by Anthology
“Who are you?” Roshar queried, still on edge.
“Gilliam.” A long swig this time. “Used to be a watchman for this glorious hellhole you see before you.” He licked purple liquid from his lips. “Course, that changed when they came.”
“Who came?”
“Not sure. Came with the mist. Carried no banner and no sigil.” Swig, slosh, swallow. “They pillaged the town, slaughtered us all. Women and children alike. We barely even had a chance. Been hiding in here ever since.” He walked into the house, beckoning to Roshar. “And then I found this one.” Chained to the wall by his wrists was a dead soldier. Bloodied daggers were strewn about. Roshar stooped down next to him. He noticed the man was missing a couple of fingers. “You can ask him questions, but I don’t think he’s going to answer.” Another swig. “Not anymore.”
“Did he talk?”
“Not at first.” Gilliam cursed and hurled the bottle on the ground, scattering glass shards across the floor. He retrieved another from the cupboard, popping it open with blackened teeth and spat out the cork. “Took a while, but he talked in the end. Said that he came from the Kingsguard.”
“The Kingsguard?” That didn’t make sense. “Why would the Kingsguard do this?”
“That’s what I asked him. He just told me to ask King Valloth when I see him. Then he died.”
“He didn’t say anything about the mist?”
“He did. Said it was the King’s doing. And his pet bitch.”
“Hmm.” It was better than nothing. Roshar stood up, his mail clinking. “Then I’d better get going.”
“Where?”
‘The castle, obviously.” The door squeaked with protest as Roshar shoved it open and trudged outside, the rancid air filling his nose. Gilliam followed, still drinking. “If the answer’s there, I’ll find it.”
Gilliam snorted wine out of his nostrils. He was still chuckling as he scraped it away. “You’re going to march up to the castle and interrogate the King?” He shook his head in bewilderment. Roshar stood there, silent. The smile wilted. “You’re serious.”
“Got any better ideas?” Over the hills a wolf let loose a deathly howl. “We’ll all be dead soon enough.”
“Aye, true.” Gilliam seemed to be thinking. “Oh well. Might as well go down fighting.”
“What?”
“I’m not going to die here.” Gilliam flung the bottle away and scooped up the bearded axe leaning against the door. “Who wants to live forever, eh? Besides, you need someone to watch over you, right?”
Roshar bit his lip. He couldn’t very well say no. And whatever happened, he didn’t want to die alone.
*
The town went downhill from that point. Carts and bloodied weapons littered the streets, the flagstones painted with sickly green moss. Glass crunched underfoot. And everywhere he looked there were cudgeled bodies, all rotting and stinking, shriveling to a leathery brown. The sight made his skin crawl and his veins prickle.
Gilliam almost seemed to enjoy his discomfort, clapping him on the back like an older brother. Roshar forced himself not to recoil. “You get used it to after a while.” He stepped over a stack of shattered shields, lovingly emblazoned with House motifs. “It does get lonely. The dead don’t say much.”
Roshar was beginning to realize that Gilliam wasn’t quite sane.
“This way.” The man beckoned to what looked like the remains of a forge. The smelter hadn’t been heated up in some time now. Roshar followed him inside the house, still uncertain.
It was a somber sight, seeing all the weapons collecting dust and slowly starting to rot. Slits of grey light poured in through the windows, drawing pale lines across the flagstones. Roshar ran his fingers along the rows of swords, shards of rust peeling away at his touch.
“Here.” Gilliam threaded his way through to the back of the shop, fingers finding a hidden door in a small crevice. He flung it open, dust stirring in the watery gloom.
“You might want to get one of those.” Gilliam pointed to several torches hanging on the wall, tips swathed in bandages. Roshar fetched two of them, soaking them in a basin of black oil.
“How do you propose we light them?” asked Roshar.
Gilliam didn’t answer. He clenched his fists and murmured quietly, beads of sweat forming on his brow. His palms snapped open and the torches blazed to life, chasing the darkness away.
Roshar looked at Gilliam. “You’re a fire mage, aren’t you?”
