by Ed Greenwood
Hidden—he hoped—in the shadows of two fallen ceiling-beams under a tangle of split and splintered boards, Rod peered at the meager collection he'd retrieved. Most of the cupboard had been full of things that were now broken, and some of them didn't look as if they'd ever been interesting. Six objects, however—the spindle-flashlight one of them—he'd kept, and carried across the room to his newfound refuge to get a better look at.
There was a hexagonal mottled brown stone that filled his palm, worked to a glossy-smooth finish and graven with some complicated-looking runes or designs. It certainly looked magical, and it had been wrapped in what had once been an opulent- looking cloth, and stuffed into an ornately carved coffer that was now so many shards of polished purple-white bone.
And there was a—
Something that was half-roar and half thunderous gurgle of hunger rang out suddenly, from above and behind him.
Rod Everlar didn't wait for the world to turn darker as the great bulk of a surging greatfangs blotted out the sky again. Cradling his loot against his chest, he flung himself across the littered floor in a stumbling, slipping run, put his shoulder to a door he'd looked at on his way to the corner, and kept right on running.
Behind him, walls that no longer had a roof over them, and bared, sagging beams that had once been part of that roof, were driven aside in a loud, approaching thunder.
Crashing into half-seen furniture and hoping by all the fiends in Hell that Malraun hadn't left any traps waiting just ahead, the Lord Archwizard of Falconfar sprinted on into the unknown, fresh fear clutching coldly at his heart.
What would it feel like, to be bitten in half by teeth longer than you were?
THE WINGLESS AUMRARR blinked at a bedchamber ceiling she'd seen before, wondering why it seemed to waver so much.
"Taeauna," she murmured, after a long and dazed time during which the ceiling ceased to cascade past her eyes. "I am Taeauna."
Her face was wet with tears. They dripped from her as she sat up, probing with her fingers at a stinging pain just above her chin. Her fingertips came away laced with blood; she'd bitten through her own lower lip.
Hunh. Small wonder, by the Falcon. The mind of Lorontar had been a dark and terrible thing, and it had been riding hers long enough to leave deep wounds. Even before she'd won herself deeper ones, lashing out at it.
She shuddered at the memory of that awful, awful...
Taeauna found herself up and staggering across the room, feeling ill and wanting just to get away.
She slammed into a wall and clung to it, tugging at it and then caressing it as if it had been the comforting chest of a lover, leaning her cheek against it and gasping out her pain and confusion and the urge to empty her guts...
This was the bedchamber where she'd lain with Malraun, in Darswords, yes. Malraun who was now... no more, his mind blown out like a candle, his body taken over by Lorontar.
Lorontar who was gone, too, but not dead. Somehow she knew that, just as she knew she was Taeauna. Oh, there were shadows in the corners of her mind that were still Lorontar—enough to tell her he yet lived, and enough not to let her forget the cold truth that he could reclaim her mind and body at will, that she was like a child with a knife to his darkly triumphant host of leering, battle-ready warriors—but for now, she was Taeauna.
Free of Malraun's thralldom forever. And for now, free of Lorontar's far deeper and mightier mind-slavery. For now.
Though she had never left the twisted, sweat-drenched tangle of the bed behind her, for a few fierce moments she had stood on the topmost floor of riven Malragard under the open sky, with greatfangs wheeling across it like gigantic bats above her, and Rod Everlar—kind, bumbling, good-hearted Rod Everlar, the only hope Falconfar still had, but little more skilled than a child, for all the fury of his resolve and the might of his Shaping, when he could manage to Shape—fleeing like a terrified rabbit from the lightning-hurling triumph of Malraun. She had seen Malraun seized, hollowed out and enslaved by Lorontar.
The true Lord Archwizard of Falconfar, a mage stronger than any she'd ever felt before, who lived beyond death in a horrible cold, malicious patience... who'd been awaiting Rod Everlar's coming, luring him with spell-spun dream visions.
And with her.
She, Taeauna, had brought Rod here to Falconfar, and Lorontar had made her do it. He'd been at work on her for season after season, twelve winters and more—probably her whole life— without her knowing it.
