“It could have been a coincidence. . . .”
“Then you are great believer in coincidence.”
“Wait a minute, Wrinkles. I thought you just said you can’t accomplish anything in the past, because if you did you’d disappear?”
“No, I said you cannot undo your reason for travelling to the past or you will return to the future as though you had never left. Whatever you do in the past it must be entirely unrelated to what brought you there. Accidents are quite possible.”
“And what about me? What about the future?”
Gabrian sent him a grave look. “That you may certainly change, so be careful what you do here, elder. Your presence in this time is unnatural and dangerous.” The old man looked away, and Aurelius felt a chill wind cut through his coat. He cinched the belt tighter about his waist and he shivered quietly. Suddenly he felt eyes on him, watching from the trees. He spun around to look, but there was nothing there. He hadn’t felt that wind since Dagheim, and here in the middle of the forest it was strange. He thought for a moment it was because they were almost out of the trees, but another hour of walking disabused him of that notion. Then finally, the horizon began to lighten and the trees parted to reveal a snowy clearing, glistening icy blue in the moonlight.
The werewolf drew alongside them in a few quick bounds and slowed just long enough to send a meaningful look Aurelius’s way. “Be careful of the old one. He smells strange.”
Aurelius frowned, feeling another chill that had nothing to do with the wind. He looked on with a frown as the wolf bounded out and into the snow. The beast stopped a few dozen paces into the clearing to stand high upon a snowy knoll, its fur rippling in the wind and catching stray silver highlights from the moon.
Suddenly, it threw its head back, arched its body, and let out a sonorous howl.
Aurelius shivered. The sooner he got back to the safety of his ship, the happier he would be.
Chapter 11
Aurelius cast a quick look over his shoulder to make sure nothing was following them out of the forest. The gloomy wall of ice-covered trees loomed over them like something from another planet, or a nightmare, reaching out with gnarled branches for hands and icy tentacles for claws. Yet the only creatures which had followed them from the forest's nightmarish depths were Gral the troll and an enormous, nameless black wolf. Did he even have a name?
Aurelius wasn't sure. He drew alongside the beast and began playing with words in his head, trying to find the best way to ask without giving offense.
“You could not pronounce my name if you tried, human, but the name given me by my human mother was Reven.”
Aurelius blinked in shock. “You can read my thoughts, too?”
“Yes.”
“Is nothing sacred?”
“What do you mean?”
“We humans value our privacy.”
“Yes, another strange thing about you.”
“It isn’t the same for your kind?”
“No. We share all of our thoughts and feelings. I felt an echo of the searing pain that Gregerr felt when you killed him with your sorcery.”
Aurelius frowned. “Greggair?”
He heard an angry snarl from Reven.
“The gray wolf you killed with your weapon,” Gabrian supplied, coming up beside them.
Aurelius saw a grisly flash of wolf’s smoking, blackened head in his mind’s eye, and he felt sick. “He was a friend of yours?”
“A brother.”
Aurelius grimaced. “Hey, I didn’t know. I’m sorry. He was about to kill me; I only acted in self-defense.”
“Were that not the case I would have eaten you by now. There is no honor in serving one who has none.”
“Wait, you attacked us. You mean if I had attacked, I would have no honor? You’re effectively saying that you and your pack have no honor, because you attacked us, and without provocation.” Aurelius caught a wide-eyed look of horror from Gabrian. The old man gave his head a quick shake, as if to say, don’t go there.
But it was too late. Reven whirled to face Aurelius, his teeth bared and snarling. He snapped his jaws bare inches from Aurelius, and he flinched.
“Do I clothe myself in the skins of your people?”
“I . . .”
Reven abruptly turned and stalked away.
“That wasn’t wise, elder.”
Aurelius grimaced. “Yeah. I can see that.”
* * *
There in the distance lay the gleaming, angular form of Aurelius’s pride and joy, the Halcyon Courier. The ship was long and roughly triangular with a pair of angular, swept back wings arcing out from the sides. Bubble-shaped turrets hung inside each wing, able to fire both above and below the ship in 360 degrees. It was painted a dark steel blue with white trim, though the paint was chipped and blackened in places from his recent battle with the ISS.
