by Ed Greenwood
He took a cautious step closer to the pile on his right, aiming the spindle-light as if it was some sort of weapon, to get a better look at it. Were those cobwebs, or—?
The pile moved, not just in front of his eyes but all around him. Rod backed away hastily, choking on sudden fright.
All around him things were erupting, shedding the enshrouding darkness. It was crumbling, falling away like loose black dirt—to reveal brown and yellow bones.
Bones now standing upright, moving in eerie silence. No, not standing, attached to each other but floating, dangling in the air like marionettes without strings. Hanging-on-nothing arrays of bones, with dark and eyeless skulls hovering in the air above all the rest.
Skeletons, dozens of human skeletons, all of them clutching rusted, jagged remnants of swords.
Swords they were pointing at him.
"HOW DO WE know you're telling us the truth?" Norgarl growled, waving his hairy hands. "How can we know, with the Lord Malraun nowhere to be found? Why, you could have murdered him and rolled his body under the bed, and we'd be none the wiser!"
"No, she couldn't," one of the brothers Esdagh said flatly. "I sent in some good men to look around. No bloodstains, no one hidden anywhere, alive or dead. No sign of the wizard, either, beyond what the two of them did to the bed—fair tore it apart, they did. And yes, we looked under it."
The other Esdagh—Mulzurr, the silent one—leered at Taeauna, but she ignored him, glaring coldly at Norgarl and Korauth. Hairy, unlovely, coarse old Norgarl had brought the largest band of warriors into Horgul's host, and everyone saw him as the senior commander in the army. Korauth, with his fiery temper and fearlessness, was the loudest of the army commanders, the most feared. The most likely to cause trouble.
The other battle-lords standing around the fire—Lanneth and Mulzurr Esdagh, ever-present axes at their belts; tall Tamgrym Buckhold, staring out at the world through his mass of scars, as terse as ever; and the old, hollow-eyed Stormar, Dzundivvur, who looked more like a worn-out merchant than a warrior—watched Taeauna to see what she'd do. What she said and did now would decide them, for her or bloodily against her. And with no wings, she couldn't just flap out of reach and avoid these butchers—yet with all of them knowing she was an Aumrarr, she already had their mistrust. Men who live by the sword grew up hating and fearing the winged warrior-women who won battles serving themselves, disdaining kings and coin.
They were all suspicious of her, too, and no wonder. Malraun had been firm enough in his oft-repeated orders that after his army took Darswords, they'd be pressing on to Ironthorn. Right swiftly, too; just as soon as they'd rested, eaten, seized food and a little plunder, and done enough to their wounds to be trudging on again.
Not that they were quite ready yet. If they turned and started striding right now, charging on to Ironthorn, they'd be thrusting their noses into a real fight, quite possibly a battle or three more than they could win. Standing over this fire now, with Darswords just fallen and blood still wet on the ground, every last battle-lord felt he was too worn out to take Ironthorn, just yet.
Taeauna knew this, but also knew they'd be slow to admit it. Warriors of their ilk stood iron-strong, cursing all misfortunes by the Falcon, and never admitted mistakes or weaknesses—or much in the way of prudence, either.
If they did not, they were not battle-lords for long.
"My lords," she said crisply, keeping her voice as deep and hard as any of theirs, slowly and deliberately moving her stare from one face to the next as she spoke, "we all heard Lord Malraun's commands regarding Ironthorn. We all know his intentions. Yet I should not have to remind any of you that he is a wizard, one of the mightiest in all Falconfar, and that the affairs of wizards can change in an instant—and that wizards can travel across Falconfar in the instant after that. I say to you again that my lord has done just that, departing the room we shared by means of his magic, hieing himself to his tower of Malragard and ordering me to lead this army to join him there."
She fell silent, waiting, to let them consider the wisdom of disobeying a man who could blast them to ashes in an instant, too—but the moment Norgarl's rising rumble told her he was gathering himself to speak, she added, "So let us ready ourselves for march, as speedily as we can, and take ourselves to Harlhoh, and Malragard. To do battle, if need be, when we arrive there.
