The Fighters: Son of Thunder

by Murray J. D. Leeder

  The magic is gone, Geildarr knew. This is after Karsus's folly, when the greatest arcanist of Netheril—the most pow­erful and most foolish wizard Faerun had ever known—had cast an avatar spell to kill the goddess of magic, hoping to gain her power.

  Instead, Geildarr recalled, Karsus destroyed all of the arcane magic in the world, sending all the sky citadels of High Netheril tumbling to the ground. Though Runlatha was part of Low Netheril, it too probably had much magic woven into its very structure—magic that failed the moment Karsus cast his spell. Without the protection of the citadels, Runlatha was vulnerable to the masses of humanoid hordes.

  Even without Karsus's folly, the Great Desert was spreading, ruining farmland throughout what was once the heart of Netheril. From his own studies of his­tory, Geildarr had decided that the fall of the Empire of Magic was inevitable, one way or another. Karsus merely hastened it.

  "We must abandon this city," a booming voice said. Geildarr spun around to see that the world had shifted around him. He was standing in a vast meeting hall, stars peeking through huge holes in the ceiling. Geildarr stood in the middle of a vast mob of humans, all staring for­ward at a man with coal-black hair, broad shoulders, and a warrior's physique. Some in the crowd wore the brightly colored robes of Netherese arcanists, the spellcasters of old, but most were plainly dressed. The general populace visibly shunned the arcanists, doubtless blaming their kind for the current lot of the world. No one acknowledged Geildarr, either not seeing him or not regarding him as anything out of the ordinary.

  Geildarr was thankful that this vision was not coming to him in the Netherese language.

  "Throughout what was once Netheril, crops are fail­ing, and orcs and other beasts are massing to destroy the last shreds of our civilization," said the man. "We repelled this latest attack, but at too high a cost. More attacks will follow.

  "And the citadels are falling. We can expect no aid from them. We are alone, and we cannot hold Runlatha for long." With a heavy voice, he said, "Our home is not worth saving any more."

  Heads bowed all over the room. Geildarr looked around at the thousands of souls around him—men, women, and children—all desperate, all saddened. All looked to this man—the Bey of Runlatha—for guidance.

  To Geildarr, the Bey did not resemble a barbarian chieftain like Sungar, but rather a disciplined military general of old Netheril, a strategist, warrior, and leader of armies.

  "Karsus's hubris has freed us from the yoke of our Neth­erese oppressors," said the Bey. "We are free now, and it is our first duty to find and rally others in nearby lands who have also survived. Through luck and companionship, we shall survive and forge a new life far away from this place. Throughout the empire, groups are banding together and seeking out new lands. Some go east, some south."

  "Where will we go?" yelled someone from the audience.

  "West," the Bey declared. "We shall try the Lowroad. The underground route will have perils of its own, but the dwarves have always been our friends, and they will shelter and protect us, if we prove ourselves to them. Already they have agreed to give us sanctuary in Ascore, and from there we shall proceed west across the North kingdom, searching for some unclaimed land to make our own. The road will be hard and treacherous, and our enemies will be many. We face even more than orcs and bandits—our leader Shaquintar kept many creatures magically caged for his experiments, creatures freed by Karsus's spell. The most powerful of them, the demon Zukothoth, desires revenge, and he has rallied some of the others to this goal."

  "But the tyrant Shaquintar is dead!" came the protests. "And we did not take part in these experiments!"

  "It matters not to Zukothoth. He blames the folk of Run­latha. He is another reason that we must move, and quickly. Perhaps we will be able to slip away under his notice."

  Not likely, thought Geildarr. He knew that the Bey would eventually go down fighting Zukothoth on the western border of Delzoun.

  "Damn Shaquintar to Moander's stinking pit," someone in the audience yelled. "He is dead and gone, yet he will still bring ruin upon us."

  "Perhaps he will save us yet. I scavenged the ruins of his manse, destroyed in the fall, and learned that not all of the magic of old has failed."

  The dream spun again, and Geildarr was standing at the front of the room, watching as the Bey picked up a small wooden box and opened it. The Bey's stony face was bathed in red light as he plucked free the glowing artifact and held it high for all to see.

