The Black Keep (The Chronicles of Llars)

by Tom Bielawski

  “Have you no shame? This woman needs clothing!” barked the knight, trying to show confidence in the face of this dark being. He was rewarded with the butt end of a spear in his gut, driving him to his knees. Hessan glared at the knight with disdain, but said nothing. Sir Ederick rose to his feet with an angry glance at the vicious orok that struck him, a silent promise of payment to the creature blazed in his gaze.

  Finally the creature spoke. No, that wasn’t right. It wasn’t Hessan that was speaking at all, but a decidedly corpse-like person standing next to the headless spirit. The more Carym looked, the more it appeared as though the thing were created from a macabre collection of pieces several other corpses; it even seemed to have its very own collection of flies buzzing and a maggot or two crawling around its lifeless white eyes.

  “Do not try my patience, Sir Ederick!” The voice from the corpse thing was the very sound of death. “You are alive by my good graces alone. She is an animal. I do not treat animals like people.”

  The woman stood with pride, her exposed breasts heaved with her rapid angry breathing. Despite her humiliating condition, she held her head high and clenched her fists within their shackles. Carym was astonished as before his very eyes, her nails extended and ears became pointier! Her eyes became wide and dark, her pupils like those of a cat’s.

  “What business does the great Lord of the Zuharim, Sir Ederick Shieldsmoore, have with a Hybrandese outlaw and a Keneerie that would be better suited as one of my slave maidens? Surely they are beneath the station of one as great as yourself,” the corpse-being made a sound that must have been laughter, though Carym thought it sounded more like rocks being shaken in a metal can.

  “My business is my own, Dark One,” Sir Ederick growled, defiant.

  “You forget yourself, knight. I am lord here, and you are in my court!” The fearsome Hessan glided down from his throne and his booted feet struck the ground with an awful, reverberating thud. He strode purposefully, slowly, toward the knight. Each step echoed through the chamber, rumbling, resonating in the chests of the companions, reinforcing the magical fear that emanated from the being.

  Hessan was fearsome, even without the aid of his magic. He wore a blue surcoat over a heavy coat of mail, a coat of arms emblazoned in vibrant color on his breast. A massive sword hung from his hip, a wicked scythe peered over the top of his shoulder, and a beautiful cloak of black and gold willowed in his wake. As the Headless Rider approached, his hood fell back revealing how the ghost got his name. A bloody neck was just visible above the collar of his surcoat, and those red points of light glowed malevolently above the gaping hole that was his throat.

  “Your court? You are a denizen of your filthy lord, Umber!”

  Carym was astonished at the Ederick’s bravery in the face of this dark thing.

  The living knight continued to antagonize his host, “I do not recall that Baron Tyrannus ever held court in his dungeon. Why is it that you cower down here in the slosh pit and fecal matter of his cast-offs?”

  Hessan’s corpse-servant laughed, its rotten and fetid breath nauseating. “That one is my servant, Zuharim! I have reduced him to nothing more than a cold breeze, knight. You would do well to mark the power of Shalthazar and Ilian Nah, the ones who give me my power,” Hessan’s voice was a mockery of a whisper now. Ederick felt cold breath on his ear, the stench of rotted meat and death, as the ghostly knight leaned toward him. “You will name me lord, before you die.”

  “I have but one lord, Hessan. Certainly that lord is not the pitiful ghost of a disgraced knight,” replied the Zuharim Knight, angrily.

  Carym knew that the man was buying time. Bart was grim-faced, his eyes closed, concentrating on something. Carym reprimanded himself for not delving into the bard’s talents further, remembering the man’s peculiar enchanted staff. Was the man a spell caster too? Gennevera stood starkly still, eyes downcast, doing anything she could to avoid attracting the hate-filled creature’s attention. Kharrihan winked at Carym, a mischievous glint in his eye, knowing that Ederick was buying time for something; the elf was letting Carym know he was ready.

