“No! I’m not just gonna sit outside and not know if you’re all right!” she fumed.
“Sit next to a window or something,” Garrett said, “You’re our best spy, and I need you watching, in case Cabre tries something.”
Haven gritted her teeth, trying to find a flaw in his logic.
“We’ll keep ya company,” Shortgrass said, settling on Haven’s right shoulder, and Sender nodded his agreement to her left.
“You don’t need my help, do you?” Mualip whispered from the back of the tunnel.
“No, Master Drypaw,” Shortgrass chuckled, “We can’t risk tha pride o’ tha Amber Court on such a dangerous mission as this!”
“Oh, good,” the little selkie sighed in relief, “I mean... thank you.”
“Who are you takin’ then?” Warren asked.
Garrett looked at Lady Ymowyn and saw a look of hope, mingled with dread in her emerald eyes.
“Would you come with me?” he asked her, “I want somebody on my side to represent the people of Astorra... the people that don’t usually get a say in things here.”
Ymowyn’s eyes tensed with emotion, and she looked as though she might cry. She answered only with another curtsy, not quite as graceful as the last.
“I don’t suppose I’m your second choice, am I?” Warren asked with a rueful grin.
Garrett smiled sadly in response. “If I’ve got Haven watching up top, I need you watching below,” he said, “If things go bad, I’m gonna need you to come up through the floor, like you did back when Shelbie had me locked in the dungeon.”
Warren glanced at his father and then nodded. “You can count on us,” he said, giving Ymowyn a nervous look, “Just... take care of her, all right?”
“I will,” Garrett promised.
“Well... who are you takin’?” Warren asked.
Garrett opened his mouth as though he had an answer to that question, though his mind had yet to provide one. The appearance of Diggs and Mink, squeezing through the mouth of a nearby drainpipe, spared him the embarrassment of admitting his indecision.
“Nasty business up top!” Diggs proclaimed with a fanged grin, straightening his bandolier of essence canisters before reaching up to help the white-furred she-ghoul down from the pipe.
“What happened?” Warren asked.
“The dead found their way inside the walls,” Mink answered.
“Huh?” Warren said.
“Those hanged guys are runnin’ loose in the streets, causin’ all sorts o’ trouble,” Diggs chuckled, “One of ‘em musta remembered a sneaky way into the city, and the rest followed ‘em in.”
“They aren’t hurting people, are they?” Garrett demanded.
“Only folks fool enough to come ‘tween them and vengeance,” Mink laughed with a wicked smirk.
“We need to hurry up and finish this!” Garrett sighed, “Let’s get to the stables.”
Mink and Luma led the way through the tunnels beneath Braedshal. As they moved farther away from the outer walls, the tunnels opened up into broad passageways, wide enough for the ghouls to walk two abreast. Garrett noted that, while the stonework appeared crude by comparison to the construction of Wythr’s ancient labyrinths, it all seemed somehow cleaner, and lacked the persistent aroma of filth and rot that filled the subterranean galleries of his home city.
“It’s really clean here,” he remarked.
“The grumlings keep it tidy,” Lady Ymowyn said, her face cast in a ghostly light by the blue glow of the algae lamp she now carried.
“The what?” Garrett asked.
“Grumlings,” she said, “tiny fae creatures. They live in the walls, out of sight of the humans above.”
“Are they friendly?” Garrett asked, suddenly imagining hundreds of little eyes watching him from the shadowy cracks of the old masonry.
“They are harmless, but shy,” Ymowyn sighed, “I counted them as friends when I lived here, though it took years to gain their trust enough to meet them face to face.”
“What do they look like?” Garrett asked.
“Imagine a furry little egg with big eyes and tiny paws,” she laughed.
“Pests!” Mink hissed.
“Oh, and they are fond of playing pranks on unwanted neighbors,” Ymowyn added.
Luma snorted.
“Does anybody else live down here?” Garrett asked.
Ymowyn’s smile disappeared. “Not anymore,” she answered coldly.
“The humans came through and burnt the place out,” Luma whispered, gesturing toward a smoke-blackened side gallery as they passed it by, “The red priest’s devils sniffed out the folk that was hidin’ here, and then they put ‘em to the fire. We managed to sneak a few of ‘em out through the tunnels, but...”
