by James Lowder
He'd carved the words there over many days as a boy of five, starting on the afternoon he rescued Caradoc's sister from the chasm spider. His father had rewarded his heroics with a real blade. The small dagger was unfit for combat, but it seemed a formidable weapon indeed when compared with the blunted wooden play swords he'd been given up until then. With that knife he declared his intent to become a Knight of Solamnia, if only to the watchmen and to the rodents that frequented that isolated part of the keep.
Here now was that declaration again. The words were faint, just as they had been in Dargaard Keep. The original inscription had been worn down by Soth's fingertips, which he traced over them year after year as he marched to the highest platform to watch the sun set on the Dargaard Mountains. Nedragaard had always lacked this detail. Yet it was in the right place, in a child's awkward scrawl. His awkward scrawl.
Soth had been so caught up in his concerns with Invidia and the White Rose, he'd failed to notice how closely the keep was beginning to resemble its original on Krynn. He'd called the place Nedragaard because of the small but noticeable flaws that differentiated it from Dargaard. Ruined doors hung where there should have been ones intact. Hallways extended a few paces too far or stopped a few paces too soon. The oath Soth had carved on that landing had always been missing. Until now. Those flaws, along with the more substantial imperfections brought on by the death knight's inattention, were apparently being corrected.
As he pushed aside some rubble that marked the stair's end, a cold wind tugged at Soth's cloak. Ignoring the chill that surely signaled the coming of winter, the death knight stepped onto the keep's highest vantage. From the ruins of the tower's upper floors, he surveyed the fortress's defenses.
The shadows that filled the Great Chasm were roiling, as they did on some bright mornings, almost as if the sunshine made them angry. This day they swirled with particular ferocity against the high cliffs that surrounded the keep on three sides. The darkness lapped, too, at the shores of the isthmus that connected it to the chasm's eastern cliff.
Or rather, had once connected it to the shore. Just outside Nedragaard Keep's front gate, a group of undead ogres were even now completing the task of drawing in the wooden bridge. A thirty-foot gap between the crumbled outer wall and the isthmus gaped blackly.
The reason for this defensive precaution milled on the chasm's eastern shore. A massive force, at least a thousand Invidian troops, had claimed the overgrown garden-graveyard there. More were straggling south along the Chasm Road. Soth could hear the ragged cheer that went up from the army as each wayward company arrived.
A banshee rose up before Soth. The sunlight made it appear even more insubstantial than normal, less a spectre than the memory of one. It was joined by a second, then a third. Leedara, Marantha, and Gisela, his three primary tormentors, the leaders of the shrieking host, stood before him.
"The wolves are at your door," Marantha began.
"They have claimed the graveyard, claimed your buried dead," Gisela added.
Leedara, whose phantasmal form still gaped from the wound Inza had inflicted upon her, hovered directly before the master of Nedragaard. "Your dead are all you have, withered rose. Lose them, and lose yourself."
"There is no chance I'll be defeated," the Knight of the Black Rose said smugly. He gestured to the east and the south. "In Sithicus, the living and the dead heed my battle cry. Even now my fleshy army comes to drive the curs from our stoop."
They totaled twice the Invidian thousand, elves from the east and a ragtag army of miners and farmers from the south. At Soth's bidding, Azrael had mustered the troops. They were intended as an invasion force, a sword point the death knight meant for Malocchio Aderre's throat. If they had to fight first on Sithican soil, all the better. The slaughter of the invaders would harden them and give them a taste for Invidian blood.
Soth watched in anticipation as the elves fanned out, forming their favored order of battle. The miners, too, arrayed themselves for the clash to come. Their lines were irregular, befitting the assortment of picks and flails and axes with which they armed themselves. The difference in formations mattered little. Soth was certain either army could easily break the siege.
A cry went up from the garden-graveyard, the fitting place where the three armies met. It was not the clamor of war Soth heard, nor the outraged roar of the dying. It was a cheer of fellowship. The three armies were now one.
The siege of Nedragaard Keep had begun.