  "It has survived!" a nearby arcanist cried. "I didn't believe it possible."

  "Yes, believe it," said the Bey. "Those of you outside the Arcanist's Guild may not have been aware of the purposes of Shaquintar's experiments. Cruel-hearted tyrant that he was, in his way he loved Runlatha and all who lived here. He wanted to keep us safe, and sensing all this inevitable turmoil, he looked for ways to hide Runlatha from trouble. Shaquintar was not so different from Lord Shadow, but on a more modest scale, tormenting creatures good and evil to achieve his goals. It is said that the beating heart of an angelic planetar was used to create this artifact."

  A collective gasp came from the audience at this revelation.

  "Shaquintar called it the Heart of Runlatha. It was to be one of several artifacts. The others were meant to move the city to some far-off place. Either he did not create them or they were lost in the death of magic. I do not know how to use this artifact. Our surviving arcanists must try to unlock its secrets. Perhaps when we find a scrap of ground to call our own, it will help us conceal it from the world."

  A cry of joy arose from the crowd. The Bey had given them hope. Geildarr admired the Bey's ambitions, but wondered if he ever really thought that they would find a peaceful home somewhere in the North, hidden by illu­sion. Little did the Runlathans know that they would be scattered and ruined, falling into barbarity and tribalism. All memories, and very nearly all traces of their civili­zation, would vanish from them, and they would become the Uthgardt.

  Naive, perhaps. Or maybe not—maybe the Bey knew real success was unlikely, but he kept up this fantasy for the sake of his followers. If nothing else, he would achieve a legacy. Some sixteen hundred years later, his name, or a form of it—whether Berun or Beorunna—would be remembered. He wondered if the name Geildarr, or even Fzoul or Sememmon, would last a fraction of that time.

  "Now we must leave Runlatha behind," the Bey told his followers. "We must renounce all claims on it, so that our own hearts do not remain here in the ruins but travel with us on the Lowroad and beyond, to wherever the wind might carry us. Let the orcs pick its bones. Let the desert rise and swallow it up. It means nothing to us any longer. Cities fall, empires perish. It has happened before, and it will surely happen again. But we shall outlast the death of our empire."

  An inexplicable anxiety rose up in Geildarr's breast, the way it sometimes did in his dreams. He reached out to grab the Heart of Runlatha away from the Bey of Runlatha, and as his hand made contact with the artifact, he woke.

  There, trembling in his own opulent bed, the sheets damp with his sweat, he heard the sound of distant footsteps.

  * * * *

  With slow, powerful steps, six behemoths walked toward Llorkh. Long serpentine necks bobbed with each footfall. Their steps were synchronized like those of an army march­ing in time, so that each heavy step sounded like the beat of a great war drum, sending reverberations across the plains. The walls of Llorkh trembled at their approach.

  Clavel and the other watchmen atop the city walls stared in disbelief as the brown-skinned lizards came closer. They seemed larger than those Geildarr kept imprisoned in the Central Square. To shocked onlookers, they appeared like vast hills of scale, juggernauts of destruction.

  The behemoths followed the wide road, the Dawn Pass Trail, continuing along the same path many thousands of merchant caravans had followed. They marched directly to the west gate of Llorkh: the largest gap in the walls but also the best-defended section. The Lord's Men manning the checkpoint outside w
isely retreated within the city walls.

  "Archers," Clavel croaked, trying to overcome his own astonishment. He barked to his fellows, "Archers! Fetch the archers!"

  "How many archers?" a Lord's Man asked.

  "As many as we have!" Clavel cried. "Quickly—wake the barracks! Wake the city!" In the Year of Wild Magic, Llorkh had withstood an attack from hundreds of foes, but could it survive an assault from only six?

  * * * *

  Vell walked ahead of the other five, watching purple-clad soldiers, small as beetles, scramble on the city walls. Before long, several dozen archers amassed around the west gate. In all the chaos and confusion, they failed to notice a giant hawk sailing over the unguarded southern walls.