“Thank you,” Ymowyn said, giving the white sisters a grateful look, “The people that called these tunnels home were my friends. They deserved better than to be hunted down like rats.”
Mink and Luma looked at one another and shrugged, looking a little uncomfortable, as though unaccustomed to praise.
Diggs sniffed loudly and hissed them all to silence. “Somethin’ comin’!” he whispered.
An orb of silver radiance rounded a bend in the passage ahead splashing its watery light across the tunnel walls.
“Don’t tell me you smelled a dead elf comin’,” Scupp growled.
“No! It’s somethin’ else!” Diggs hissed back.
“Songreaver!” Starweaver’s ghost exclaimed as the orb shimmered into his elven form, kneeling before Garrett, “Enemies approach!”
“Douse the light, Ym!” Warren whispered, and Ymowyn quickly hid the algae-filled bottle under her cloak.
Starweaver dimmed his transparent body to a faint, gray light as well, leaving the two fairies to flutter for cover behind Haven. She shot them a foul look as their glow neatly silhouetted her against the stone buttress where she had been attempting to take position for a potential ambush.
“A human patrol,” Starweaver whispered, following Garrett as he and the ghouls moved to either side of the tunnel.
“Where’s Crookjaw and his guys?” Garrett whispered back.
“They fell upon another patrol, farther in,” the elven ghost answered, “Some of the humans fled, and Crookjaw pursued.”
“Where are your people?” Garrett asked.
“Awaiting my orders.” Starweaver answered grimly.
“All right,” Garrett sighed, “Is there any chance the patrol won’t see us?”
“They are moving this way quickly,” Starweaver said, “They waste no time searching but move with purpose.”
“They know we’re here?” Garrett demanded.
“Shh!” Diggs hissed.
“Augh!” Scupp gagged, “What’s that smell?”
Diggs reached back and wrapped his paw around his sister’s snout, silencing her, though the glare she gave him promised later retribution. The two fairies burrowed into the hood of Haven’s cloak on her back, and Starweaver’s ghost slipped silently into the wall beside Garrett, the last of his light flashing in the red eyes of a half dozen ghouls, crouched and ready for battle. Then the tunnel plunged into darkness.
Garrett smelled it now too, a pungent scent of vinegar and rot that filled the air, even as a dim red light began to creep from the far end of the tunnel. For a moment, Garrett recalled the odor of Graelle’s gangrenous wounds, back in the temple dungeon, but this was something fouler still.
He sensed more than saw the hulking forms of the ghouls creeping forward into the protection of the archway between them and the approaching threat. Lacking any sort of cover, Garrett simply drew his sword quietly from its sheath and crouched low against the floor, watching the ever-brightening glow of ruddy light in the tunnel ahead.
A long shadow arced across the curve of the tunnel wall, the dark outline of a man, or something man-like that shambled and lurched as though on mismatched legs. Then, suddenly, it stopped.
“Here!” rasped a chilling voic
e that might have been a man’s, “The children of darkness are here!”
“Contact south!” barked another man’s voice.
“Chadiri,” Garrett hissed through his teeth.
The reddish light ahead flared to brightness as a whoosh of flame sounded from around the bend of the tunnel.
“Clearing!” a Chadiri voice shouted, and Garrett blinked at the sight of a red-armored soldier sprinting into view around the corner with what looked to be a basket full of flames in one hand.
With a mighty grunt of effort, the Chadiri soldier hurled the flaming basket down the tunnel. Tongues of flame licked the walls and ceiling as the object bounced and rolled directly toward Garrett’s position. The basket itself sputtered and popped as whatever fuel within it now erupted into a blinding hot ball of fire.
“Ah!” Garrett yelled, scrambling to his feet as he blasted apart the burning projectile with a bolt of sizzling ice.
“Mage!” yelled the soldier as the glow of blue and red fire faded from the tunnel.
“Get ‘em!” Warren roared, and the ghouls surged forward as a single pack of claws and teeth.
Garrett could think of no better plan and simply roared out a battle cry as he charged after the ghouls, sword in hand.
