Beyond Ragnarok

by Mickey Zucker Reichert

  Discomfort gnawed at Baltraine, a sensation of profound and supernatural evil. He felt like a toddler desperately trying to sleep while haunted by stories of demons and Loki. He did not understand the need for darkness, and it took several moments for the obvious to penetrate. More likely, Xyxthris had closed the curtains for privacy rather than to stifle the light. Suddenly, the plan Xyxthris had outlined seemed foolish. No amount of cosmetics could make Baltraine pass for Kohleran. He doubted even Xyxthris could be made up to pass for the grandfather he resembled. The age difference would defy the effort of even the princesses’ best handmaidens. But he had little choice except to hear Xyxthris’ plan. Maybe the heir had stumbled upon something useful. Or maybe the drugs he had taken had destroyed his mind.

  “What do you. . .?” Baltraine turned from the window, only to find himself alone in the room. He trailed off, startled, and glanced at the door. He had not heard it open or close. The uncomfortable feeling intensified in an instant. He sat in the only chair, feeling out of place, as if he had squeezed into a seat constructed for a child. Obviously, Xyxthris must have slipped quietly away while Baltraine contemplated. Yet Baltraine could not dismiss the image that the younger man had simply disappeared.

  Moments stretched into a lengthy pause, while Baltraine’s mind conjured everything from Xyxthris returning with a regiment of guards to arrest him to some mystical process that allowed them to read his mind so long as he stayed in this room. He attributed the whole to paranoia, but even logic could not quell his doubts. Something seemed terribly amiss.

  Finally, Baltraine had enough. The continued silence and his overactive imagination were quickly driving him to distraction. He rose just as Xyxthris stepped into sight, followed closely by a stranger. Baltraine froze in a position halfway between sitting and standing. The two approached as if through a door, yet through no entrance Baltraine could see. He plopped back down into the chair, uncertain his legs would hold him. Recovering swiftly from that shock, he studied the stranger.

  The other stood nearly as tall as himself, with a wild mane of fine red-blond hair. His heart-shaped lips seemed feminine in contour, as did his delicate frame; yet Baltraine unquestionably knew him as a male. One green eye sparkled from between canted, long-lashed lids, its color oddly steady. The other socket lay empty, yet with none of the ugly scarring that drove most with such an abnormality to wear a patch.

  Xyxthris gestured from Baltraine to the stranger. “Prime Minister Baltraine, Dh’arlo’mé.”

  Dh’arlo’mé performed an unfamiliar gesture that seemed respectful. Baltraine copied it with less precision.

  “Dh’arlo’mé and his followers can help us. They’re elves, and they use magic.”

  Baltraine swallowed hard, glad he had already chosen to sit. Answers to old questions came to him now, not the least of which was an explanation for the statues come to life in Béarn’s courtyard. The belief that he was in the presence of great evil intensified. Xyxthris had intimated that a decision about his involvement in all that came next was imminent. Baltraine suspected the time for choices had ended. He would work with this not-quite-human creature, or he would die.

  Baltraine drew breath, desperate to find the words that would make him seem invaluable. To do less, he knew, would translate into suicide.

  * * *

  During the day, crowds filled Pudar’s streets from end to end, sweeping past the merchants at a pace few dared to interrupt. Citizens and visitors, trapped too long without necessities, scoured the streets in a mass so tightly packed it resembled a single entity. Therefore, Ra-khir did all of his searching in the quiet darkness that followed the closing of the market. His life became an endless cycle of sleepless days and futile nights. Kevral became an obsession. He heard little of Darris’ and Matrinka’s discussions. Whenever they talked of any matter but Kevral, they seemed like traitors to him; no topic should take precedence. His own attitude bothered him as much as theirs. He had no right to judge these friends. His honor did not allow it any more than his conscience. It seemed best to ignore them and work on finding Tae. Yet one day followed the next, and he found nothing but gambling houses and empty streets.

  By the third day, Ra-khir was becoming desperate. His heart seemed to have tripled in weight, and it burned in his chest like a brand. Food tasted like mud, and the pain swallowing caused drove him to put nothing in his mouth at all. He left the cottage at nightfall, his only hope the kind that accompanies ultimate need.