Fifteen
The tripartite army's cry of unity reverberated from the walls of Nedragaard Keep, echoed across the Great Chasm, and finally faded. The leaders of the three allied forces stood for a moment, bathed in the glow of fellowship, before turning to consider the seemingly inviolable fortress looming before them. The good cheer fled, and the relief at having finally ended their long marches soured into exhaustion.
It was Gerhard, commander of the miners and farmers from the south, who gave voice to the question vexing them all. "Well," he asked gruffly, "now what do we do?"
"The isthmus is too narrow for any large-scale frontal assault," noted the elven general Ulrisch, an effete nobleman from Har-Thelen. "Perhaps we could mount a sneak attack from the chasm and have a few dozen men attempt to gain access to the keep from below. They could reset the bridge, allowing the rest of-"
"Who'd be idiot enough to climb down into those shadows?" interrupted Gerhard.
"Why, your miners, of course," the elf sniffed. "They're used to the dark. Besides, all those stories about the chasm are silly. It's just another hole in the ground."
"Well, then, your elves can go," Gerhard snapped. "It's your idea, after all."
The commander of the former Invidian forces, a particularly gruesome ogre named Onkar, snorted his amusement. He immediately scratched furiously at the gaping hole where his nose once had been. Snorting always made the tattered flesh there quiver.
"What for do you think we carry all this wood?" Onkar asked, gesturing to the heaps of timber piled at the center of the garden-graveyard. As each company of ogres and mercenaries arrived from the north, jingling with the gold and silver Azrael had used to buy their loyalty, they dutifully deposited more logs and beams onto the stack. There was enough there now to construct the frame for a fairly large house.
"Siege engines," the elf noted, "Of course. That would have been my next suggestion. Only we have nothing to hurl at the keep."
"Elves," Gerhard grumbled. "We have plenty of elves."
Onkar removed his foot from the large granite headstone upon which he had planted it. The stone was ornately carved, inscribed with the name Gelbmartin and the badge belonging to the lord steward of the keep. The ogre reached down and yanked it from the ground. "These make good crash," he said. "When we run out, we dig up the dead guys and fling them, too."
Gerhard and Ulrisch stared at the brute. "Crude, but creative," the elf said at last. "You supervise the stockpiling of the ... missiles, Onkar, and we two will begin construction of the catapults." He encircled Gerhard's shoulder with an arm and steered him away from the brute. "Let us discuss the division of labor."
When they were safely out of earshot, the elf murmured, "Is there anything about this situation you find odd?"
Gerhard shrugged. "Odd? Like you pointy-eared wine sippers showing some spine for once-that kind of odd?"
With an exasperated grimace on his face, Ulrisch rolled up his shirt sleeve. His arm was a mass of scars from elbow to wrist. "I was captured by my Iron Hills kin. They flayed my arm, and a few other parts of my body you wouldn't care to see, before I managed to escape." He let the sleeve slip back into place.
Gerhard patted the politska's silver axe hanging at his belt. "I've peeled a few people in my day, too. None of 'em escaped, of course. Still, you're all right by me if you stood up to that sort of torture."
"I'm so glad," the elf said blandly, "but you still haven't answered my original question." At the blank look on Gerhard's face, Ulrisch prompted, "O
ur situation. Do you find anything odd about it? Where, for example, is Azrael?"
"Back at the mine," Gerhard said quickly.
"And what, exactly, are we supposed to accomplish here without him?"
The politska remained silent.
Ulrisch nodded curtly. "You're catching on. Even if we do manage to get inside the keep, who here will stand against Soth?"
"We've been tricked," Gerhard rumbled.
"Used," the elf corrected. "We are a diversion, nothing more."
Gerhard kicked the dirt and muttered a string of obscenities as vile as any creature lurking in the Great Chasm. "So what do we do about it?" he asked after he'd calmed a little.
"Play the role assigned us," the elf replied.
"Why not leave?"