These are Malraun's orders, and I will follow them. I should have thought there would be no question at all of you not doing the same. Certainly I would not want to stand in that man's boots, who dared to defy Malraun the Matchless, and then found himself facing Malraun to answer for it."
"We have only your word, wench, that he gave such orders!" Korauth burst out, leaning forward in the trembling eruption of his rage. "And I for one trust not an Aumrarr—"
Taeauna yawned, sighed, and let boredom slide clearly onto her face, shifting to settle herself into a comfortable pose for a long, patient listening. This raised a smirk from the brothers Esdagh and from Tamgrym, but brought Korauth around the fire in a lurching charge, roaring in fury as he flung out both hands to throttle her.
Tamgrym moved not a muscle, standing like a statue as Korauth tried to bull right through him, and their collision sent the burlier man reeling. He kicked his way through the fringe of the fire in a shower of snapping sparks, waving his arms wildly to keep from toppling into it—and avoiding the flood of hot broth that spewed out of the blackened cauldron as it lurched on its fire-frame—and so reached her off-balance and seething.
Taeauna ducked low, more to get beneath his belly and avoid his hands than to menace his cods, but Korauth flung down one arm to shield himself from any blow she might land. Which allowed her to twist as she kicked herself upright, pinning that arm against him with her hip, and punch him in the neck and throat with all the strength and weight she could manage.
Only the sidelong, upthrust angle of her strike kept Korauth's throat from being crushed. His bearded chin snapped up, head twisted around and roar becoming a shriek, and he took two awkward steps and flopped down on his face, bouncing limply, and lay very still.
No one went to check on him, though his bodyguards turned sharply from their cooking-fire, not far off, to stand uncertainly with hands on the hilts of their blades, and stare.
Taeauna ignored them. "My lords," she told the rest of the commanders flatly, "I have been given clear orders by my lord Malraun. I will follow them. I trust you'll do the same, because unlike Korauth, I deal in trust. Fighting alongside men who stand true makes me trust them."
She looked around at the battle-lords, one after another, keeping her eyes moving as she added, "If you decide to defy Malraun's orders—whether you seek to pass this off as spurning my lies about those very clear commands, or for your own reasons—you will disappoint me greatly, but I'll not seek to strike you down, or make war on you and the warriors you lead. Unless you offer violence to those of us still loyal to Lord Malraun, of course. Otherwise, to spare lives and preserve all I can of this army, I shall stay my hand. However, knowing Malraun as I do, more closely than all of you, for reasons you very well know—" She waved one hand across her chest, then down at her crotch. "—I do not think it likely that he will stay his hand, having learned of your treachery, when next he sees you. Govern yourselves accordingly."
She went to Korauth's sprawled form, faced them across it as she knelt to roll him over, and added, "I will be gathering all loyal to Lord Malraun to march out of Darswords just as fast as we can. Set the guards at the wells to taking turns drawing water to fill flasks and skins."
Norgarl frowned. "Many streams cross the trail to Harlhoh," he growled, fresh suspicion clear in his voice.
"The faster men march, the more they need to drink. I mean to be hurrying to Malragard," Taeauna told him.
Under her hand, Korauth stirred and groaned.
Norgarl bent closer. "Is he—?"
"Struck senseless, but coming out of it. Though I rather doubt he'll have more sense than h
e did before," she replied, stroking Korauth's cheek as if he was her son. "He might not have much of a voice for a time, either, but I suspect I'll not be the only one to welcome that."
Every one of the men around the fire chuckled.
WHEN MORNINGS WERE bright and rainless, it was the habit of Tethtyn Eldurant, youngest underscribe to Horgul's new Lord of Hawksyl, to invent an errand—or more often, trumpet a task deliberately left undone from the day before, to save on expensive candles—that would take him from the market hall to the records rooms up at the Hawksylhar. Not to dawdle or hide from work, but just to walk in the sun and have a few moments to himself to think.
Thinking aloud, usually, murmuring some of the thoughts that rose unbidden in his mind and tumbled all over each other in their usual flood. Ideas—crazed notions, those who knew him called them—had come to him for as long as he could remember, and lust as often had come tumbling out of his mouth.