  What was this like for the others? Vell wondered. Did they keep their minds the way he did, or were they now the rampaging beast he had been when he killed that Zhentarim skymage outside the camp? With no way to communicate with them, he could only hope they would follow his lead.

  The city gates grew closer, and so did the archers defend­ing them. Some of them lit their arrows ablaze, as if it would make a difference.

  I've never been in a city before, Vell thought, though he had always been faintly curious about life inside them. Some of the merchants who had visited Grunwald when he was a child told him stories about these faraway places with mysterious names. As near as Silverymoon, or as far as Calimport, they were all the same to him—so far outside of his experience that Vell knew he would never come near them.

  A few arrows flew from the top of the wall. The archers were firing too early and the missiles fell short, striking the road in the behemoths' path.

  Vell thought, I never considered entering a city in this way.

  * * * *

  The Mayor of Llorkh paced his residence, the Heart of Runlatha still held in his right hand. All of his ancient treasures, hanging on his walls or placed on pedestals, trembled with the vibrations shaking the city.

  Ardeth appeared from her door on cue, as she always did. He did not need to summon her. She always seemed to know when to appear.

  "I sense Sememmon behind this, Cyric take him," cursed Geildarr.

  "Really?" asked Ardeth. "You think Sememmon sent these behemoths to destroy Llorkh?"

  "Perhaps, perhaps," Geildarr thought aloud as he marched out onto his balcony. He could no longer see the behemoths; they were now close enough to the city walls that the angle hid them. In the town below, excitement spread as people dashed about in the early morning streets. "He probably made a deal with those ancients you discovered in the Star Mounts."

  "But didn't you say he was determined to preserve Llorkh, so he could take it himself later on?" asked Ardeth.

  "Yes! No!" Geildarr slammed his left fist down on his balcony rail. "Those damned Uthgardt are clearly involved somehow. The Thunderbeast tribe. Rouse Kiev. He needs to have a little chat with our friend the chieftain."

  The rhythmic footfalls still sounded from outside the city walls, now so loud that Geildarr could feel them in his bones.

  Ardeth nodded. "The Lord's Men will assail the behe­moths with all they have. They'll stop them outside the gates, if they can. Perhaps we should join them... perhaps with our magic..."

  "Some mages are down in the Merchant District, staying with a caravan from Darkhold. We'll see how they fare. If these behemoths should break through the walls, our magic will be needed to fight them here," said Geildarr. He shook his head in disbelief at the words he was speaking.

  Ardeth reached out and clasped her small hand around Geildarr's right wrist. "What of the Heart of Runlatha?"

  Geildarr looked down at it, its shimmering red energies radiating forth. "It is safe here. The Lord's Keep is warded and defended."

  "This place may not be so safe after all," said Ardeth. "I can take it out of the city, deliver it to Zhentil Keep if you will it."

  Geildarr peered into the artifact. He felt a hollowness in his breath, and he asked himself, Will all of Llorkh fall over this?

  "Netherese magic," he marveled. "All those cities fell, all that civilization was lost. Yet this remains."

  "Geildarr!" Ardeth protested. "Are you all right?"

  The mayor looked down on her pale face, and a tear rolled down his cheek.

  "What do we do?" Ardeth asked plaintively.

  "We wait," answered Geildarr.

  Chapter 20

  The behemoths stepped over the ditch as if it were a scratch in the dirt. Each new thunderous step, with its hellish synchrony, kicked up clouds of soil, which the wind caught and blew into a brown haze. Clavel could feel each footfall, vibrating the stone walls all the way to the top where he stood.

  Five or six dozen Lord's Men stood ready above the gate, their bows strung and arrows nocked. Without a bow of his own, Clavel stood behind the line of archers, facing outward, trying to stay out of the way, yet remain close to the action. He looked up and saw a murder of crows circling the wall, wings flapping. The birds settled into glides as they navigated the currents.

  "Take aim!" the archers' commander shouted.

  The crows were flying low. They were ready to pick the carrion, Clavel reasoned. Clever birds.

  The archers took aim all along the line. Some hands trembled. The repetitive pounding of the behemoths' steps echoed up their spines, and they did not know if their arrows would even penetrate the behemoths' scales.