"Azrael stationed some of your axe-wielding comrades in Har-Thelen just before we left," Ulrisch noted mournfully. "I thought it an uncharacteristically thoughtful gesture on his part to guard the city while we fought. I suspect now that none of us would find our families alive upon our return should we betray him or not do a creditable job in this siege."
Gerhard closed his eyes tightly, picturing the camp where the families of his troops awaited their return. It, too, was guarded by the Politskara. "We're all dead men," he murmured.
"Not necessarily," the elf said. "I suggest we keep the Invidians-pardon me, former Invidians-to the front ranks. From the clank their purses make, they've been paid too well to notice their peril." He paused to survey the fire-blackened walls of Nedragaard Keep. "And hope."
"For what?" Gerhard asked.
"For Soth to discover Azrael's plan, whatever that may be, or for the dwarf to succeed in his scheme." The elf sighed raggedly. "It doesn't matter which, so long as it happens before the lord of Nedragaard decides to sweep us from his stoop."
* * * * *
"To me, my knights!"
From the gallery overlooking the main hall, Lord Soth watched the thirteen undead warriors arrive from their various stations around the keep. The first to enter was Wersten Kern, most loyal of his men in life. He was the most loyal, too, in death-if loyalty was a trait these shuffling skeletons could possess. The shadow of that quality lingered in them at the very least. For Soth, that was enough.
Farold, Valcic, and Vingus, the inseparable Knights of the Sword, arrived together. Meyer Seril took up his usual station beside the main doors. As if pulled away from some other, more important task, Derik Grimscribe straggled in last. Once, the Sword Knight had been a master of words. His explanations for his tardiness would have amused the gathered knights no end. Now his jaws moved soundlessly, his tale trapped on the remnants of his rotted tongue.
The thirteen gathered warriors turned their eyeless skulls to their liege. Before Soth could speak, though, another voice sounded in the hall.
"How goes the siege, mighty lord?"
The skeletal knights looked to the shadow-shrouded dais. They hesitated, then dropped to one knee. Soth leaned over the gallery's rail. He had to look straight down the wall to see the Vistani girl perched upon a heavy wooden box set next to his throne. Long ago, another chair had been positioned there, the one belonging to the mistress of the keep, Soth's wife.
"My knights mistake you for someone else," Soth said coldly. "You mistake yourself for someone other than a guest." The death knight's harsh tone made it clear that he did not readily dismiss such improprieties.
"No insult was intended," Inza replied. "I thought it best to speak to you of my concerns before you sent your troops anywhere."
"You have nothing to fear. I will keep my word to your mother. You are safe in my-"
The crash of stone against stone resounded through Nedragaard as the bombardment, which had stopped for nearly half an hour, finally resumed. The missile had not struck the keep itself, though; it had crashed into the rocky ledge to the north. The aim of the engineers directing the catapults had not improved in the five hours they'd been directing sporadic fire against the keep. Far from offering Soth relief, their ineptitude only infuriated him.
The death knight gestured in the general direction of the besieging army. "You would have nothing to fear from them were you alone in this place. This is no assault. It is an annoyance-one I intend to silence before another moment passes." Inza stood and walked toward the center of the hall. As she stepped from the shadows, the skeletal warriors rose from their deferential stances. " Annoyance,' " she mused aloud. "Perhaps. This assault most definitely offers no threat to you. Unless ..."
"Out with it, woman," Soth rumbled. "You do not play coy well."
'This hopeless siege provides a distraction from the deeds of some great power," she replied bluntly, "an enemy more worthy of your attention."
Soth began to descend the curved stair from the gallery to the hall. "I do not lack in enemies," he said as he came. "I see all of their hands in this- Aderre, the White Rose, that treacherous cur Azrael."
"Azrael. He must be the one who set your own people against you," Inza said. The clatter of a missile finally striking the castle underscored the comment.
"He is the one who foolishly heaped gold on Aderre's raiders, paying them to join in this inept siege," Soth added. "He is no 'great power,' just a traitor with an inflated estimation of his own cunning."