A pair of small, dark shadows were moving slowly around his ship, poking at it with sticks. Aurelius gritted his teeth in time to every bang of steel against the hardened duralloy hull.
“They’re stabbing my ship with spears!” Aurelius hissed and rose halfway out of their hiding place behind a clump of jagged black rocks.
Gabrian pushed him back down with surprising force. “Wait! Gral?”
“Yes?” the troll boomed softly.
“Take care of them.”
“As the master commands.”
Gral vaulted over the rocks and raced out across the snowy plains between them and the ship with long, eager strides. His feet were punching through the icy top layer of the snow with every step. He was churning up a blizzard as he ran. Gral had gone empty-handed to face the two spearmen, but Aurelius doubted if the giant would need any weapons to face them.
“What’s he going to do?” Aurelius asked.
Gabrian gave him a bland look, as if he were stupid for asking. “He’s going to kill them, of course.”
“What?!” Before Gabrian could stop him, Aurelius ran out after the troll. By now the two men in the distance had spotted Gral and were shouting to one another in urgent tones. They’d formed a two man phalanx with both their spears and shields pointed out toward the troll in a united front, but Gral hadn’t even slowed.
“Wait! Don’t kill them!” Aurelius called.
Gral was just seconds from reaching the men when he registered Aurelius’s command and slowed his headlong rush to cast a confused look over his shoulder. In that instant one of the men took advantage of the distraction to throw his spear, and it struck Gral in the arm. He roared furiously. The spearhead buried itself halfway in Gral’s bulging triceps, but compared to how thick his arm was, it was little more than a scratch. Aurelius watched as Gral tore the spear out of his arm and snapped it like a pencil. He spun to face the two men, spreading his arms and fists wide. He roared again, and this time he seemed to swell to twice his size as he flexed every muscle in his enormous frame. Veins and tendons stood out like cables on the monster’s grayish skin.
The two men quavered uncertainly before their gigantic foe. To their credit, they held their ground. The man who’d thrown his spear drew a long sword from his side and broke formation with his comrade to circle the troll warily. Gral angled after him, and the remaining spearman took that moment of inattention to thrust for Gral’s ribs. Gral caught the movement in his peripheral vision and grabbed the spear just after its gleaming point. With a mighty heave he wrenched the weapon out of the man’s hand, yanking him off his feet. The man’s face smashed into the icy snow, and Gral turned the spear on the advancing swordsman. The swordsman cast a quick look to his fallen comrade, his eyes wide and terrified, and Gral seized that small window of opportunity.
Aurelius watched the troll rearing back to throw the spear. “Stop!” he screamed.
But this time Gral wasn’t listening. His arm shot forward, snapping straight in an instant, and the spear whistled for a split second before slamming into the swordsman’s chest with a mighty clank! Of steel against steel. The spear
passed straight through the man’s body and went skidding along the icy snow behind him. Blood gushed blackly from a dark hole in the man’s chest. His mouth hung open in a soundless scream and his sword clattered from lifeless fingers as he fell.
The other man was just stumbling to his feet, blood streaming from his nose. He drew his sword, and Aurelius watched in slow-motion horror as Gral stomped up to him, batted the sword aside with his bare forearm, and grabbed the man by his neck in one enormous fist. Gral lifted the man half a dozen feet above the ground and then squeezed. There came a sickening crunch and then the troll tossed the man’s limp body aside with a contemptuous snarl.
Thud. A small cloud of snow resulted from the impact.
Gabrian walked up beside Aurelius and placed a hand on his shoulder. Aurelius flinched away and rounded on the old man.
“What’s wrong with you?”
“It was the only way.”
“No! It wasn’t the only way! You could have knocked them out.”
“Do you really suppose that a troll is capable of such subtle means?”
“I said you could have.”
“With magic?”
Aurelius smirked. “What else? I wouldn’t want you to get your hands dirty.”