Yet everything had changed when the Army of Liberation had come riding into Hawksyl, and not just the changes all knew about, the fires and death and local lords swept away. No, something had changed for Tethtyn, in an instant and forever, his body catching fire inside at the mere sight of a spell hurled by the wizard they called Malraun the Matchless.
Or perhaps more than mere sight. That crawling magic had sent men staggering all around him, and felled dead the warriors it had been aimed at farther off, but it had left young Tethtyn quivering. Staring in helpless longing at the distant dark-robed mage, Tethtyn had found his body shuddering from ears to fingertips with a power that thrilled him utterly, a tingling that would not fade, as the blood in his head pounded and warmed as if it was afire.
The sweating heat had gone as suddenly as it had come, but the tingling hadn't faded for days, until long after the army had marched on and Tethtyn's quill had been put to the service of Lord Bralgarth, the cold-eyed, limping warrior who'd been given the lordship of Hawksyl "until Horgul rode back in."
Bralgarth had needed a few folk able to read, write, and count to keep records for him, and by the time he'd finished executing those who tried to steal from the treasury and flee, and those who tried to poison him and all his warriors at table, there were only three Hawksarn left who had such skills—and stammeringly young, workshy Tethtyn was one of them.
Oh, folk didn't scorn or begrudge him serving Bralgarth—one did what one had to, to keep one's hide intact—but his new position left Tethtyn even more alone than before. Not many Hawksarn could freely enter the gates of the small but formidable Hawksylhar on its high ridge, and those within were usually grim warriors from the army, cooks and maids who did their work with fearful efficiency, keeping to themselves, and a succession of terrified local wenches whose doom it was to share Bralgarth's bed until he tired of them, and whose bruises showed every eye how ungentle he was.
The chief scribe was old Lythrus, who spent much of his days drunk and whose watery eyes were failing by the day, and the other underscribe was a bitter, ugly-as-a-jug woman with no head for tallies who wrote crudely. Which left Tethtyn doing most of the work, but doing it alone, sought out by his surly superiors only to demand the surrender of his work and give him more.
Which was a good thing, considering some of the things he was mumbling these days. That spell, and another minor magic he'd seen the Lord Malraun cast with casual ease, had set his dreams and waking visions alike down new trails.
He dreamed now of hurling such power, of working magics to awe warriors and topple castles alike—and every time Tethtyn thought of such things, the merest ghost of that tingling came back, an echo of power that made him feel warm again and sent his mind racing through strange skies in imaginary flight, swooping and darting along on surging powers that whirled up forces he could almost feel, hues he'd never seen before, that—
Lost in the thrill of remembrance, he trudged perhaps a dozen paces on up the steep lane before he realized that all around him in Hawksyl, folk were shouting or screaming.
What, by the Falcon—?
He turned, rather vaguely, to peer about for the cause of all the alarm. No fire, no half-hoped-for bright cloud of hurled magic and Malraun the Matchless standing fearlessly behind it, no charging army... Hawksarn seemed to pointing or looking up, into the sky...
So Tethtyn did, too—and felt his jaw drop open, just like the minstrels always said jaws did.
Huge and dark and bat-winged, looming up with frightening speed as it blotted out half the clouds, was a dragon.
Or no, no, it was... a greatfangs!
Falcon Above! If this was a greatfangs, how big would a dragon be? As large as the entire hargrauling sky?
It was diving down, headed more or less for him.
Great wings swept back, only the edges curling here and there as the gigantic, sky-filling beast tilted slightly to alter its course, then deftly rolled and tilted again, as gracefully as a hawk. Its talons were out, ready to grab...
It was swooping down to pounce on someone, to be sure.
Who? Tethtyn stared into its great eyes—gold, then blood-red, then he knew not what hue, as he met its cruel gaze and was lost.
Standing frozen and agape as the black, razor-sharp talons, every one of them longer than he stood tall, curled around him as deftly and gently as a nurse takes up a beloved baby—
And snatched him into the sky, a sudden roaring of wind in his ears, the stillness broken in a rushing that wrenched his breath away and bore him aloft again, the huge body above him surging as the great wings beat and then beat again, like a man at his oars, pulling through the sky, rising above the ridge crowned by the Hawksylhar, leaving the screaming behind.