For all she knew, he'd been at work in the minds of all the Aumrarr, perhaps even seeing to who they bred with, to fashion them into his unwitting tools—ever better tools—to turn up Shapers as miners turn up gems amid rocks. To find Shapers, and bring them to him.
So Lorontar could use them to reshape Falconfar to what he wanted it to be, and in time to come leave undeath for full life again.
Taeauna blinked, turning away from the wall to find herself panting, knuckles at her mouth. Now how had she known that?
He hadn't managed it, though. Yet.
He was still stealing the bodies of others, burning out their minds and riding their bodies until death came for them or he tired of them. Or a better body came within reach.
What body was he in right now? Malraun's—or had something better happened along?
Taeauna stared down at the bed, forever empty of the cruel wizard who'd forced her upon it—then shook herself to put such thoughts behind her, and strode away.
Her armor was a tangle of straps and plates, in the corner where she'd so hastily torn it off under his mind-goading, to bare herself to him. She plucked up the shiny-worn, smooth, sweat-soaked leather jack she wore beneath its plates, and pulled it on.
The straps still needed mending, the buckle that rode on her left hip still bit into her. Familiar, reassuring; she reached for her crotch-cloth, with its long laces.
She had to get to Malragard. Malraun was gone—and that was one good thing for Falconfar, even if a worse wizard than he'd ever been was now striding the kingdoms in his body—but the man he'd been trying to slay, that any one of the six greatfangs might well have been about to devour, might yet live.
And that man, that bumbling Rod Everlar, was the last hope of Falconfar.
She believed that still, even if that belief had been something Lorontar had birthed in her, had nurtured into a fierce certainty over years of deft dream-weaving. Seeing Rod's face before her now, conjured up out of memory—mouth agape in astonishment, eyes full of that familiar, infuriating helplessness, as lost as a rabbit in her grasp—Taeauna found herself smiling.
Even when the armor-plate that always dug into her ribs did so again now, bringing the familiar raw pain as it sliced anew into the deep weal in her flank, she smiled.
She believed.
Oh, yes, she did. That helpless, bumbling idiot was the hope of Falconfar.
If she could keep him alive long enough to destroy Lorontar—for he was the only one who could, if anyone could—and become the Lord Archwizard in truth, that hope might just become something more.
Giving her—giving all Falconfar—a world free of wizards fell and mighty enough to be called Dooms, and all their hosts of lorn and Dark Helms and greatfangs. A place where veldukes like Darendarr Deldragon could rise to rule well, and the gruffly honest likes of Eldalar of Hollowtree and Tindror of Tarmoral could flourish in their smaller domains, and folk could enjoy seasons of peace and good harvests again.
"My thoughts," she told herself huskily, finding herself about to choke on fresh tears—she didn't have the Falcon-be-damned time for them, just now—"are like a bad ballad. A proper weepwailer."
She swung her heavy shoulder-plates over her head and into place, smacking herself across the face with at least two of their dangling buckles. As usual.
"Ow," she said. True Aumrarr suffer in silence, the saying went. A stupid saying, now that she thought about it. So was that more of Lorontar's meddling, or herself, freed of it?
She shrugged and set to work
finding straps and buckles and mating them up properly. Being as there was no nimble-fingered maid or Stormar shieldguard to do that for her.
Malraun would probably have bedded them and then blasted them to ashes, if there had been.
Just as he would have served her, if she hadn't been useful as a lure for Rod Everlar, a handy lass in which to slake his lusts—and a thrall he could send into peril, or escape if need be into the mind of, just as Lorontar had done.
Now, that would have been utter doom, if Malraun and Lorontar had each found her mind a mite crowded with the other one there, and decided to fight it out inside her head.
She shuddered at a brief, vivid image of her head bursting on her shoulders like rotten fruit, drew on her gauntlets, shifted the hilts of her scabbarded blades and reached for her helm.
With all wizards out of her head for the moment—forever, if she could manage it, though that was more grim determination than anything she had any power to prevent—it was time to get back to work. She had to salvage all she could of Falconfar from all wizards. Which, right now, meant rescuing Rod Everlar.