Gabrian met his expression with a scowl. “I need all of my strength to find Malgore. I told you once already, elder: there is far too much at stake for me to risk it over a petty distinction between right and wrong.” Gabrian brushed past him and started for the ship. Reven padded softly after him, and Gral stood already waiting for them by the boarding ramp. Aurelius gaped in disbelief for a handful of seconds before hurrying after the old man.
“A petty distinction?” Aurelius demanded. “You call cold-blooded murder a petty distinction? That seems pretty damn clear-cut to me.” Gabrian offered no reply. “Answer me!” Aurelius yelled.
The old man replied in a cool voice. “They were able to defend themselves. They had weapons. This is war, not a children’s game that you can play and afford to lose. Better luck next time; no hard feelings; I’m sorry I killed you; maybe next time you can kill me?” Gabrian rounded on him, his blue eyes blazing with fury. “None of that, elder! Choose your side, but trouble me no more with your foolishness or I will turn you into a puppet who will obey me without this tiresome bickering.”
Aurelius ground his teeth as he bottled his own furious indignation.
“What will it be, elder?”
“What’s so damned important about this relic, anyway? So what if Malgore has it? You told me no one can change the past, so how can he possibly do any harm?”
“Don’t be naïve. There is always a way. Besides, you want to get back to your time, don’t you? Yes, of course you do. Now come on, you are wasting time, and we have none to lose.”
Aurelius stalked after the old man and up to the Halcyon Courier. He had half a mind to fly up into space and toss the old man out the airlock. Let’s see him use magic to survive that!
But something told him that Gral wouldn’t take kindly to his master suffering explosive decompression, and Aurelius didn’t think being ripped apart limb by limb by a troll would be a very pleasant death either.
* * *
Aurelius stood before the open airlock doors, his gaze skipping between Gral, the narrow portal to his ship, and back again.
“He’s not going to fit,” Gabrian said.
“Really? That hadn’t occurred to me.”
“Spare me your wit, boy.”
“Don’t you mean elder?”
Gabrian met his gaze with impatient fury. “Have you a solution to this problem or not?”
Aurelius scowled and looked the troll up and down thoughtfully. “Well, he’ll fit through the cargo bay doors, but he’ll have to stay there in the cargo bay, because the rest of the ship is far too small for him.”
“Make it happen.”
“Wait here, Gral,” Aurelius said as he, Gabrian, and Reven squeezed into the airlock. Aurelius led the way through the gleaming corridors. The lights came on automatically as sensors detected movement. He reached the inside cargo bay doors and waved his hand across the door scanner. The doors swished open to reveal a yawning space, filled only partially with a scattering of crates that were bolted to the deck. The ceiling was tall enough to accommodate two trolls standing on each other’s shoulders.
“This will do, elder,” Gabrian said, looking around.
“We should just leave the blood-thirsty monster,” Aurelius said as he stomped through the cargo bay to the outer doors. “I don’t trust him.”
“He will serve me without question and without complaint, which is more than I can say for you.”
“Yeah, well, mindless obedience can be a double-edged sword. Be careful he doesn’t slice off anything important.”
“You needn’t trouble yourself. My life shall not be at risk.” The subtle emphasis Gabrian placed on the word “my” gave Aurelius cause to send a narrow-eyed look over his shoulder. Still glaring at the wizard, he absently waved a hand across the door scanner. A heavy clunk sounded and then came a grinding of gears and a hissing of pneumatics. The large double doors rolled slowly open and after a few seconds they clanked into place inside the jambs. Not bothering to extend the cargo ramp, Aurelius jumped the half a dozen feet to the ground and yelled, “Gral! Over here!”
They heard the snow crunching loudly with his approach, and then the giant troll loomed into view. “What want from Gral?”
Gabrian pointed inside the ship. “Climb aboard.”
Gral walked up to open doors. The deck stood only at knee height for him, even though it easily cleared Aurelius’s head. Gral stepped up onto the deck and began thudding around the cargo bay like a little kid.
