Frank-KWar

by Kynyr's War [lit]

  The lycan sprang onto a boulder, from there to a bench and then executed a somersault over Jondries head. Finn landed behind him and hit him with a side slash to his injured right. The sa'necari's right knee gave and he went down, twisting to keep Finn in view.

  Finn's fur thickened and his face snouted as he went as far into the hybrid form as he could. He parried Jondries counter, side-stepped into a lunge and drove the blade with all his force into Jondries right side, into the same spot that Fergus had broken the links of Jondries armor with his axe earlier.

  Jondries screamed.

  The lycan twisted the kendaryl blade in the wound, kicked Jondries in the ass, and sent him face down. Stomping on the sa'necari's blade arm, Finn moved to bring his sword down across Jondries neck.

  The swift gesture of a spell caught the edge of Finn's vision and he threw himself sideways to avoid it. Black force struck Finn in the chest, passed through his armor, and sent pain raging through his body.

  Death Web . Finn sank to his knees, fighting the burning fire in his lungs. He had been so caught up in fighting Jondries as a swordsmon, that he had forgotten to watch for the magic.

  Jondries dragged himself up, entangled Finn's blade from above, and pulled a runed hellblade from his belt.

  Breathing hard, Finn threw himself backwards and rolled. Jondries gained his feet and took a tottering step after Finn. The lycan's eyes narrowed. One cut from that hellblade, and depending on the runes it carried, Finn would be in serious trouble.

  He rose to this knees with a series of swift feints of his sword, twisted and chopped hard at Jondries left hand with the axe. Bone snapped and the hellblade dropped from Jondries grip. The sa'necari made a staggering retreat.

  Finn lurched to his feet. The pain from the spell had started to fade and Finn guessed that the armor must have absorbed or deflected the worst of it. Mastering his body, Finn beat Jondries defenses down and hit him again in the right side. The sustained punishment to his right finally told and Jondries collapsed.

  Clutching his wounds, Jondries stared up at Finn and whimpered. No."

  "You killed Sainy. Finn's words emerged hoarse and rasping, spoken with the savagery of an injured animal. She was the sweetest little thing ... never hurt anyone."

  Jondries tried to writhe from the path of Finn's descending blade, and failed. The kendaryl sword passed through his neck and broke through the bone. The sa'necari's head parted from his body. Jondries amaranthine eyes blinked and then glazed in death.

  Finn settled on a boulder, wiped his sword in the frosted grass, and sheathed it. His shoulders drooped, and his head lowered. His eyes closed in exhaustion. The sound of footsteps made him open them again.

  "Finn? Kynyr gripped his spiritbrother's shoulder. Are you hurt, Finn?"

  "Nah. I'll be okay. His gaze was drawn to Heironim's head hanging from Kynyr's belt by the hair. That the bastard killed Cullen?"

  "Yeah."

  "He's Jondries. Finn snagged Jondries head and tied it to his belt by the hair.

  He rose wearily and staggered two steps.

  Kynyr caught him and shouldered his weight. Ugly cubs have more fun."

  "Yeah we do."

  Walking to the brothel together, they noticed that the sounds of fighting had ceased.

  * * * *

  Fergus hand closed on Darcy's. The Sharani surgeons had given him a large dose of Pollendine, a narcotic so potent and potentially addictive that it was usually only given to the dying, yet it barely eased his pain.

  "Darcy ... tell Siusan ... I loved her."

  "I will, Fergus. I promise."

  Lord Brodrig grasped the arm of the Sharani surgeon as she walked off from treating Fergus. How is he?"

  She shook her head. Nothing we can do. Nothing at all. None of us are Menders."

  A forlorn look came over Brodrig's young face. He went to Fergus and stroked a lock of sweat-drenched red hair from his friend's face. Hold on, Fergus. Just hold on."

  Fergus gave him a long, weary glance. Face it, boy. It's the end of me."

  "No. Brodrig spun on his heel, glancing frantically for Cahira. He failed to see her, but reasoned that as short as she was, she would be easy to miss. He worked his way through the common room crowded with wounded and dying, searching for her.