Climbing into higher and colder sky, hastening on into the unknown so swiftly that the only part of Falconfar he'd ever known was already a dwindling spot amid the endlessly rolling green darkness of the Raurklor behind him. This impossibly huge beast, this monster as big as the Hawksylhar itself, was taking Tethtyn Eldurant—struggling to breathe, but bearing not even a scratch—away.
To whatever places lay beyond "away."
Or, no...
Dark fear boiled up in Tethtyn. Lacking air enough to scream, he started to tremble instead.
It wasn't taking him to fabulous new lands. Oh, no. Rather, it was heading straight to wherever greatfangs went to feed on scrawny young underscribes. Fast.
"STAY BACK!" ROD Everlar snapped, trying hard to sound fierce and commanding—and not shriekingly terrified.
Which he sure as damn-it was. He backed away half a step from the skeletons he was facing, before he remembered there were skeletons right behind him, too, and whirled hastily around.
Their brown, crumbling stumps of swords were almost in his face. The weapons were more rust than steel, now, yet looked plenty sharp enough to deal death. By sliding right into the bodies of lone idiots who came blundering into their crypt, for instance.
"Get away from me!" Rod commanded, hearing his voice rising in fear. "I am the Lord Archwizard of Falconfar, and I command you—"
Skeletons were evidently unimpressed by Lord Archwizards, or at least by quaking men claiming to be Lord Archwizards.
They were all shuffling toward him now, freeing themselves from the black cobwebs of what looked to have been their shrouds and converging on him in slow silence. They came floating unhurriedly ahead with a curious side-to-side gait, for all the world as if an unseen puppeteer was somewhere above them beyond the solid stone ceiling, making sure all of the bobbing, floating pieces of his marionettes kept together when they moved.
The spindle-light's beam did nothing to them at all, not even causing one of them to slow in caution when he shone it right at its gaping eyesockets, and willed it to get blinding-bright.
"I'll blast you down!" Rod threatened firmly, waving the spindle's light-beam around wildly, and at the same time trying to look at the four other things he'd scooped up without dropping and breaking any more of them in the process.
There was the hexagona
l magic stone that he didn't know how to use, or even if it really had any magic at all; what looked like two finger-rings, or perhaps very short lengths of small plumbing pipe, both pierced and joined by a fine chain that ran through those piercings; and two cubes like very large dice, two inches across on a side, that had no markings or number-dots or anything on their sides, and seemed to be made of something hard that was glass-clear in streaks, and opaque blackish metal elsewhere. One of them was slightly larger than the other. No, no markings on either.
Now, just how or what any of these—
Coldness touched him, on his shoulders and hips and arms, and intense cold lanced through him in a gasping instant.
He was right out of time to try to play with his toys.
ROD GROANED, SHIVERING uncontrollably, doubled over and feeling helpless. He was so cold...
Wherever the skeleton's swords touched him, he felt as though he had just been plunged into icy water. It was a cold so harsh that it burned.
He stiffened, hissing in startled pain.
Steel had bitten into the strange sort-of-armor Rod was rearing—into a joint or gap in it, that is—and sliced into the vorn leather padding next to his skin.
They were going to kill him, and there wasn't a damned thing he could do...
He could barely stand. He was shuddering uncontrollably from the utter biting cold, bent double and reeling blindly.
Rod blundered forward doggedly. He kept on clutching the maybe-magic gewgaws to himself, but lashed out wildly with the flashlight-spindle, seeking to smash some of those rusty blades away and maybe into ruin. They looked as if they should disintegrate into rusty flecks and dust.
They did, some of them, as he saw when he slipped and fell on his side. A moment later, a forest of converging swordpoints hung above his face, with more thrusting in to join them, the skeletal arms that wielded them seeming to pass through each other, strings of floating bones that could intersect without getting tangled or harmed—but two of the swords, less rusty than the rest, were being swung at him to cut.