The Fall of Highwatch

by Mark Sehestedt

  Prisoners in tow, they ran.

  “How far is the way out of here?” Hweilan asked.

  “Skip, hop, and a stone’s throw,” said Menduarthis, and they came to an opening in the wall. “Let’s see to your pup,” he said, and rushed inside.

  They ran through a tunnel formed of foliage, leaving the soft ligh of the night behind. Holding the prisoners, Menduarthis could not retrieve his light. Hweilan followed the sound of his movement, his boots kicking their way through eons’ worth of dead leaves.

  They emerged from the tunnel and into a large area devoid of trees. Clouds hid the moon entirely now, and the last of the stars were fading behind their haze. But faerie light lit the area before them. A fall of glowing frost, much like the ones Hweilan had seen in Ellestharn, only much larger, fell over a low cliff to their right and gathered in a narrow pool. Small orbs of light, none larger than her fist, floated soundlessly throughout the area, reflecting off the fresh snow in every color of the rainbow.

  A huge tree, shaped like an ancient oak but utterly black and leafless, grew out of the glowing pool at the bottom of the glowing fall. It towered at least fifty feet in the air, but its lower branches, thick as battering rams, bent low to the ground. Vines draped the tree, and thorns covered the vines. Tangled among the vines, like a fly in a spider’s web, was Lendri. Naked, his pale skin bled from dozens of places where the thorns had raked away great gouges of skin or cut deep into the flesh beneath.

  “Quickly, Hweilan,” said Menduarthis. He was watching the sky nervously. “Every moment counts now.”

  He needn’t have said so. The pounding in her brain told her all she needed to know.

  She ran to Lendri, Menduarthis following with their prisoners.

  Mindful of the vines and thorns, Hweilan knelt in front of Lendri. He raised his head to try to look at her. She reached in among the thorns, slow and careful, and brushed the hair from his face.

  “Hweilan?” he said. “Are you—?”

  “I’m well enough. But we need to get you out of here and be gone.” The words from her dream came to her suddenly—Death comes … empty dens, dead hearts.

  “Leave me,” said Lendri.

  Much to Hweilan’s surprise, Lendri looked even better than he had when she had last seen him in the queen’s palace. Not good. But not just half a shade from death either. He bled from dozens of cuts, but few of them looked very deep. Hweilan suspected the worst of his injuries were more to his spirit than his flesh.

  “How badly are you hurt?” she asked.

  Hweilan heard Menduarthis walk up behind her, and Lendri’s eyes focused on him. “What’s he doing here?”

  “Helping us escape.”

  Lendri barked something that was part laugh and part sob, then let his head fall again. “Get out of here while you still can, Hweilan. But don’t trust that one.”

  “Weak words, coming from you,” said Menduarthis. “But we can play Menduarthis-was-right-all-along-and-oh-how-I-should-have-listened later. After we are well away from here.”

  Hweilan looked up at Menduarthis. “What’s the matter with him? He looks better than when we saw him at the palace.”

  “The queen’s had him tortured,” said Menduarthis. “Several times. But before he can die and be out of misery, she has him healed again, then starts over.”

  “Help me free him,” she said.

  Menduarthis looked down at his two captives. “You heard the lady. Double quick!”

  The sentries stared spears up at Menduarthis. They’d heard that Menduarthis suspected that Kunin Gatar was headed their way, and a great deal of defiance had returned to their gazes.

  “Don’t make me twirl my fingers.” The one Menduarthis held with his left hand tried to thrash out of his grip, but Menduarthis held on and shook him. “Just for that, I’ll burst your chest first. Go on! Free my hand!”

  Wind gusted, rattling the branches of the old tree and spraying them with snow. By the slight widening of Menduarthis’s eyes, Hweilan knew he hadn’t done it. But that was apparently lost on the guards, and they jabbered something to him in their own tongue. Menduarthis answered in kind, then let them go. They stepped away, each of them rubbing their arms where Menduarthis had held them.

  “Stand back, Hweilan. Let them work.”

  She did. The two guards stood in front of Lendri. They began a sing-song chant, more mutter than song, and passed their open palms over the thorns, beginning low down where thick tangles of vines held him around the waist. As they did so, the vines peeled away, unwrapping themselves.

  “Why didn’t they bind his legs?” Hweilan asked Menduarthis.