  Cool night air caressed Ra-khir as he wandered the city streets without plan or pattern. The moon seemed to follow him, drawing shadows against the buildings that little resembled the shapes that made them. Tarp-covered stands formed ridges like giants’ teeth along the many roadways. Deeper into the city Ra-khir trudged, determined not to quit until he found the key to Kevral’s salvation. That her fate lay in Tae’s graces only worsened the sense of hopeless distress that plagued Ra-khir.

  Ra-khir shied from the opening to an alleyway so narrow and dark he could not see as far as his hand inside it. His instinctive reaction stopped him cold. I’m looking in the wrong places. A lifetime of training had kept him on the safer streets, open ones with lighting, guards, and daytime traffic. But a street tough on the run would not follow such a pattern. Ra-khir’s mistake was thinking like a knight-in-training instead of an orphan raised on nothing more than his wits and wariness.

  A ray of hope trickled through where none had previously existed. Ra-khir reworked the strategy he had not even realized he had, deliberately resisting common sense to pace the scummiest, darkest back alleys Pudar had to offer. Every sense jangled to full alarm as Ra-khir traced roadways he would otherwise not have entered on a dare. Only love could drive him to do such a thing, and he had to believe that such sacrifice would triumph. To think otherwise would undermine the last of his flagging reserves.

  Hour flowed into desperate hour. The constant need for caution made him all too aware of every passing second. Though noise might draw unwelcome attention, he called Tae’s name softly on occasion. He could not wholly trust the hunted Easterner to find him, especially since they had never cared for one another. Ra-khir clung to Matrinka’s explanation and hoped Tae would prove as generous now as he had, apparently, in the past. Kevral could not die.

  The image of Kevral sprawled on some torturer’s rack, willingly giving herself to the executioner’s knife brought tears to his eyes and nausea to his belly. He had eaten little since Kevral’s pronouncement, and acid churned through his gut with no food to counterbalance it. His thoughts slid to his father as well and to Kedrin’s unjust imprisonment. Loyalty had doomed both of the people he loved: Kevral’s to a street punk and Kedrin’s to his country. Guilt twitched through Ra-khir then. I should have stayed in Béarn and worked on freeing my father. If I had, we would still live at home and Kevral would never have sacrificed herself.

  Ra-khir cast the idea aside. Their mission remained sacred, despite the delay; and it was at Kedrin’s insistence that he had gone at all. Ra-khir had no way to know the consequences of having chosen this other path, and hating himself for doing what seemed right at the time served no useful purpose. He had no choice but to commit himself to the task at hand.

  Even as Ra-khir dismissed the new train of thought plaguing him, something soft slid across the front of his shins. Startled, Ra-khir stiffened, heart rate doubling in an instant. Eyes now adjusted to the darkness, he sorted out patches of white and gray near his feet. Mior. The identification swept away fear, and his heart settled back into its regular cadence. “Mior, what are you doing here?” he whispered. “Go back to Matrinka.”

  In response, the cat meowed and remained in place.

  “Go on, Mior. It’s not safe for you here.” Ra-khir did not know how much Mior understood, but her communication with her mistress suggested it would prove far more than an ordinary cat.

  When Mior again did not obey, Ra-khir stepped over her and continued his inspection.

  Mior rubbe
d across the front of his legs twice more, Ra-khir ignoring the animal for the more important matter at hand. Again, Mior twined around his feet, meowing piteously.

  The distraction quickly became an annoyance. “Mior,” Ra-khir said firmly. “Go away.”

  Without waiting to see if she obeyed, Ra-khir sidestepped, then edged forward again. The darkness deepened as poorly crafted rooftops overlapped, locking out the light of moon and stars. Ra-khir’s vision disappeared, and he became even more wary as his safety depended on fewer, less often used senses. A whisk of movement touched his hearing from ahead, and he paused, uncertain whether to worry or hope. “Tae?” he said softly. He strained his vision, making out a barrier ahead. It appeared he had reached a dead end. Ra-khir sighed, taking one more step to ascertain the impasse. His foot came down on something soft and unstable. Mior! Afraid to hurt the animal, Ra-khir twisted. His ankle landed in an unnatural position, and pain shot through his leg. Balance lost, he tumbled to the dirt alleyway. Momentum sent him skidding toward the blockage, tearing skin from his left arm and shin.