  He had about given up when he heard her distinctive voice coming from a corner of the room. Cahira stood talking to a pair of Sharani priests who had come to pray for the dying.

  Brodrig pushed between the priests, getting a glare from them.

  Cahira took his hand and drew him to her. What is it, Lord Brodrig?"

  When the priests realized that he was the MacLachlan lord, their attitudes shifted to concerned and attentive.

  "It's Fergus MacFie. He's dying. He needs a Mender."

  "I'm exhausted... Cahira began.

  "Can you draw from rapport? asked Leanajys.

  "I haven't done it in years."

  "Are you willing to try? We'll help you."

  "Yes. Cahira allowed Brodrig to guide her through the room to Fergus side with the two priest walking behind them.

  She unshouldered her satchel and placed it on the table that Fergus lay upon. She grasped his wrist and Read him. It's going to be iffy. Very iffy."

  Cahira wiggled her fingers into the belly wound. Circle."

  A pattern of white energy snapped into being, linking the priests to Cahira. She closed her eyes and drew upon their psychic energies. Despite their augmentation, Cahira swayed and looked ready to faint from exhaustion when she finished.

  "What have you done? Darcy asked.

  "Mended his wounds. Cahira forced herself to focus, snapped her case open, and took out a box and several jars. She smeared Idyn Gold into the wounds. Then she opened the little box and they saw that it contained needles stained with a golden substance. Cahira examined Fergus arm for a good vein and inserted the needles into it. I'll need a board. His arm must be immobilized while the drug enters his system."

  "Will he make it? Brodrig asked.

  "I don't know, but his chances are improved. Last time I had to deal with something like this, I saved two and lost one."

  Finn put his arm around Darcy as she began to cry. Reaction had set in and she was feeling her losses. She put her hand to her face, pressing her leaking eyes.

  "Come on, Darcy. Let's have a drink. There's nothing more you can do here."

  Darcy nodded and walked away in the circle of Finn's arm.

  They settled Fergus into a bed upstairs, and his brother Atair straddled a chair to sit with him.

  * * * *

  Malthus met the Lycamornots at the old cottage that he and his nieces had once lived in on an isolated section of the land that had been ceded to the refugee camp by the previous owner, Beth. He had enjoyed Beth, taking her mind and body on his first night living in the camp. She had run this place with some help from the old Willodarian priest, Tempest Anstey. Malthus had murdered Tempest and, a little time later, his friend Egidius had rited Beth.

  He delighted in the deception that compound and surrounding lands were run by Clodagh and Pandeena, when it was actually himself. This place had been his first conquest, and Merissa had been his second, when all of her family were dead and he ruled through Merissa, then he would complete his conquest of the Red Wolf Clan.

  The table they sat at had made for him by Shalto and Oswyl so that they would have one large enough for all of them to sit around it. Preece had his chair right up against that of fourteen-year-old Rheu, the smallest and youngest of them. Malthus knew they were lovers, although they used the women also. Nesswen, a shaggy young blond, with watery blue eyes, and an overbite, watched the others over his tankard of mead. Torquil was the largest member, a huge strapping smith's apprentice. But Malthus favorite was Yren who was sitting between Oswyl and Torquil. There was not much to Yren physically, he looked like a stick figure with a mop of reddish brown hair, but he made up for it in feistiness.

  And he liked to
hurt people.

  They were all good with the long knives riding at their hips, but only Torquil could claim a moderate expertise with swords and axes. They wore simple wool drawstring pants, and knee length robes that wrapped loosely around their upper bodies in a variation of the traditional lycan garb that allowed them to switch freely into their powerful hybrid forms.

  "This Patton sounds suspicious, Shalto, Malthus said over a tankard of ale. He had tired of drinking mead all the time just because that was what the young ones liked.

  "He's certainly asking an awful lot of questions, just as many as that lawgiver is. Yren wrinkled his nose and red hair sprouted along his arms in reaction to his irritation. He tried to pin me against a tree for some answers, but I got away from him."

  "I don't think it would be wise for me to meet him. Malthus lowered his head, gazing off to the side. I'm still healing. You'll have to take him yourselves."

  "It's good that you're getting better. Shalto refilled his tankard.

