointed, but it took several moments for Nessie to connect the wild-looking figure below with the brother she remembered. Then he tossed his head toward the tower, and the gesture was unmistakable. Nessie crawled up on the rampart and started waving her hands.

  “Ian! Ian, we’re up here!” she shouted as loudly as she could. The sound dropped into the courtyard and disappeared among the smoke and screams of dying men. “They’re going to get into the tower, Ian. Help!”

  Beyond the walls, the sky opened, and something empty poured into the world.

  * * *

  Minutes later—long, quiet minutes that Nessie spent staring at the gheist bearing down on her home—Ian gave a single look at the tower and then rode off into the forest. Nessie watched until he was gone. The smoke stung her eyes.

  “He didn’t see me,” Nessie mumbled through her tears. “He didn’t see.”

  * * *

  The forest air stung with smoke and trailing cinders. Ian could barely see the path in front of him. He sawed his reins back and forth to drive his horse past trees that sprang out of the choking miasma in front of him. The going was slow, and behind him Ian could hear stones breaking and people dying.

  Nevertheless, he pushed on.

  Bruler rode close. The old man’s expression was calm, but his knuckles gripped the reins like the last knot on a fraying rope. Ian called over his shoulder.

  “Did you think it would end this way?”

  “At the side of a heretic’s son, hunting some kind of pagan god?” Bruler asked. “More or less, but I don’t think this is the end. Not for me, at least.”

  “No? Old man like you, and you’ve got no fear of dying?”

  “I’ve had plenty of chances to die, young Blakley. Missed every one of them. Now keep your mind on the path.”

  Ian grunted as a fallen timber rushed at him, scraping over it by mere inches and coming down in a bramble. The horses chomped their irritation, but once beyond the tangle, the air seemed to clear. The forest thinned, and here most of the flames had burned out.

  “Think we’re close?” Ian asked as they passed over the remnants of a fire.

  “Closer than this lot,” Bruler said, staring down. They were stomping through a charnel floor of bodies, all burned to a crisp. Ian reared back, but there was so little difference between body and ash that the horses didn’t seem to take notice. Moments later, the brace of Blakley spearmen flowed over the bramble, flanked on both sides by pagan hunters. Each group kept a guard against the other, watching their new allies out of the corners of their eyes.

  “Spread out,” Ian called. “Folam has to be around here somewhere. It doesn’t seem as if he could accomplish anything in that haze, not properly, so he’s probably up high, somewhere the wind can scour. That would give him a good view of the battle, too.”

  “He’s probably along a ley line,” the pagan of bones said quietly. Ian rode closer.

  “What’s your name?”

  “Hassek,” he said, “but you’ll do well to forget it after tonight. It’s the last time we’ll be talking.”

  “Very well, Hassek. What’s this about lies?”

  “Ley lines,” Hassek said scornfully. “You celestials have forgotten so much of the true ways, it’s hardly a wonder the soil rebels against you. The rivers of the earth. Henges string them along, or focus them. There are no henges here, other than the dog shrine, but the lines survive.”

  “Henges,” Bruler said. “The pagan north is supposed to be filled with ’em. Shouldn’t be hard to find one in this mess.”

  “Not true,” Hassek answered. “Suhdrins and their precious priests came through and tore them down. ‘Pulling the teeth of the old gods,’ they said, but all it did was loosen their bonds. Give them freer rein in the world.”

  “He’s right,” Knox said. “There’s not a standing stone in a hundred miles of this place. Church tore them all down, and sanctified the earth.”

  “Not all,” Ian said with a smile. “Do you really believe he’ll be at a henge?”

  “Can’t imagine doing a summoning of that power without tapping into a line,” Hassek said. “Do you think he’s in your shrine, houndsman?”

  “No. There’s another place,” Ian said, turning his horse. “Follow me.”

  * * *

  The doma stood harsh against the sky, the colored panes of its windows dull with the absence of the shining sunlight. The forest all around stood silent, black trees against grim sky, the soft loam of the ground swallowing their footsteps.

  Inside, however, there was singing. The words were foreign, strange, like the broken rambling of a madman. The air above the doma twisted slowly, debris floating in the air like a whirlwind seen in slow motion. The sight of it made Ian’s stomach queasy.

  “Many of the domas were built on henges,” he whispered as they approached. “Places the priests couldn’t make holy, or where the power of the gods was so clearly present that the sanctity lingered, even with the gheists expelled. Ley lines, I suppose.”

  “Godly churches on pagan ground,” Bruler muttered. “I will never understand the north.”

  “Your churches, too,” Ian said. “They were all pagan once. They were all profane.”

  “Not sure how I’m meant to feel about that,” Bruler said, “but it makes me uncomfortable.”

  “Good,” Hassek whispered.

  Ian held up his hand, and the scattered murmuring of their party disappeared. They were on foot, having left the horses below. There were no good roads up to this doma, only a winding path that clung to the rocky hill like a vine, switching back and forth up the steep side. The doma was a shrine used by pilgrims to meditate, or passing youth to dabble in adulthood. The priest who worked and lived there claimed the place was blessed of silence, and the undisturbed hour.

  His body hung outside the door, neck snapped and throat cut. His fat belly, naked, was smeared with blood. Bruler whispered a prayer as they passed.

  The door was broken. Shadows skipped over the windows, the dancing forms of a dozen or more of the void pr
iests. Ian paused beside the entrance, bracing himself. Bruler watched him.

  Ian nodded, and they rushed in.

  62

  THE MEN AND women guarding the voidfather were not priests, or Ian’s attack would have failed before it began. The feeling of sickness that had seized him when he first saw the doma grew sharper with each step. The moments before he and his men stormed the building, the ground shimmered under his feet. Ian’s shoulder slammed into the wooden doors, throwing them wide, and he stumbled inside.

  The interior was nearly empty. The pews and altar had long been removed, but even the scattered furnishings that Ian remembered were gone. Scraps of cloth skated along the perimeter, caught in the wind that rushed in through the open door. A dozen figures sat loose-limbed around the room, surrounding a lone form at the doma’s center.

  They were dressed in black, chain dulled with thick oil that muted the light from a dozen lanterns, and they carried short spears with wicked blades, the hafts bound in leather and steel. As one, they stood and faced the intruders. There were both men and women among them, some tall and thin like Suhdrins, others staring out from the tattooed faces of Tenerran tribesmen.

  At first Ian thought they had been singing, but the voices continued even though none of the figures spoke. The song was coming from the air, rising from no mortal throat, sung by no mortal tongue.

  The last figure was Folam Voidfather, huddled at the center of the room, his forehead bent against a crooked spear that pointed to the sky. Traces of light sparked along his wrinkled cheeks, following the pattern of ink that covered his face, drawn up the shaft of the spear and into the air. The sparks threw more light than seemed possible, casting shadows against the walls that shifted as they spun up toward the ceiling. The whole effect was dizzying, and Ian took a long breath to steady himself inside the door. Bruler, Knox and the others stood at his side, waiting for him to move.