  “He can struggle more that way. The more he struggles, the deeper he cuts himself.”

  The nagging beat in her mind was screaming at her now. “Hurry!” she told the guards.

  Lendri seemed to sense something as well. He raised his head and sniffed at the air. “Hweilan, run!”

  The guards had removed most of the vines from his torso and shoulders, and as Hweilan watched, the last coils sloughed off his neck. But many still encased his arms, holding him upright but limp, like a puppet hung from a peg on the wall.

  “We’re not leaving without you,” she told Lendri.

  “Don’t be foolish,” Lendri and Menduarthis said at the same time, then glared at each other.

  Seeing the vines sloughing off him, more and more skin revealed, Hweilan realized a flaw in their plan. They’d brought no clothes for Lendri. After they left the Feywild, it might not be as cold, but winter was still holding on in the mountains.

  She turned to Menduarthis. “Why didn’t you tell me he’d be naked?”

  “How would I know?” he said. “But this one can take care of himself.”

  “He’ll freeze!” Hweilan took Lendri’s pouch that she’d rescued from Roakh out from her belt and laid it on the ground before her. She knew there were no clothes in there, but there might be something to give him a little modesty at the least.

  “He won’t,” said Menduarthis. “Trust me. He can—”

  Lendri screamed and lunged for Menduarthis. Most of the vines had been taken away by the guards, and the few that still clung to his arms ripped away, taking more skin with them.

  But Menduarthis sidestepped, and Lendri sailed past. He hit the ground and turned, already preparing another lunge. Menduarthis stood ready, one hand held before him, another raised over his head, the eldritch glow of a spell pulsing in both fists.

  “Stop it!” Hweilan screamed, and jumped between them.

  Lendri crouched before her, hands like claws before him, lips pulled back over his teeth like some rabid beast.

  “Stop this! Lendri, stop! Menduarthis saved my life and risked his own to free you. We’re leaving here with him.”

  Lendri recoiled as if slapped. The fury melted from his face, but he didn’t relax. “You can’t trust him, Hweilan.”

  “More so than you,” said Menduarthis.

  The two guards, seeing their captors distracted, fled. One headed for the tunnel, the other ran over the lip of the hollow and disappeared into the woods.

  “Let them go,” said Menduarthis. “Doesn’t matter now.” Still holding his magic and standing guard against Lendri, Menduarthis spared a glance at the darkening sky and the wind rattling through the branches of the great tree. “Come with us or don’t, Lendri, but we are leaving. Now.”

  Hweilan winced. The pounding in her head was so intense now that it had gone beyond annoyance or anxiety to actual pain. She took Lendri’s pouch that she’d found in Roakh’s roost and handed it to him. “Please,” she said. “Let’s just go.”

  Resigned, Lendri stood, took the pouch, and reached inside. He pointedly avoided looking at either Menduarthis or Hweilan.

  Menduarthis straightened, the magic in his hands dissipating.

  “You have something for the cuts?” said Hweilan.

  “I’ll be fine,” said Lendri. He took out the copper ring she had seen in the
pouch and slid it on one finger. Hweilan could see his hands trembling.

  Menduarthis shouted, “Hweilan!”

  She turned. A figure stepped from the tunnel. Or shambled more like, as if it were hurt or carrying a great weight. Shadows seemed reluctant to leave it. Darkness clung to the thing like a cloak. But as the figure stepped onto the snow, the fey light illuminated his features.

  Soran.

  But he had been … not hurt. Savaged. The flesh and skin along one side of his face hung in bloody tatters, and the eye in the midst of it was only a dark, wet socket. The lips and cheek were gone, showing his teeth in a lopsided, savage grin. His few remaining clothes hung off him in tatters, and great gouges of flesh along his torso had been ripped away. He dragged his right leg as he walked. In his left hand, he held a sword, broken about halfway above the crosspiece and ending in a jagged shard. Bits of vine hung off him, and in his right hand he held what Hweilan first took for a tree branch. But as he walked, the thing in his hand flopped, and she saw that it was an arm, still dripping blood and steaming in the cold air. Hweilan feared she knew what had happened to the guard who had fled into the tunnel.

  The thing fixed its one good eye on Hweilan, its bloody half-grin widened, and it increased its pace.