  He closed his eyes and forced himself to concentrate, to see the stones in his pouch. Each one was there now, in his mind, and he willed himself to make mental contact with the Flamestone. Once again he felt strength returning to him, the chill air pushing away from him. He felt the cold metal of the chains that bound him, felt all of the tiny cells that comprised the metal; then the metal began to warm up. He forced the image of a Sigil in his mind, a Sigil that commanded the stone and the flowing Tides of power belonging to the Flames. He willed the power of the Tides into the very metal of his bindings. He forced the power into the invisible gaps between the tiny, tiny, cells that had been super-heated to make their current form. Like a wedge, the power worked its way into those cells, expanding and breaking them at their smallest level, weakening that which was the strength that held the metal together. Slowly, the chains that bound him became brittle and weakened and he could break them with a twitch of his wrists.

  Sir Ederick continued to focus the brunt of the undead knight’s wrath on himself, and indeed Hessan was possessed of a vile hatred for all things that resembled his former life in the service of Zuhr. Ederick exemplified that which Hessan hated, that which had repudiated Hessan, that which he felt had betrayed him in the form of the Dark Paladin. Ederick knew this, and knew he was risking his life, but he knew he had to help the group escape. So it was with great horror that when Carym opened his eyes he saw Ederick on one knee, the dead knight’s hand on his shoulder, grunts of pain escaping him as he looked the Headless Rider defiantly in the beast’s red pinpoint eyes.

  Frantically, he mentally reached out to the Flamestone again. He was forced to double his concentration now, distracted by the plight of his friend. The Shadow stone must have sensed the nearness of the Headless Rider as it began to agitate Carym and tried keep him from using the other stones. Quickly, and with great effort, he repeated the process with the chains that bound each of his companions and the odd looking woman.

  With a force that nearly sent him reeling, a spear butt struck him in the gut and he fell to his knees ready to empty his stomach. Words buzzed in his ears as he realized he was being spoken to, shouted at.

  “Open your eyes!’ demanded the guard, harshly.

  Carym obeyed, wishing no more abuse. “The Lord addresses you, pig!” snarled the orok.

  “That’s rich coming from you!” he risked a small show of his own bravado, hoping to distract his captors from what he had been doing. He was rewarded with a slap to the face, a rather insignificant one, he thought. He grimaced and looked at Hessan who had come to stand before Carym.

  “Do not think for one minute that I have forgotten about you,” Hessan’s corpse-voice cackled harshly. “Indeed, you and I will be spending much time together as you learn to harness the power of the Shadow!”

  Carym shook his head, a small act of defiance. The threat of the Rider told him much, however. That little bit told him that Hessan would not kill him, at least not right away. It confirmed that the Shadowfyr would try to turn him first, a horrifying thought. He pushed the thoughts from his mind and forced himself to concentrate on his plan. Out of the corner of his eye he saw Ederick glancing at him, trying to appear unconcerned, yet Carym knew differently. The knight wanted him to sell the show back to Ederick, to let Carym work quietly. He bowed his head in mock acceptance.

  “I am no fool, Carym of Hyrum. I have survived many centuries. I can sense the power of the Tides surging about you, I can see them bending to your will even now.”

  Carym panicked, thinking the undead knight was on to him. But the creature went on, “I knew you would come to me! Do not believe for one instant that your pitiful experiment with the Flame Sigil will help you fight me.” Carym kept his head bowed, refusing to meet that penetrating red gaze. “Yes, I know all about you. The great Shadowfyr himself has sent me to collect you...and you walked right into my tra
p!”

  The Headless Rider moved its bloody neck next to Carym’s ear. Its fetid breath distracted him so much, he could not concentrate on the Sigils, so he feigned obeisance. Hessan seemed to be sniffing at Carym, not unlike a dog, and the man wondered if the Shadow stone was directing the ghastly creature, working against Carym even now. Finally, the undead knight became bored and wandered over to Kharrihan.

  “Where did you get this vermin, Ederick? Hmm? I haven’t seen a Silver Mountain Elf in many, many, centuries. I thought we killed them all when the Dark Paladin still rode for the glory of Umber.” Hessan was trying to bait the companions into action. The Headless Rider spoke truly of the raids on the elves of Kharrihan’s kin. Carym hoped that the elf wouldn’t take the bait; here was one of the very beings who perpetrated that heinous crime!