  “Damn.” Ra-khir grabbed at the wall for support, surprised to feel grainy wood rather than the stone construction he expected. Low to the ground, a black square interrupted the otherwise steady surface, hidden by weeds growing in the untended roadway. Curious, he touched the inconsistency, and his hand met no resistance. He had discovered an opening in what had initially seemed a solid wall. A chute? It made no sense to have a place to fling laundry or food in the middle of a narrow alley.

  Mior paced between Ra-khir and the hole while he tried to ignore the cat. He sat back on his haunches. Whatever its origin, the opening would admit a crawling person. It would prove a tight squeeze for a man as large as Ra-khir, impossible had he worn his armor and sword, but if Tae had stumbled upon the same place, surely he would have taken advantage of it.

  Excitement tingled in Ra-khir’s chest, and he forced away the hope that accompanied it. His efforts so far had always ended in disappointment. The more faith he placed in having found the right place at last, the worse the fall when he discovered he had made an error. Still, something inexplicable told him he had finally found Tae, a belief as deeply set as his religion. At last, he had uncovered Kevral’s liberator, and he could put the situation right. Ra-khir plunged his head and shoulders through the opening, Mior mewing frantically behind him.

  Darkness closed around Ra-khir, as tight as the wooden walls. He wriggled forward, the sides pressing the fabric of his tunic against him, rescuing him from scrapes and splinters. For a moment, he stuck, hands scrabbling for purchase on the roadway. Then he fought one shoulder through, and the rest followed as naturally as a baby leaving the womb. He found himself in a short tunnel, a square of light at its end. He crawled through, excitement building despite his best efforts to hold it in check. As he approached the end, he drew breath to call for Tae.

  But, before the word left his lips, hands seized his wrists and hair, dragging him through the opening. He twisted, catching a spiraling view of strange, filthy faces studying him with expressions of rage. Six pinned him to an earthen floor, their grips pinching his wrists and ankles like vises. Ra-khir froze, not bothering to struggle yet. The unexpected greeting killed hope and refired desperation. He looked for Tae among the group, noticing details as he did so. He counted nine youths, all in their teens and all male. Those old enough sported scraggly beards that looked more like weeks of stubble. Some wore tattered rags and others newer, cleaner garb; but every one wore red and black with the same fanatical devotion that he had for royal blue and tan. A few cracks in the overlapping rooftops admitted moonlight. Two stone walls from buildings on either side of the alley and two of wood that spanned the roadway formed a room protected from the wind if not the rain. Crates lay stacked in one corner, a few more scattered around the makeshift room, apparently for use as chairs.

  Ra-khir attempted to rise, but the hands tightened, holding him in place. “I’m sorry I intruded. I’m looking for someone. I wonder if you’ve seen—”

  “Shut up!” shouted one of the youths who wasn’t holding him. Tall and nearly as muscular as Ra-khir, he seemed the leader. Hazel eyes glared at the knight-in-training from beneath uneven, brown bangs. The rest of his hair hung in curtains on either side of his head.

  Ra-khir fell silent, more annoyed by the rudeness than afraid. He had no reason to believe these youngsters, many his own age, meant him any harm.

  The leader made a gesture Ra-khir could not read. “Pick him up.”

  The others complied without a word, and Ra-khir made their job easier by rising with them. The ones who had clamped his ankles to the ground withdrew, leaving only two to hold his wrists. He felt the urge to straighten clothes dragged into dirty wrinkles but resisted it. Ra-khir was certain he could wrest his hand free from the child at his left, but it seemed impolite at the moment. He had encroached on their private territory, and they had a right to establish security before releasing him. They had not chosen the politest means of doing so, but Ra-khir expected nothing more from low class youngsters on the streets.