She strode across the room, flung wide the door—and came to an abrupt halt. The room beyond was icily silent, and the men in it had swords drawn.
Two of them, whose tense shoulders were right in front of her, were the guards charged by Malraun to let no one approach the bedchamber. They were facing down five warriors; four expressionless bodyguards and their burly, glowering master—who was one of Malraun's army commanders. Korauth of Belamber, fearless but with a temper to match his flame-red hair, scowling brows and full beard. He was scowling right now, his helm in the crook of his arm just as Taeauna's was, and full, freshly-polished armor gleaming on him.
He hadn't been one of Taeauna's favorites when at his best, and he was far from at his best now.
"Wench!" he snapped, "where's your master?"
"Elsewhere," she flung back at him, and to the guards added a curt, "Stay your blades."
The doorguards obeyed her, but Korauth's bodyguards did not. She gave each of them a long, cold stare, but all that accomplished was to make them shift their swords from raised in general menace to pointing right at her.
"Disobedience," she observed softly, "tends to end in death."
"Enough, bed-lass; you don't command here!"
Taeauna turned her stare to Korauth. "As a matter of fact, Korauth, I do. You can dispute that with Malraun if you'd like to... but I'll wager much you won't like to." She raised an eyebrow in mocking query. "Well?"
"Well, there's no time for this foolishness!" Korauth started to pace, waving his helm for emphasis. It took him only one sighing whirl around back to face her to tell Taeauna that he was deeply worried beneath his bluster. "We have troubles!"
"Troubles, lord?" Taeauna lowered her voice and stepped closer, like a confidante rather than a challenger. This man was scared.
"Lorn have been seen lurking," he blurted. "Not once, but scores of times now. They're spying on us, following us—drawing back from battle when we try to cross swords with them. They all have swords, too!"
"And?" she asked gently, knowing there was more. Lorn in the Raurklor were a real danger, but hardly something new.
"Greatfangs have been seen in the sky! A line of them, low down yonder—" He waved an arm at the wall behind him. "Winging their way, straight across. Six of them."
He started pacing again. "More than that, small magics cast by Lord Malraun have been fading away; the glow-lamps, the horse-calmings. The men are unsettled."
He waved his other arm, and added heavily, "And none of us battle-lords know what to tell them."
Then, as she'd known he would, Korauth whirled around to face her and snarled, "So, woman: where by the flying Falcon is Malraun? Rutting takes not that long, he's never been seen to need much sleep, and we'd have felt it if he'd been spinning mighty spells in there—so what have you done with him?"
THE GLOW BOBBED with Rod as he ran, clutched against his chest with everything else. He should be using it like a flashlight, but that would draw the greatfangs right to him—
Behind him, the ceiling was torn away like a kid tearing aside cellophane to get at a toy underneath. No, not a toy. Chocolate. A big hunk of rich, succulent chocolate.
And he was that hotly-sought treat. Never mind the glow from the spindle, it was after him anyway!
Get lower down, deeper into Malragard, down into the lowest cellars where the ceilings would be layers of solid stone, not timber beams and cross-boards and—
Rod blundered into the edge of an unseen doorframe and through it, running on until the floor suddenly opened up under his boots and he fell—headlong down bruisingly-hard stone steps.
It was a long and steep flight of steps. He'd never been so happy to fall down stairs in his life, but the third bounce spilled some of his loot out of his grasp. Rod let it all go, making a grab only for the spindle-light, raking it in as he fetched up in a ball on a stone step with a chipped, saw-sharp edge.
"I'm a writer," he gasped into the darkness, feeling that edge biting into his shoulder, "not a fucking warrior—or cross-country runner, for that matter!"
Rod's breath ran out before he could vent any more, and he lay there panting for what seemed a long time—as more of the tower groaned and shrieked and was torn away, somewhere back above him—until he could find strength and air enough to roll over, banging his knees and elbows, and aim the spindle-light.