Garrett rounded the corner to see the pack of hairy ghouls clawing their way over the top of a trio of shieldmen that spanned the broad corridor. The smell of vinegar and decay nearly overwhelmed Garrett’s senses. Beyond the shield wall, he saw a gaunt man in stained red robes. A baggy red hood with two dark eyeholes covered the man’s face. The man lifted a gilded staff, topped with twin hammerheads and pointed it directly at Garrett now, shrieking, “The abomination is upon us!”
More red-armored soldiers pushed forward from behind to put themselves between the ghouls and their priest, and Garrett lost sight of the foul-smelling inquisitor in the clash of ghouls and redjacks.
“Down!” shouted the voice of the man who had thrown the fiery basket earlier, and Garrett shielded his eyes against a blast of heat and light as someone dashed a pot of liquid fire across the ceiling above the ghouls.
Haven yanked Garrett back as gobs of burning oil rained down, catching the hem of his robe alight. Ghouls howled in pain as fire dripped down onto their furry backs, filling the air with the acrid scent of burning hair.
“No!” Garrett screamed, blanketing the ghouls’ bodies with a thick coating of frost, even as Haven batted out the flames on Garrett’s leg with her cloak.
“By his might!” screamed a Chadiri warrior as he shouldered back a stunned, frost-coated Warren and drove his war pick into Bargas’s shoulder.
The big ghoul roared in pain as he crumpled the man’s helmet with a smashing fist.
Mink and Luma, their white fur glistening with ice, seized another man by the arms and dragged him back from the line then fell upon him with tooth and claw.
Diggs tossed aside an empty canister as he belched out a blast of rainbow-colored fire across the raised shields of the Chadiri patrol, and men screamed in pain and rage beneath. Beside him, Scupp lunged forward, taking advantage of the men’s distraction to slip beneath their shields and shove open a gap in the line.
The hooded priest swung his hammer-headed rod at the ghoul’s exposed face, but Scupp caught it between her teeth and wrenched it from his grasp with a toss of her head.
Garrett leveled a fiery blast of magic through the narrow gap and sent the Chadiri priest flying backward, his red robes now frosted with blue ice.
“Kilkaelam!” shouted Starweaver as he and two score of elven ghosts blazed forth from the tunnel walls to fall upon the Chadiri from all sides. The men’s faces contorted in pain as ghostly spears pierced their bodies. Though the insubstantial weapons appeared to do no real damage, their effect on the Chadiri soldiers seemed horrible enough.
The noise of battle soon fell silent, leaving only the gasping, panting breath of the Marrowvyn ghouls, and the wet crunching sounds coming from the dark corner where Mink and Luma had dragged their prey. Garrett tried his best not to look in that direction as he checked his friends for injury.
“Hold still,” Lady Ymowyn chided Warren as she smeared paste over a badly singed patch of his back fur.
“Ow!” Warren whined, flattening his long ears against his head and baring his fangs in a tight grimace.
“Gettin’ slow,” Bargas sighed, massaging the bloody wound in his shoulder before pausing to lick at it with his long black tongue.
“You guys all right?” Garrett asked as he approached Diggs and Scupp.
“I feel great!” Diggs said with a manic laugh, his fanged grin still glowing with vibrant green essence.
“I’m good,” Scupp said, tucking the priest’s gilded staff up under her armpit. Finding it a little too long, she pivoted it in her grip and crunched off a foot and a half of its length between her teeth. She spat out the splintered, gold-foiled wood and then smiled as she settled her weight onto her new crutch.
“I like it,” Garrett chuckled as he turned to look for the war priest among the Chadiri fallen.
The hooded priest stirred to consciousness again, lying on the floor against the far wall, surrounded by glowing elvish ghosts. Sir Baelan stood over the fallen man, his sword in hand and pointed at the priest’s chest.
“Sold your soul to darkness, Astorran,” the priest hissed as he clutched at the frosted chest of his robe with a gloved hand, “Your family will burn with you for this.”
“You have nothing left to threaten me with, devil,” Sir Baelan answered sadly.
“Devil?” the priest spat, ruffling the face of his red hood and Garrett could smell the stench of his rancid breath from across the hall. “You serve a devil, Astorran,” he rasped, pointing a shaking finger at Garrett, “and he will bring death upon you all!”