“Is it that obvious?” Gilliam scooped up a torch for himself, the light playing sinister shapes across his face. “I was taking lessons. I was damn good at it, too. Then my master saw fit to die and that was it.” He beckoned towards the back room. Roshar noticed a gaping hole in the floor. “You coming or not?”
Gilliam hopped into it, landing with a thud. Roshar cursed and followed him down.
*
Roshar kept up with Gilliam’s pace, maintaining a slow jog through the passageway. It was threateningly claustrophobic in here. The light peeled blackness away from the walls as they advanced.
“How do you know about this?” Roshar asked.
Gilliam chuckled. “Used it often myself back in the day. Paid the princess a visit now and then. When she learned of her arranged marriage they became less frequent.” He shrugged. “I expect she’s dead now.”
“You think the King’s dead as well?” Roshar brushed filthy cobwebs out of his face. He noticed that the trail was slowly inclining. He was also starting to have that prickly feeling in his system, like the one in Gaeon’s hut when he brought out the arrows. It was only mild, but it pulsed through him nonetheless. He squashed it down the best he could.
“Dunno. You heard what the soldier said. We’ll go from there.” The man barked out a brittle laugh. “What do we have to lose?”
After what seemed like hours, days, months, years, Gilliam halted. The dancing flames exposed a wall with a rickety ladder leading upwards. “We’re here.” Gilliam clamped a hand over his torch, gutting it out. He didn’t seem to be in the slightest pain. He placed one foot on the lowest rung and started to climb with slow rhythm. The thing didn’t look safe, bound together with string and twine, but it was the best thing they had. Roshar followed him up, the tortured wood groaning beneath his feet.
“Stop.” Roshar froze, his fingers wrapped around a rung. Gilliam seemed to be pushing against something hard above them, swearing and grunting from the effort. At last it seemed to give away and he shoved the hatch open. Light poured in, sweet, and delicious. Roshar clambered up the last few rungs and hoisted himself out of the hole. He found himself what seemed to be a large storage room, steel rimmed kegs of mead, sour wine and dark ale stacked along the walls. They’d been chopped into splinters, the colours gushing out and bleeding out on the floor. Light eased through a glass-stained window.
“All that fine drink, all gone to waste.” Gilliam nudged an empty barrel with his foot. “Aha. No wonder I couldn’t lift the hatch.” He pointed to the shrunken corpse curled up on the ground. “Out of all the places to die…”
Roshar peeked through the window. They were high up, probably on one of the castle’s top floors. He could see the yards, towers and steeples, but the distance was obscured by the mist, thick, hazy and impenetrable as always.
“Oh,” he murmured to himself. This was not good.
“What is it now?” Gilliam demanded.
“Look.” Roshar pointed downwards. Marching in the streets, in the courtyards, on the flat roofs, on the battlements, were countless guards, all armed and armored. There didn’t seem to be an objective, any order, rank or discipline. Ballistae sat useless and gibbets still held ancient skeletons in their bellies. They plodded around, sitting about and leaning against the walls.
“Good thing we didn’t come that way.” Gilliam sauntered towards the door. “You coming?”
“Can’t you feel that?” The sensation was back, and it wasn’t just uncomfortable this time. His mouth felt dry and his
intestines seemed to be trying to tie themselves into bows. It was working its way under his veins, turning his blood to gravel.
Gilliam gave a low chortle. “Course I can. Means we’re getting close.” He swung the door open and made a mocking bow. “After you.”
*
The scent of death hung heavily in the air. The hallways were smeared with grime, bodies pinned to the walls with iron arrows. What was once ornate furniture had been splintered into countless wooden fragments. Paintings had been stripped down and shredded, vases smashed, old plates of armor and bloodied gold coins scattered about the floor. Roshar had never seen so much gold! And there was no one to use it, no one to spend it.
“Ah.” Several soldiers were sprinting down the hall, rusty armor clanking as they moved, brandishing halberds and falchions. Gilliam stood there, his fists clenched, perfectly still with his eyes fastened shut.
“What the hell are you doing?” Roshar yelled.