He willed it brighter, and it obligingly showed him that these stairs ran down not to a door, but into the open darkness of a lower level, with passages running off—cold, dank stone, all blocks of different sizes, fitted together, with old mold everywhere on them—in several directions.
Not deep enough. He needed solid stone around him to be safe from the talons behind him, though there was always the risk of being entombed by all their digging. Surely the greatfangs wouldn't keep after him forever, when there must be easier prey around? After all, he hadn't done them any harm; their rage couldn't be at Rod Everlar.
Oh, shit. Unless a wizard was guiding their thoughts. Using them, like trained dogs, to do his digging for him. No, worse than trained—mind-thralled, enslaved to be as controlled as the knives and forceps a surgeon held in his hands when cutting into a patient.
Urrgh. Enough of that.
Rod banished thoughts of spurting blood and steaming red innards and got himself down the rest of the steps just as fast as he could scoop up the things he'd dropped. One of them had broken in half, and he stopped long enough to peer hard at it in the light of the spindle, then shrug and toss its pieces away. It didn't look as if it had ever held magic, but if it had, all that power was fled now. It was just broken.
Someday, if he ever became Lord Archwizard in truth, he'd come back and find those two pieces and Shape them back together and make it something magic. Someday.
If ever.
Right now, he had four—no, five; one of them split into two about three strides along it—passages to choose from, and a greatfangs right at the head of the stair now, its long talons reaching down...
Rod chose the largest-looking passage and sprinted along it, arms wrapped more securely around his loot. What need would a powerful wizard have to hide the way to his lower cellars? Who would dare go snooping after his secrets, when an invisible, silently waiting spell could turn them into frogs if they reached the wrong place?
Wait. Turn him into frog, too?
"Shit," he gasped aloud, running hard. "Shit shit shit shit shit." Ah, we writers; so eloquent, aren't we?
He found himself grinning at that—a grin that widened as the passage came to an end in a stair leading down, a stair that for the
first time had walls and—yes!—a ceiling of rough, chisel-scarred stone. Solid rock at last!
It could end up being his tomb, yes, but then so could any patch of grass or castle room in all Falconfar, with a greatfangs—or six—chasing him. And the one fate might lurk in the fut
ure, whereas the other awaited him right now.
The stairs started to curve, angling around to the right and becoming even steeper. Colder, too—and for the first time it occurred to Rod that the magic that gave the spindle its glow might have limits. He'd better know how to grope his way back to this stair in utter darkness, from wherever he ended up at the bottom of it.
Which was going to be someplace pretty darned deep, by the looks of things. A vast labyrinthine world in the darkness under the earth, like in so many fantasy novels he'd read; so many endless copies of Moria?
The stairs took a last abrupt hook to the right and ended, in another level of passages and doors that looked very like the one he'd just left.
It was cold here, and very quiet; the noises of Malragard being destroyed had faded away entirely, leaving him alone in stillness.
Where Rod stood, not fleeing anything for the first time in ages, realizing suddenly how tired he was.
Bone-effin'-weary. Oh, his thoughts were racing along (here I am, not knowing where I am or what to do next or what all this stuff is that I'm carrying—as usual); he felt no urge or need to yawn or anything like that. It was his arms and legs, bruised and numb from all the unaccustomed work he'd demanded of them, that were tired right out.
Not that anything like a soft bed looked likely, down here in all this stone. Still, perhaps behind one of these doors there'd be a heap of—of—turnips, or something, that he could just flop down on, making sure he propped the door open with a lot of them, and...
The nearest door was black, blackness that crumbled and flaked off at his touch. Iron, or something like it, painted black. Counterweighted, so loose in its stone frame that it couldn't possibly be rusted shut—or ever rust shut, for that matter—and adorned with the symbol of the Falcon in flight.
Which meant... what?
A temple? Something sacred? He had no idea.
Rod sighed, hoping he'd not be facing some fearsome monster in a moment, and tugged the door wide.
Silence. Dark, chill, still silence. A smallish stone room—no other doors—with irregular dark heaps all around its walls. Had he found his turnip-pile? He couldn't smell anything particularly bad, or for that matter anything at all...