“Another Inquisitor?” Garrett asked as he drew as close as he dared to the foul-smelling priest.
“Jareg Schruut,” Sir Baelan said, “he calls himself a witch hunter... he’s burned many good people.”
“Good people?” the Inquisitor laughed harshly, “There are none!” The putrid stench of gangrenous flesh stung Garrett’s eyes as the priest rolled onto his side and pushed himself up into a kneeling position. He paused then, coughing out his rotten breath and swaying a little on the knees of his stained and tattered robe.
“Do creatures such as this now rule the green woods of Kilkaelam?” Starweaver’s ghost demanded.
“Not anymore,” Sir Baelan said.
The diseased priest grunted with effort as he struggled to rise, but Sir Baelan’s sword point pressed against his chest pushed him to his knees again.
“For crimes against the Crown and people of Astorra, I sentence you to death, Chadiri,” Sir Baelan said, his voice cold and dispassionate. He lifted his sword in both hands, as high as the ceiling of the tunnel would allow.
“Wait!” Garrett said, lifting his hand in protest.
Sir Baelan furrowed his brow as he half turned toward Garrett, his sword still upraised.
“We don’t have to kill him,” Garrett said.
“This man burned whole families,” Sir Baelan said, his lips twisted in disgust.
Garrett shook his head. “I at least wanna talk to him first,” he said, “Later, when we have the time. I wanna ask him about what’s going on with the Chadiri.”
“You will learn nothing from me, Demon!” the Inquisitor chuckled, “My God has already scourged the flesh from my body! No torment you could devise would compare with what I have already suffered!”
“I don’t know,” Haven mused as she sidled up to Garrett, “I bet we could come up with something pretty creative.”
“We’re not gonna torture you!” Garrett sighed, “I just wanna talk.”
The Inquisitor shook his hooded head. “Kill me know, Astorran,” he hissed, “End my suffering... Send me to the Holy Mountain where I shall dwell in the presence of God for all time! Free me of this living hell with your feeble weapons
of flesh... but know this, your time here is fleeting! The hammer will soon fall, and your iniquities shall be purged from this world with His holy flame! Your seed shall be consumed in the...”
Shortgrass barked out a disgusted cosheili that brought the frothing priest’s rant to a merciful end. The robed Inquisitor stared blankly into space as he sank back to the floor with a soft groan.
“Can we go now?” the little fairy demanded.
Chapter Thirty-two
A distant scream echoed through the moonlit streets of Braedshal, followed by the muffled shouts of men. Garrett and Lady Ymowyn huddled together in the shadow of a stone tower, waiting for Sir Baelan’s signal. A warm wind whistled around the stones, carrying with it the scent of ashes. Garrett felt a sudden pang of loss, remembering the sight of his home burning, the day Brenhaven fell.
I guess I’m the dragon lord this time, Garrett mused bitterly.
That’s the spirit, Brahnek’s voice chuckled in the back of his mind, better on the dragon than in it.
Garrett glanced skyward without thinking, then felt stupid for still being afraid.
Even I was afraid of dragons, boy, Brahnek admitted, There’s no shame in that.
Yeah, but he’s dead, Garrett thought, Why am I still afraid of him?
It isn’t really the creature itself that we fear, Brahnek answered, It is the idea of something larger than us, against which we have no power.
But there’s a dragon inside us now too, right? Garrett wondered, I mean the Songreaver before you was a dragon.
Yes, Brahnek chuckled, he’s here as well.
Well, how come he never talks to me? Garrett thought.
He’s talking to you now, Brahnek laughed, He and We are the same.
I don’t understand at all, Garrett sighed inwardly.
It isn’t necessary that you understand now, Brahnek said, We have the rest of eternity to keep each other company.
Unless I die, Garrett thought.
You are not your body, boy, Brahnek said, I thought you understood that much at least.
Yeah, but you said I could pass this thing on to somebody else and then I could die and go see my brother, Garrett protested.
Yes, Brahnek said, but you would remain with us as well.
Trials of the Twiceborn (The Songreaver's Tale Book 6) Page 37