  Then Clavel noticed something curious. At least two of the crows were holding objects in their feet. The items flashed as they reflected sunlight—they were made of glass. And they were directly over the archers. Clavel leaned his head back and saw another crow hovering right over him, a small glass flask in its feet.

  "Get ready!" shouted the commander. The Lord's Men drew back their bowstrings.

  Fear arising in his throat, Clavel tried to dive for cover, but there was none to be had. He fell on his belly and des­perately tried to roll under the bowmen. He upset their feet and a few tumbled backward, landing on top of him. Two archers lost their balance entirely and fell off the wall with a scream of death.

  All along the line of archers, Lord's Men turned their heads to look at the source of the commotion.

  The crows released their flasks in unison.

  "Fire!" the commander shouted, but not a single bow­string snapped in response. The flasks, which Clavel too late recognized as alchemist's fire, smashed on the archers and the wall. Leaping, roaring flames burst upward, crawling along the top of the wall and raining fire down each side. The Lord's Men closest to the impact let out cries of agony as their clothes erupted in fire, their bowstrings incinerating in their hands. Those farther from the blasts released their weapons and went running to help their fellows, slapping them in a vain attempt to put out the fires.

  Clavel rose, a plume of orange flame leaping from his purple cloak, his screams unheard among the chorus of pain. He plunged off the wall, landing as a flaming wreck directly in the behemoths' unchallenged path.

  * * * *

  Vell watched as flames decimated the mass of soldiers assembled on the wall. Blazing men tumbled to the ground like a fiery waterfall. He looked upward and saw the crows scattering away from the fires. He silently thanked Lanaal. Her plan had worked perfectly.

  The behemoths behind him moved into a line, single file, as they approached the heavy wood gate into Llorkh. Vell stepped onto the flaming ruins of some fallen archers, barely feeling any pain as the blazes were extinguished under his vast feet.

  Arrows flew down at them, but the missiles were few, and they bounced off thick behemoth hides or embedded, troubling the creatures little more than pinpricks.

  Vell's mind reached out to his imprisoned fellows. He felt their excitement, felt them straining against their bondage even more strongly now that liberation seemed so close.

  Shepherd, they seemed to say, give us our freedom!

  Vell raised himself partly onto his hind legs and kicked the massive gates to the city, the last barrier between
him and the behemoths, and the ancient wood groaned. He kicked again, and the whole gate shuddered. A crack raced to split the wood from the point of impact. With one more kick, the door splintered and fell apart.

  Vell lowered his neck to pass through the gateway into Llorkh, where a whole city was ready to fight him.

  * * * *

  Sungar lay on the floor of the cramped cell, its walls marking the edges of his world. With his ear to the ground, he could feel the vibrations of the huge thunderbeast steps. He smiled.

  His two dungeon guards arrived at the cell door. He lay limp and clenched a fist under his body.

  "Wake with the morning, chief," said one of the dungeon guards, unlocking the cell door. "Kiev requests another audience." He spoke faster than Sungar had ever heard him, the urgency plain in his voice. Looking up, Sungar could see that both soldiers had swords at their belts, though neither of them had their hands anywhere near the hilts.

  The instant the first guard walked into the cell, the keys still in the lock, Sungar burst into action. He unleashed all of the anger he had kept in check till this moment. In his clenched fist, he hid all of the dust and pebbles that had fallen from his cell walls during his imprisonment, and he threw it into the guard's eyes.

  As the guard tumbled back, surprised and blinded by Sungar's attack, the second guard stepped backward into the passageway and quickly pushed the cell door shut. Sungar grasped his fellow by the hair and slammed him face-first into the stone wall, then pulled him back and let him fall to the ground. With a swift foot, Sungar stamped on the guard's face, and with the single blow the guard's skull collapsed, his head smashed open on the cold cell floor.

  In the corridor, the surviving guard desperately fumbled with the keys, glancing with fear at Sungar's raging eyes, gone wild and red with fury. The chieftain made a run for the cell door. The guard jumped backward just as Sungar rammed his foot into the door and sent it flying open, its thick iron hinges trembling as it smashed into the wall.