  “What is it you desire with these fools? Is it perhaps that your own Order has sunk to the use of Necromancy?” Hessan asked, taunting Ederick. “You pitiful fools are slaves to Ilian Nah!” The undead knight and his corpse companion let the comment sink in for a moment. “The Dark Paladin isn’t worth the weight of his own bones. That spineless bastard begged forgiveness from Zuhr because he was scared! A coward of the lowest order!”

  “Zuharim do not practice the black arts, demon!” shouted Ederick passionately, which only brought a chorus of laughter. Carym realized now that his judgment of the knight had been sound. This man knew nothing of the treacherous acts of his brother knights. “It was a sense of his lost honor, and rightful humility before the Great God, that brought the Dark Paladin to his knees.”

  Hessan’s corpse-voice laughed at the knight.

  Quickly Carym’s sight shifted, without his control or warning. The sounds of the exchange between Ederick and Hessan drifted away as Carym stayed down on his knees trying to make sense of his vision. Then it hit him, there were more people in the room. Oroks, mostly. Although these seemed to be the same oroks that had harassed and herded his companions to the castle. And they were definitely different from Hessan’s beasts. These newcomers seemed as chaotic and ill-disciplined as most oroks he knew of....and dead! As he glanced casually around the room he saw with his enhance sight that there were many other ghosts in the room too. Some were hiding in niches in the walls, others stood poised behind the living soldiers, prepared to strike them down. While still others floated near the ceiling. The sight struck Carym with cold fear.

  Then he looked toward the throne and suddenly it all made sense. The Black Baron sat on the throne vacated by Hessan, looking right at Carym. The apparition could certainly be no other. He understood now that the power of the Spirit Stone was affecting his sight and had enabled him to see into the realm of the dead. The Black Baron’s apparition was strikingly handsome and noble, a youth of no more than twenty years by his appearance. Carym wondered how such a young man could have developed such a long and nefariously distinguished career.

  “Thank you for coming, Fyrbold!” the young man said to Carym, telepathically. “You and I have a common enemy, so it appears.”

  Carym did not reply, did not know how to. The man was handsome, very pale. His eyes were pure black, malevolent, but very shrewd. He wore a coat and trousers of black with silver trim, silver epaulettes, and silver facings. He tapped his fingers on the armrests of his throne and Carym saw his long, bloody fingernails. A shiver ran down his spine.

  “Hmm. Let’s cut to the chase, shall we? The others cannot hear us, they cannot see me. Your Spirit Stone enables you to harness the Tides serving it and communicate with me. The fool Hessan taunted me with the knowledge of your impending arrival in my own lands. He told me of your powers and your significance in it all...blah, blah, blah. But, I find it quite amusing and ironic that he didn’t know of the Spirit Stone which you possess!”

  “What do you want me to do?” Carym asked silently, avoiding a mental discussion of the stones.

  “I want you to destroy that which binds me to this place. That which Hessan stole from me, that which he uses even now to feed that blasted Tide of Shadows. I care naught for his cause, only for myself!”

  “And in releasing you, I assure my own doom at your hands!”

  “Fool!” the Baron was angry now, insulted. Carym wondered at the irony. “I have always been a man of my word! And my word I give you now. Free me and my minions will not harm you so long as you leave my lands! Tarry and I will not guarantee your safety.”

  Carym thought it over briefly. “But bound you can do no more harm to the people of Ckaymru!”

  “To Hades with you then! I care not for your pitiful quest. If you release me, I will surely continue my ways. Eventually this fool will leave and another will come. Someone will free me in time.”

  There was logic in the Baron’s words, but he was indecisive. Could he live with himself after releasing one of the world’s most notorious murderers, freeing him to be as wicked he liked? More and more of late Carym found himself feeling as though he were leaving important things undone, making promises to return and right wrongs perhaps perpetuated by himself. He let out a great sigh, knowing what must be done. He must escape and reach the Tomb. The Black Baron would have to be dealt with later.

  “You had better decide soon, Carym,” the Baron intoned in a childlike way, nodding at Gennevera, who now was the focus of Hessan’s attention. Carym looked back to the spiritual form of the Black Baron and nodded his ascent. The Baron grinned a wicked grin and whipped a dagger out of his pocket, tossing it happily into the air. He slammed it into the armrest of the throne next to a small black gem, one that gleamed and swirled with magical forces.