“What this cave made of?”
Aurelius hauled himself up after the troll with considerably more difficulty. “Welcome to your new home, Gral.”
“Home? This not home. Gral not even have furry feather bed to sleep on.”
“We’ll get you a furry feather bed, but for now just make yourself as comfortable as you can. Oh . . .” Aurelius trailed off in a frown and cast about the cargo bay.
“What?” Gabrian asked, his brow dropping a dark shadow over his eyes.
“Artificial gravity is malfunctioning, which means inertial compensators are, too.”
“And?”
“And, unless we want troll pudding, I’d better think of something to keep him from flying around.”
Gral was looking back and forth between Gabrian and Aurelius, slowly blinking his large yellow eyes. He might have looked fearsome with his bloodstained hands, his giant frame, and his demonic features, but for the dumb look on his face. “Why talk about Gral like he not here? Tell Gral what to do, and he do it.”
Aurelius sent the troll a quick, placating smile, the kind a parent might offer to a child. “Sure . . .” He cast about a moment longer, then walked up to one of the crates and typed a code into the panel on the side. The top of the crate slid open and Aurelius peered over the rim. “Good, it’s empty. Come here, Gral.”
Thud. Thud. Thud. Thud. . . .
“Get inside.”
Gral obediently climbed in.
“Now sit down.”
The giant monster sat with his knees tucked up to his chest and a third of his body still poking out of the crate. Aurelius stood back with a frown.
“Well?” Gabrian demanded.
“It’ll do.”
“Then let’s be on our way.”
Aurelius nodded and they turned to leave.
“Wait! Gral not comfy!”
Aurelius cast a quick look over his shoulder. “You have to stay there, Gral, or you’ll fly around the cargo bay like a giant pinball.”
“What is pinball?”
Aurelius sighed. “What happens to an egg if you drop it?”
“It crack and leak.”
“Yeah, that’s what will happen to you if you don’t stay in the crate.”
The t
roll’s eyes narrowed. “Gral stronger than egg.”
“Just trust me. You don’t want to leave that crate until I say you can.”
“Fine.” Gral screwed up his face in a fearsome pout. For just a second Aurelius felt sorry for him, a simple creature thrust into a complicated environment and forced to adapt.
Gral squandered that sympathy in the next instant by sticking out his fat green tongue and flicking it like a snake. Aurelius left the cargo bay with a snort of amusement. Gral was like a giant four-year-old—a four-year-old with a tendency for murderous rages and a penchant for raw meat.
* * *
They reached the cockpit and Aurelius and Gabrian took their prior places in the pilot and copilot’s chairs respectively. Reven was left to take one of the remaining two passenger’s seats. Aurelius cast a quick look over his shoulder to see how a wolf might do that and found the beast stuck on the other side of the cockpit doors, its shoulders too broad to even fit through the doorway.
“Ahh . . .” Aurelius’s mind was already racing to solve the problem. He was about to suggest that the wolf go join Gral in the cargo bay when the wolf’s lustrous black fur rippled and shimmered. Suddenly the fur seemed to peel back from Reven’s face; his snout grew shorter; and his ears became less pointed. His skin took on a pinkish hue and his whiskers disappeared. The monster stood up on its hind legs and suddenly, standing there before them was a giant, hairy, naked man. Aurelius grimaced at Reven’s nakedness and shrugged out of his coat.
“Here, put this on,” he said, tossing the furry brown coat at the wolf man.
Reven caught it with a snarl, revealing unnaturally pointy white teeth and prominent canines. Guessing at the reason for Reven’s sudden fury, Aurelius said, “Who better to wear such a coat than another wolf?”
“Would you wear a coat made from human skin?”
A disgusted look crawled onto Aurelius’s face. “I suppose not.”
Reven tossed the coat back and then turned sideways to squeeze through the door. He sat with his bare backside on one of the leather passenger seats. Aurelius grimaced and made a mental note to replace that seat when—if—he ever got back to his time.
Mrythdom: Game of Time Page 10