  “Run!” Menduarthis spread his arms in a flourish worthy of a tavern bard, and his fingers began to twist in their intricate pattern.

  Lendri grabbed Hweilan by the forearm and pulled her after him, heading downslope toward the woods.

  She looked back.

  Menduarthis brought both hands around in a sweeping motion. Wind crashed down like a wave, driving snow and ice and compressing it into a wall that rolled toward the Soran-thing. It struck him full force, stopping him in his tracks. Snow and ice continued rolling over him, encasing him.

  “Ha!” Menduarthis cried.

  But then the spell was spent. Thick ice encased Soran up to his waist. He thrashed like a live fish thrown onto a hot pan, striking at the ice again and again with his sword and fist. His strength was far beyond anything human, and the ice was not glacier solid.

  “He’s breaking free!” Hweilan shouted.

  “Duly noted,” said Menduarthis. He stood his ground.

  Soran broke through the last of the ice and charged.

  Menduarthis’s hands were forming another spell.

  Soran plowed into him. But Hweilan was his target, his one blazing eye fixed on her, and he simply crashed through Menduarthis like a stallion breaking through a half-open gate. Menduarthis hit the ground several feet away.

  “Keep going!” Lendri said, and shoved Hweilan in front of him.

  She went all of five steps before turning and drawing the knife sheathed at her back. She held the knife in one hand and brandished her father’s bow in the other. Her body trembled, and the warning inside her seemed to be trying to claw its way out of her skull, but she would not run while her only remaining friends fought.

  Lendri kept himself in a low crouch between Hweilan and Soran. Covered in blood, his long hair in a wild tangle, muscles trembling, the elf was a fearsome sight. He threw back his head and screamed. It struck Hweilan like a physical blow, and she realized there was nothing remotely elven in the cry.

  But it didn’t affect Soran in the least. He brought the broken sword around in a savage arc, aiming to cut Lendri in half. But Lendri ducked under the blow and lunged. He latched onto Soran and buried his teeth in the man’s throat.

  Soran didn’t scream, didn’t cry out in pain. With his sword arm pinned, he could not bring the blade to bear. But his strength far outmatched Lendri’s. He grabbed Lendri’s forearm and threw the elf off, sending him sailing through the air. Lendri landed not far from Hweilan, hitting the snow and skidding a ways before coming to his feet. When he rose, the wind blew his hair out of his face, and Hweilan screamed at the sight.

  The bones in Lendri’s face had thickened, his jaw elongated, and when his lips peeled back in a snarl, he revealed sharp teeth.

  Soran swung his sword, but not in a strike. Lendri was too far away. He threw the broken blade, and it cut through the air, twirling end over end. Just before it was about to strike Lendri, a shard of ice, thick as a lance but moving swift as an arrow, slammed into the steel, shattering it into several pieces and sending the frost-covered shards into the snow.

  Hweilan followed the path from which the shard had come and saw Menduarthis standing again, frost still leaking from one fist, like heavy smoke.

  Weaponless, still the Soran-thing kept coming. But he was not coming for Lendri. Hweilan had half-turned to flee before she realized she had no idea where to go.

  The wall of vines and trees at the edge of the hollow exploded in a gust of snow and wind. The blast shattered all but the thickest branches of the great tree and struck Hweilan like an avalanche. She flew through the air and hit the ground hard. She tried to breathe, failed, then tried again, forcing frigid air into her lungs.

  She rolled over and sat up. A section of the wall wider than Highwatch’s main gates had been completely blasted away. Leaves and shards of shattered wood and vines still rained from the sky. In the gap in the wall, framed by a storm of wind and snow, draped in feylight frost, stood Kunin Gatar.

  How Hweilan had ever seen the queen as a young woman her own age, she could not imagine now. The being that stood at the rim of the hollow was ancient of days, queen of winter and wielder of all its power. She held storm in her hands, and in her eyes swirled the darkest moonless midnights. All the fey lights now shone cold and white, and they swirled around her in dozens of tiny cyclones.

  Kunin Gatar spoke, her voice shook the ground, but the words were in a language that meant only storm and ice.

  Lendri and Menduarthis were both on their hands and knees, looking up at her—Lendri in defiant fury, Menduarthis in a sort of resigned despair.