  “Smash this! This is my prison! This is what binds me to the castle and the land of the living. It was the focus of my obsession in life, it was the focus of my power. Now, the one who bears this...owns me.” The Baron took on a look of sadness, as though thoroughly offended by the notion of being owned by another. The irony was almost amusing.

  “What is to stop me from owning you?”

  That comment brought a bout of laughter to the young Baron. “Own me?” he demanded. “Me? You have neither the nerve nor the stomach for that. No, you will do as I ask. You are far too weak and noble to do otherwise,” the Baron finished.

  “Which is why you need me, isn’t it? Very well. How can it be destroyed?”

  “It must be destroyed by the force which created it centuries ago. Cast a Sigilspell combining the powers of Flame and Spirit into the gem, then you may smash it with an ordinary object. When it breaks I will be free!”

  He truly had no choice, it would only be moments before the Headless Rider began killing his friends. It was time to act. He broke the weakened chains with a surge in his arms and they fell to the floor in a pile of metal dust.

  “Break your chains!” he shouted to his friends. “The ghosts will help us, take no action against them!” Carym desperately hoped his friends understood what was transpiring, and for all their sakes he hoped they would not strike at the Baron’s minions. Although startled, Kharrihan, Bart, and Gennevera did as they were bade and shrugged free of their bonds, prepared to fight. Then Carym reached out mentally to both the Spirit Stone and the Flamestone. He charged across the room bending the Tides to his will. He called out the name of the Sigil that would do his bidding and was rewarded by the sense of power flowing into his body.

  As he reached the throne, the orok guards had recovered from their momentary surprise and raced toward him. He had barely a second to do what he needed. He grasped the black gem in his free hand and infused it with the power of the Flames and the Spirit. Suddenly he felt an onslaught of spindly, but strong, orok arms grasping at him, beating him, but he would not release the precious stones in his hands. After several savage kicks, and a wicked slice on the back of one arm, Carym dropped the large black diamond to the ground. The oroks dropped back in surprise, fearful of the stone as it danced and spun on the floor, wisps of smoke drifting lazily from its slick surface.

  “NO!” came the powe
rful, yet fearful tone of the undead knight’s corpse-voice. Hessan, sword in one hand and scythe in the other, stalked toward Carym, his boot falls striking fear with each step, his black blade glistening with dark flames. Carym felt compelled to freeze in place, but the call of the stones in his mind was too strong to ignore. He was dimly aware that fighting and agonizing shrieks had broken out throughout the chamber, but he could only focus on Hessan and those angry red points of light suspended over a cavernous neck. Pushed purely by the force of the Tides in his body, Carym stomped the black gem with his boot heel, shattering it to pieces.

  Ederick flexed his strong arms and the shackles that bound him fell away like dust. He immediately grappled and overpowered a nearby orok. With a great heave, he silenced the struggling beast, used it as a living shield and barreled into two more oroks nearby knocking them senseless. He grabbed an Orkish polearm from the ground and began swinging it in a deadly arc as the fearless little oroks closed in on him.

  Three oroks faced Ederick who now stood with his back to the wall as they advanced upon him in a wedge. Although they were brave and disciplined, the little beasts were no match for the powerful knight who battled with decades of martial experience. Ederick parried a thrust from the lead orok, and followed through stabbing the orok in its exposed neck; a surge of orok blood spurt across the floor and splattered the Zuharim knight. His first opponent out of the way, the knight brought the butt of the long-handled weapon up between the legs of the second orok, stunning it and followed with a solid smash onto the top of the thing’s thick skull with the head of the weapon.

  When he turned to face the third orok, he was surprised to find it had been hoisted into the air by an unseen force, its face going blue and its feet kicking wildly. He couldn’t see what was holding it, but he could hear the wicked cackling laughter of madness and he began to guess what was transpiring.

  Nodding a quick thanks to the unseen ally, Ederick turned and began to battle his way toward the companions’ belongings. It was then that he heard the chilling sound of a funeral dirge being played on a flute!