  "It was a very near thing, Shalto. An inch lower and that bloody barb would have been in my heart."

  Shalto's face filled with concern. You be careful, Malthus. We don't want to lose you. You're our inspiration."

  Malthus lowered his head still more as if overcome by the praise, tilting it to the side with a small smile. Thank you, Shalto."

  "We'll take care of this, Torquil said. Trust us. We'll go at him like wolves on a deer."

  "Make sure no one sees you do it."

  Preece smiled and ruffled Rheu's hair. I'm good at ambushes."

  Malthus regarded Preece. He was more and more certain that both Preece and Yren had killed myn before and enjoyed it. The other thing we need to do is to get the pregnant women out before anyone notices them. Kandaishee's getting huge."

  Shalto chuckled. You must have got her up the stick good first try. She was already swelling before the rest of us started taking our rides."

  "She's due to deliver me a son long before my wife is."

  "So what are we doing with them?"

  "Sending them to my mother's estate. I have some friends who will meet us in the forest half a day's ride from here and take them the rest of the way."

  "Sounds good to me, Shalto said.

  The others murmured an agreement.

  * * * *

  Malthus rode out of Wolffgard village with a packhorse tied to his mount's saddle, supposedly going hunting to bring back meat for the Sanctuary. It had been hard convincing Sheradyn that he was well enough to travel. Even old Claw had argued against his going, and normally the bastard did not give a damn what happened to Malthus. He rode north alone, heading for the mountains where the caves were that formed the north boundary to Red Wolf lands. He needed to arrange the rendezvous that would take the pregnant women, not to his mother's estate, but to his own at Carrion Crevasse where he was re-establishing his laboratories and preparing to resume his old experiments on lycans and other races once his job in Red Wolff Valley was done.

  He stayed deep in the forest, traveling through the shadowed places where he was unlikely to be seen, sheltered from view by the pine forest and diverged late in the day onto the same hunter's trace where he had killed the lawgiver Nikko Softpaws months ago. After riding for two hours, he began watching for flashes of orange moving through the trees above him. By now, he should have seen imps scampering about on every side of him, through the trees on every side of him, through the brush and briars, and up in the trees leaping like wizened orange-skinned monkeys. He had been promised the service of dozens, under the leadership of the imp-warlord Gahni. Malthus and Gahni had worked together many times over the years. Yet it had taken substantial promises of food, gold, and booty to persuade Gahni to bring his people from the West Bank of the Hillora to Waejontor. Malthus had also provided Gahni's queen with a large supply of one of his mother's most potent arrow poisons in return for the queen releasing Gahni and his myn to Malthus service.

  Malthus wondered why they were not around, greeting him and looking for food. Legend had it that imps were genetically altered monkeys, created by a hellgod named Jasmeden during the last godwar.

  "Where's Gahni gotten off to? he muttered.

  The trees gave way steadily, thinning into a rocky fell. As Malthus horse topped the first treeless rise, he saw the northern border of Claw's lands, the Place of Boulders. Huge rocks, which had fallen from the mountains rising above it, broke up the landscape like the remains of a giant's scattered toys. It looked like a good place for an ambush and Malthus rode cautiously through them.

  When he reached the far side, he saw a stone bleeding table with a tool table sitting next to it almost beneath the cliff, saw the mossy overhang that concealed his brother's caves, and saw a lycan body on the bleeding table on its belly. If it was female, then he would be very irritated with Egidius and Laetus.

  He had told them to spare as many of the bitches of childbearing age as possible and send them to his manor in Carrion Crevasse. He knew that none of them would arrive there virgins, but that did not bother him. Any that arrived there pregnant would be a bonus to his plans to create a new race of genetically altered slaves. He would succeed where Waejonan had failed.

  He dismounted and tied his horse to a tree near the cave before investigating the body. To his relief, it was a young male perhaps fifteen years old. The runes painted on the nude corpse drew Malthus eyes. This one had been an offering for the soul of the dead. He wondered who warranted that attempt to send a soul to Bellocar, their liege-god, instead risking its capture by Hadjys the dark judge.

  "Egidius! He called out, turning around. Egidius!"