  The leader stepped up to Ra-khir, so close the Erythanian could smell the sweeter aroma of fruit on the other’s breath, beneath the overpowering odor of beer. “Who are you?”

  “I am called Ra-khir.” As Kevral had warned, Ra-khir did not complete his title. “Again, I apologize for my intrusion.”

  “Your intrusion?” The young man snickered, and the others laughed in his wake. “Your in-troo-shin.” They laughed again, then the leader sobered. He paced a quiet, studying circle around Ra-khir, and came to a halt in front of the prisoner again.

  Ra-khir cleared his throat, tiring of the inspection. He had no time to waste. “I’m on important business. May I leave now, please?”

  The leader stared at Ra-khir as if he had taken leave of his senses. A few snickers broke the ranks, silenced by a glare from the leader. “I’m not finished with you yet. Not nearly finished. You’re going to pay for your mistake.”

  Ra-khir considered the words and the tone with which they had been spoken. “Pay? Is that a challenge?”

  The leader smiled, revealing a mouthful of chipped teeth separated by gaps. “If you wish.”

  “Fine.” Ra-khir could accept that his transgression had earned him a future duel. “You may choose time, place, and weapons then. That’s the custom where I come from.”

  More snickers broke the hush that followed. The leader simply stared. “That’s your custom, is it?”

  “It is.”

  “Your custom?”

  “Yes,” Ra-khir affirmed.

  The leader turned his back, hand stroking his stubble as if in consideration. Suddenly, he whirled back. Silver flashed in his hand. Before Ra-khir could consider its origin, a knife tore a fiery path across the skin over his gut. Shock and pain stole his wits momentarily, and he recoiled with enough force to tear his left hand free. He stared in disbelief at the gash in his tunic and the scarlet blood trickling over blue linen.

  “That’s our custom,” the leader stated, sheathing the blood-smeared knife without bothering to clean it. He turned his back again, this time retreating, and spoke to his followers without bothering to look at them. “He’s all yours. Do as you please, but be sure he doesn’t have the chance to tell anyone about this place.”

  Ra-khir steeled himself for the worst, gathering breath for a vow of silence and a speech that might earn him a reprieve. A fist crashed into his diaphragm, slamming the air from his lungs. Pain lanced through the depths of his gut, worse than the sharp tear of the knife. He gulped desperately for air, but his lungs refused to function. Kicks, punches, and gouges rained down upon him. The force sent him crashing to the floor, head thumping against the wooden barrier. None of this compared to the agony of needing and not finding air. What little vision the roof gaps allowed disappeared in a wild swirl of dizzying spots.

  Ra-khir grappled for his own knife, knowing as he did so that an unexpected slash
might gain him an opening to escape. His training resurfaced as naturally as the instinct to breathe. He could not attack unannounced, not and remain a knight-in-training. His diaphragm spasmed, then regained function, and air wheezed through his throat in a trickle. As he gulped hungry breaths, he cursed the very honor he refused to betray. His fingers closed over the hilt even as boots hammered bruises the length of his arm. But he did not whip it free. He used a controlled draw that revealed its presence to his attackers before he could use it.

  “Knife!” one yelled, the warning enough for Ra-khir. He plunged it toward one blindly. Then a foot kicked the blade from his grip, and teeth sank into his empty fist. He heard the rasp of steel from several directions at once. He struggled to rise again as short swords and daggers bit rents from his legs. A heavy object cracked against the back of his head, driving his face into the dirt. Consciousness wavered, and the world spun in limping, disjointed circles. Another blow to the side of the head knocked him sprawling. His sight went blank first, then all sensation left him.

  Chapter 31

  The Black Renshai

  Competence is a minimum expectation, not deserving of admiration.

  —Colbey Calistinsson

  Clutching Mior against her body with her left hand, Matrinka charged through Pudar’s night streets, still in slippers and her sleeping gown. Darris managed to keep pace at her side, though he gasped for every breath. He, too, had not changed from his nightclothes, though he had strapped on his sword and belt.