The death knight had reached the hall now, and Inza bowed to him respectfully as he approached. "There is the White Rose to consider, mighty lord," the Vistana said. "When I read your fortune in the tarroka cards, her presence loomed large. Come, let me show you."
She led Lord Soth to the dais. There, upon the seat of the throne itself, lay nine cards arranged in a cross. They were large and crammed to the borders with intricate drawings. Soth could see the red tinge to the ink, even in the gloom shrouding the platform. This deck had been crafted with pigments mixed with blood.
The card at the center of the cross was a knight outfitted in plate armor, roses and kingfishers graven upon the breastplate. There could be no mistaking the figure for anyone but Soth, though the rendering depicted him before his damnation. "It was my mother's deck," Inza explained. "Who else would she portray upon the master card of swords? It is the suit of warriors."
The Vistana pointed to the two cards arrayed below the Warrior. The first depicted a ghost rising from a crypt. "This is your near past," Inza said. "A force arises to collect an old debt, to remind you of old obligations you have forgotten. The card below it is your distant past: the Innocent."
"There are no innocents in my past," Soth said.
"The card can signify someone who was powerless to defend herself at a particular moment in time, someone you might have taken advantage of," Inza noted. "She might have been quite formidable otherwise. Both these cards depict the Rose, I think. From what my mother told me, you think she is some warrior from your past, someone with a score to settle."
"Kitiara," Soth said.
While no innocent, Kitiara had been helpless, dying, when the death knight took her body from the Tower of High Sorcery. She feared him then, feared that he would raise her from the grave as his eternal consort. That had been his intent, of course. Had he not been dragged from Krynn into this nether-realm, it was an intent he would have fulfilled.
"Perhaps," Soth murmured. "Perhaps."
"Your adversaries are easier to identify," Inza said. She gestured to the first card on the Warrior's right. "The Traitor. It can be only Azrael. Behind him is the Charlatan. This woman is your real foe. See the picture-she hides behind a mask, a false identity like this White Rose of yours."
Soth indicated the rest of the cards with a sweep of his hand. "Do these tell me what they plan or how I may stop them?" he asked.
Inza suppressed a smile. She had arranged the cards with just that purpose in mind, to direct Lord Soth as she required. But when she looked down at the remaining four-the cards revealing Soth's allies and his future-a wave of fear washed over her. They were not the ones she had so carefully chosen.
"Well?" Soth said
impatiently.
"These cards to the Warrior's left are the forces that fight on your side," she said, desperately trying to forge a suitable meaning for them in her thoughts. "Though you may not recognize their actions, they are important to you."
She lifted the first card, the two of coins. "The Philanthropist. Someone who gives unselfishly, seeking no return but the act itself." Another card, stuck to the first, dropped onto the ground. It was the eight of glyphs, the Bishop. "This person is bound by some rigid code. Or perhaps there are two allies who are connected somehow, one who gives, the other who enforces a code."
The next card, the one that revealed Soth's most important ally, was supposed to have been the four of stars, the Abjurer. The connection of the card's image-a raven-haired woman with a crystal ball-to Inza herself would have been obvious, even to Soth. But the card laid out was the Myrmidon. The unarmed, unarmored figure faced three men shrouded in mist, uncertain of their identity as friend or foe.
"Your other ally seems to be me," she lied. "The figure is helpless, surrounded by threatening figures: my situation in the forest before you came to my aid."
The remaining two cards foretold events to come. The near future was dominated by the Beast, symbolizing anger and fury. The Donjon, with its lone figure trapped within a moonlit tower ^resembling Nedragaard Keep, indicated the distant future. Were Inza trying to interpret the fortune correctly, she would have suggested that anger might continue Soth's imprisonment. Instead, she told him just the opposite. "If you give in to your fury and slay the Beast," she announced solemnly, "you will break free from your prison."
"Then your cards confirm the course upon which I have already decided." Soth turned and strode from the dais. "I want them slaughtered to the last man," the death knight told his skeletal minions. "The banshees will ride alongside us. Let them ready their chariots of bone."