No answer. Then Gilliam’s eyes flipped open and beamed a crimson red. He stepped forward and clapped his hands together with a boom. A fire sprouted up in the middle of the soldiers, engulfing them in a roaring, scorching cocoon. Tapestries on the walls were eaten away in seconds. Men reeled away, burning and screaming and tumbling.
It didn’t take long before they were all a smouldering pile of bodies, ropey coils of smoke spiraling to the blackened roof. Gilliam turned around, sweat gushing out of his pores. He nodded towards the sizzling bodies. “Hungry?”
Roshar just shook his head and tried not to gag. Gilliam chuckled, then led the way through an arching doorway, revealing more staircases. This had to be the way. Roshar was aware of the pain mounting with almost every step, scrubbing away at his bones—
Gilliam twirled his axe. “You may want to step aside.”
“Wha—” Roshar threw himself forward as a portcullis gate guillotined down, bolts slotting into place and dividing them from the castle’s entrance. Gilliam’s face split in a grin, tapping the broken wheel spoke, the rusty chains collapsed on the floor like a lifeless snake. He gave the humongous gate a rattle. It refused to budge.
He grinned again. “Now let’s see them try and follow us.”
“And what if we want to get out again?” asked Roshar curtly.
Gilliam just laughed.
*
Gilliam stood in front of an ordinary looking iron-bound door. “Can you feel it?”
Roshar nodded as the pain flushed through him like a river, damn near forcing him to his knees. They had to be close.
Gilliam scraped open the door. It seemed to be a medium between a library and laboratory, bursting with old tomes and manuscripts. There had to be thousands of them, black ink on faded parchment, recalling the histories and the songs and the battles and the kings. None of which mattered anymore. The desks were cluttered with dried herbs and resin, gnarled roots and metallic utensils. Drawers hung half open like tongues, more papers spilling out.
And in the middle was a woman. She was small and lithe, her hair flowing down in beautiful ebony waves. She turned around and gazed at him with brilliant blue eyes that pierced into his heart. In her hand was a small green herb. She placed in back on the bench with care. “Hello there.”
…it was the King’s doing. And his pet bitch. “Who are you?” Roshar demanded, drawing his sword as spikes of pain skewered through him.
“Kill her! Now!” Gilliam made an attempt at springing forward, axe in hand. Yet he seemed to freeze like an ant in amber, his silhouette outlined with the rippling of air.
“Don’t listen to him my dear. He’s not important.” Her voice wafted over to him in silky ribbons. He found his sword grip loosening, clattering to the ground. “You’re here now. That’s all that matters.”
Roshar nodded vigorously, turning away from Gilliam. “Yes, yes that’s right.” He found himself drawn to her, this mysterious woman with a voice like the gods. How could one possibly resist?
“Come closer, slowly now.” Roshar obeyed, hanging on every word. She padded towards him, something in her hand. A familiar voice called him from far away. What was it saying? Roshar shoved it away. It didn’t matter. Nothing mattered anymore. Everything would be fine.
Her body was the center of the room, center of the entire world. She smiled, subtle sunlight glistening on her hair with an indigo shimmer. She lifted her hand, showing a dagger. But that didn’t matter. She wouldn’t hurt him. She couldn’t.
“Poor fool,” she said, her voice draping over him like honey, swathing him in syrupy bliss. “It’s too late for you. It’s too late for us all.”
She raised the dagger.
Gilliam let out an ear-splitting roar, snapping Roshar out of his trance. He remained rooted to the ground, yet managed to swing his arms. His axe went scything through the air with a whistle. The woman sprung backwards with an impossible agility, the glinting blade nearly cleaving her in half. It smashed into the table with a shower of splinters, throwing up a cloud of resin.
“You.”A cold smile twisted on her face and she spun around, flexing her hand to fling the dagger in Gilliam’s direction. Roshar fumbled for his sword, yanking it out with a sharp scrape and without thinking thudded it into the bridge of her skull. He staggered backwards, the world swimming around him as white noise whined in his ears. He sucked in a ragged breath and looked at the woman, the sword well and truly buried in her head. She had to have been a mage some sort. A powerful one, too. Was she the cause of all this?