  From a pile of forest debris and snow, Soran rose to his feet. More of his skin had been stripped away by the blast. But he did not even glance in the queen’s direction. His eyes, one all dead flesh, the other a blazing red, fixed on Hweilan.

  Lendri stood between them.

  Kunin Gatar rose, lifted into the air by currents of air at her command, and entered the hollow.

  The queen turned her gaze on Lendri. “You brought this on us? On me?”

  The winds calmed around her, and when her feet touched the snow, she was already storming toward Lendri. He looked up at her, then spared Hweilan a glance. In his eyes, Hweilan could see that he knew he was about to die. He looked more relieved than frightened.

  Soran, thinking perhaps that the queen was coming for Hweilan, lurched toward her. His muscles trembled and convulsed so strongly that his entire body seemed to be shaking itself apart, and tiny tongues of orange flames began to dance up his arms and crown his head with fire. He spared Hweilan only a glance before charging the greater threat.

  Seeing Soran advancing on her, Kunin Gatar shrieked, “You dare?”

  She thrust her hand, one finger pointing at him, like an angry teacher disciplining a rebellious pupil.

  Hail and ice shot out of Kunin Gatar’s body and struck Soran like a storm of nails, stripping away what remained of his skin and taking large chunks of flesh. His remaining eye exploded, and both empty sockets blazed like tiny forge fires. The flames dancing along his arms and head fell flat, but they grew in power, and although his gait slowed, he did not stop.

  Soran struck the queen like the tide striking the shore. His fists ripped through her. She wailed, the sound of wind breaking rocks. Her physical form melted into the storm, wrapping round Soran, and pounding him again and again. The thinner bits of flesh round his skull, hands, and shoulders flew away, and the flames on him grew brighter still, burning away the frost in a hissing steam.

  “We should go now!” said a voice beside her, shouting to be heard over the storm. Hweilan tore her gaze away from the battle. Menduarthis, wide-eyed and trembling, crouched next to her.

  Lend
ri was just beyond him. He looked down at her and said, “Go!”

  “What about you?” she said.

  “I’ll follow. I know the way. Now go!”

  Menduarthis pulled her to her feet, she snatched her bow from where it had fallen in the snow, and together they ran for the woods.

  Just before they reached the shelter of the trees, Hweilan risked a look over her shoulder. Kunin Gatar and Soran had separated, and both now seemed more elemental than physical—one of malicious winter, the other consuming fire. Lendri huddled in the snow not far away, watching them. The two combatants struck each other in a clash of howling wind and hissing steam. Hweilan felt the ground shake.

  Lendri shouted something and pointed one fist—the one on which he had put the ring, Hweilan remembered—and fire spewed out from his fist, enveloping the queen and her adversary.

  As Hweilan and Menduarthis plunged into the wood, a terrible shriek filled the world. Fury, fire, agony, ice … all combined into one great scream that rattled the trees around them.

  The incessant pounding in Hweilan’s mind exploded.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE

  ARGALATH’S EYES ROLLED BACK INTO PLACE. THE final shudder shook him so hard that he fell to his knees, and his free hand came down right in the middle of the corpse. He could feel the hot blood and viscera between his fingers. The reek wafted upward so strong that he could taste it in the back of his throat, coppery and searing.

  But he could see again. The eviscerated corpse of the Damaran. Sagar …? Had that been his name? It no longer mattered.

  The other corpse—the one kept so carefully whole, tended so well after death, and laid so carefully beside the sacrifice—was sitting up. The corpse that had once been Guric turned its head and smiled down on Argalath.

  Half of Argalath’s vision was still in the other world, and he could see the furnace of black fire blazing behind those eyes.

  “Well come, brother,” he said.

  “Come at last,” said the thing inside Guric.

  They stood together and turned to face the Ring of Ten—Vazhad, Jatara, and eight of Argalath’s acolytes. The last of his acolytes. The strongest. The others had not been found worthy and had been put to other uses. They stood round the basin on the great rock shelf where once the Knights of Ondrahar had held their holy rites, where the final stages of Argalath’s plan had begun with Valia. How fitting that Guric should now join her. Sooner than expected, to be sure. The man had surprised Argalath, had come to his senses and seen through the lies far sooner than Argalath had thought he would. No matter. The hardest part of the plan was done. Planting season was over. From here, it would be a matter of tending the healthy crop of his designs.