  Malthus walked into the cave. There were two interlocked caves, and they were roomy, around the size of a bedchamber. The first one had a cabinet, a table, and two chairs in it. He thought of it as his brother's cave because it was here that he found the first proof that his half-brother Troyes had been killed. He would never forget finding two of Troyes blades in one of the drawers along with the empty hilt of a third. The blades only shattered when they were used to kill their makers. Beside the blades had lain the crest of their family carved into an ivory round, painted, and attached to a golden chain. They had bottled his brother's blood after killing him on that bleeding table. Malthus had found it, and then he, Egidius, and Laetus had drunk it in remembrance of what a fine sa'necari Troyes had been.

  He had still not gotten his full vengeance against Isranon and Claw, but marrying Merissa had given him a start on achieving it. Once Claw and Darmyk were dead, and the valley had fallen to his armies, then his vengeance would be complete and Malthus would reveal himself.

  A mon slumped across the table, making small sobbing noises, with his hand on a bottle of blood wine.

  "Egidius? What happened?"

  Egidius lifted his head and his sa'necari eyes, amaranthine without pupils, iris, or whites, looked at him glistening with tears. Malthus could tell that he was half-drunk.

  Malthus gripped Egidius shoulder and shook him. Whatever it is, you can't let it unman you."

  Egidius put the bottle to his mouth and drank more, the wine dribbling into his thin beard. Laetus is dead. I promised my family I'd take care of him, and he's dead."

  "How did it happen? asked Malthus, his voice low and dangerous. He knew that Egidius and his much younger cousin, Laetus, had been very close, but this display of grieving sottery irritated Malthus.

  "Three Stones ... near Iudris Meadows...."

  "Where you exterminated that battle-clan? Malthus head tilted back, rising to an alert angle. He had given permission for Laetus to take a sizeable force against the hamlet, more than enough to have taken on whatever the lycans might have been able to field. There wasn't a surviving battle-clan in the area, just farmers. Around three weeks ago, Lokynen and Phelan had come from Three Stones insisting on a private talk with Claw. Did they tell him about this? And he said nothing to me? Why hide a victory?

  "Yes. Oh, hell, it seemed so easy. Just a little
hamlet. Laetus wanted to lead it himself. To show me what he could do, you know? I let him. Gods of Hell, I should have been with him."

  "What happened, damn it. Get to the point! What went wrong?"

  "They were wiped out. No one escaped, not even the three brukulacos I sent. Since then, the hamlet raised a fort around their perimeters ... and an ugly abatis that would be hell to get past."

  "How do you know he failed to escape?"

  A long sob came from Egidius and he took another drag from the bottle. They piked his head above the gates. I saw it."

  "How could this happen? Malthus searched his memories of Lokynen. That mon had a stench of power about him. Lokynen must have been part of the force that defeated Malthus units. But what kind of force? He needed more information.

  "That's what I keep asking myself."

  "They had to have had help of some kind. And it didn't come from a battle-clan. There are none left in the east here. Malthus thoughts circled around and around.

  "Remember those odd prints we found when those Rakshasha scouts were killed? I asked then if you thought it might be yuwenghau and you laughed at me."

  "Yuwenghau. The word tasted nasty in his mouth. Lokynen had to be yuwenghau. Malthus connected more pieces together. Lokynen had to be Lokynen Willidar the Battle-Master, a very dangerous yuwenghau, and the odds were that he was not the only one. Lokynen had spent time with both Claw and the priest. Was the priest also yuwenghau? We need weapons from the godwar. There's a rumor that Lord Daemon found a cache of them. He'll want something in trade, and I have an idea of just what to give him. Call the others."

  Malthus held back on informing Egidius that Lord Daemon, principle advisor to Queen Tomyrilen was actually Lord Hoon, possibly the most dangerous vampire in existence. Brandrahoon had created the golden band on Malthus hand that concealed his nature for his brother, Waejonan the Accursed.

  * * * *

  Pandeena answered the knock on her door with a knot of irritation in her middle. If that's you again, Odhran, go away."

  "It isn't."

  A smile flashed across Pandeena's face at the sweet male tenor that spoke from the other side. She yanked the door open and threw herself onto Hathura.