“That wench has a good throwing arm.” With a lead heart, Roshar noted the dagger protruding from Gilliam’s chest, wedged between his ribs. He collapsed on the stone floor, breathing hard. Roshar knew it was over for him. They both knew it. He stooped low, holding Gilliam’s coarse hand as the life poured out of him.
“You finish this, you hear?” ordered Gilliam through bloody teeth. “Find King Valloth and kill him. I didn’t come this far for nothing.” He spat weakly, tears welling in his rheumy eyes. “Leave me. I’ll see my family soon.”
Roshar nodded, swallowing the lump in his throat. He’d seen many men die, some old, some young, all trying to put on a brave face in their final moments, trying to be heroic men. They never succeeded. Never. No matter how bold and hardened, in their final moments they all wanted their mothers. To be in the arms of their loved ones.
Roshar stayed with Gilliam, this madman who’d gone through hell with him. Roshar stayed with him until he stopped breathing.
*
There was no better place to find a King than the throne room.
It was almost anticlimactic, seeing King Valloth sitting on his rusted throne, his pathetic figure swaddled in faded robes. He’d been a notoriously obese man, his face pasty and rosy. Now he was bitterly thin, loose flesh spilling down in fleshy folds. He didn’t even look up as Roshar approached. The bodies of his vanguard were piled against the throne, a mountain of rusted mail and greatswords.
“Someone finally made it.” His voice was low and quiet, but somehow it carried an eerie force that echoed throughout the entire room. “I’m afraid you’re too late.”
“Your mage said the same thing,” said Roshar. A javelin of pain shot through him. He absorbed the impact with a shudder.
Valloth looked up, revealing a sunken face with hollow eyes the colour of festered flesh. “Is she dead?”A pause. “It should have been done years ago.”
Roshar blinked. “What?”
“It was her,” Valloth hissed, his voice grating against Roshar’s skull. “That stupid woman and her experiments. They caused all this.”
“How?”
“It got out of control,” Valloth murmured. “We just wanted to unravel the enigmas of the world. But the power was too great to contain. So many things went wrong. So much death. That ghastly poison.” He nodded weakly towards the glass window. “It took hold of the kingdom. It created the mist. It drove men mad, turned them into the bloodthirsty soldiers you’ve fought your way through.”
Roshar stepped forward and was immediately hit by a sudden force that ripped through his stomach, almost doubling him over. He gritted his teeth and took another step, the fibers in his legs burning. “There had to be a way,” he rasped, “to stop it.”
“There was.” The King shut his eyes and lowered his voice down to a whisper. “I was greedy. I saw the power she created and I took it. I didn’t know how powerful it would become. Now it resides in me. I’m its vessel.” He hunched over with a hacking cough, putrid saliva dripping from his lips. “I could have halted it if I took my own life. But I could not perform the deed. Now I don’t have the strength to stand up.” His eyes seemed to bore into Roshar, burn through him. “It scrapes a man clean. Gives him power and tears it away, piece by piece.”
Roshar felt the sickly stuff seeping down his throat, spreading through his system. He had to hurry. “I can still do want you couldn’t.”
Valloth froze, then gave the faintest of nods. “Yes. Do it. Quickly, now.”
Roshar tightened his grasp on the sword’s hilt. “Where would you like me to strike?”
“No!”Valloth’s voice intensified, a raw lust for control that nearly blasted Roshar off his feet. His face sagged, his eyes becoming black as night, black as ink. “Don’t you dare take my power away!”
The pain was nearly engulfing him now, his muscles contracting in spasm, bones rattling in their cages. Tears of agony were trickling down his cheeks, old wounds weeping blood. He started up the dais, the thrumming in his skull mounting by the moment. Every cell in his body begged him to leave, to turn away and run. He thought of Robin and the way she would smile at him. She started to slip away between his fingers like ashes in the roaring wind. He clamped his teeth together and latched onto her memory, the last thing he had and took another step. And another. And another.
There was a shriek from Valloth as he readied his sword, nearly blowing out his eardrums. “Don’t! Stop!” He was scrambling back, trying to hug his throne for protection “It’s MINE!”