by Andy Remic
"Myriam?" Nienna reached out, touching her arm.
Myriam whirled, her face a mask of snarling animal hatred. The Widowmaker was high, pointing at Nienna's face. "Don't touch me!" she snarled. "If you touch me again, I'll remove your damn face!" With that, she stalked off through the woods leaving a shocked and chalk-white Nienna staring at the slowly cooling corpse of Styx.
Nienna sat for a long time. She watched Styx stiffen. She had never seen death like this before, close up, casual; she had never before been the spiritual prisoner of a corpse.
I should like this, she thought.
I should be filled with joy.
She pictured Katrina's face. Styx had murdered her; cut short the young woman's blossoming life. This was her revenge! This was her moment! A time for Nienna to internalise emotions and find some kind of closure.
It should have been wonderful! thought Nienna.
However, if this is revenge, why does it feel so wrong?
Eventually, she stood and stretched and moved to the packs the group had carried. Nearby, a horse whinnied. Nienna rummaged around until she found some small, hard oatcakes. She sat back on a log and ate, slowly, with small rabbit bites. As she ate, her gaze dropped, lower and lower, past Styx's shocked and destroyed face, past his narcotic-stained lips, to the Widowmaker lying on the frozen ground with his fingers still curled around the stock. Nienna continued to eat. Would it be hard to use? she thought. How hard could it be?
She stood, finishing the food. Myriam's voice cut through Nienna's thoughts of escape.
"Don't be fooled," came her softly spoken words. "It takes weeks of practice. And against somebody like me, with a deadly eye, the steady hand and eye of the hunter, and a killing edge you could never possess?" Myriam stepped forward from the shadow of the trees. "Well girl, you'd die real quick."
"I wasn't thinking…"
"Shh." Myriam held up a single finger. "Sort through Styx's pack. Save anything you think you can use, dump the rest here. We're riding out."
"I thought we were waiting for Kell?" said Nienna, her voice small.
"We will. At the Cailleach Fortress."
"I thought you said it was haunted?"
Myriam grinned, her face skeletal, and gaunt with the cancer. "We'd better make a pact with the ghosts, child; for if Jex comes back, we'll need a fortress to fend him off. He's a warrior of great skill."
"Kell will kill him," said Nienna, hope bright in her eyes.
"Maybe," said Myriam, gathering her bow. "Maybe."
They rode through a winter landscape, down narrow unmarked tracks and threading between wooded hills. Myriam knew the trails and paths like the back of her hand; never once did she falter when they reached a fork or series of scattered trails. Nienna, riding on Styx's horse, contemplated making a break for it often, but the Widowmaker hanging close by Myriam's right hand, and indeed her skill with her yew longbow, made her think twice. Myriam told Nienna the short clockworkpowered crossbow could kill at a hundred paces; Nienna didn't want to find out the hard way. As night approached, so did the Black Pike Mountains. They were huge, rearing from beyond the summit of a hill as they breached the rise on steaming mounts. Nienna coughed a gasp. She had seen the Black Pikes, but never this close; and when she saw the reality of their massive, stunning, brooding mass, the sheer weight of their squat and terrifying majesty, all thoughts of exploring them with student classmates went the way of campfire smoke.
"They are truly… stunning," said Nienna, almost lost for words.
"They are deadly," said Myriam, drawing rein. Her mount snorted, stamping cold, and she calmed the beast with soothing words in his ear. She gestured, with a broad sweep of her arm. "The Black Pike Mountains, thousands of leagues of impassable treachery. There is no forgiveness there, Nienna. Only hardness, and a willingness to see you die."
"One day, my friend and I were going to explore the passes. We were going to climb to Hawk's Peak. It is said to be beautiful beyond belief. We were going to camp, and paint the beauty of the scene in oils to show our friends back at university."
Myriam snorted a laugh. "Paint? Girl, Hawk's Peak is a place of wolves and bears, of bandits and blood-oil smugglers. There is beauty, I'll grant you, but there is only one guarantee; death for the unwary."
"You have been there?"
"I have travelled much in the Black Pikes."
"So has my grandfather."
"This, I know," said Myriam, eyes glittering. "It is why I need him so. Come on. We need to make camp. I can feel more snow in the air, and if it rolls down from the Pikes we'll wish we had a roof over our heads."
They made camp that night by a tumble of boulders, and Myriam cooked venison over the fire on a spit. Fat sizzled, dripping into the flames, and Nienna watched, entranced.
"Never seen meat cook before?" asked Myriam, sitting with her legs spread wide, her quiver of arrows before her, checking the length and integrity of each shaft, the quality of each tip, the helical fletching of each arrow so they would rotate in flight.
"When I lived with my mother, we never ate meat."
"Why not?"
Nienna shrugged. "She thought it was inhumane."
"How odd," said Myriam, frowning. "Animals are there to be eaten. They have no other use. What the hell did you eat, then, child?"
"Can you stop calling me child? I have seen seventeen winters pass."
Myriam grinned, and her gaunt face looked almost friendly. Almost. "Habit. And compared to me, or rather, compared to the horrors I have witnessed for the past decade, you are indeed a child; shall we say, a child of innocence? However. What did you eat?"
"Bread. Vegetables. Roots. Mushrooms."
"What a veritable platter of delights you must have enjoyed. What about succulent meat compressing between your teeth, juices running down your throat and chin, what about the perfect flavour of roasted venison?" She pulled out her knife, and cut a slice from the roasting spit. She held out the knife to Nienna. "Go on. Enjoy."
Nienna ate the venison, and it was indeed a dream. She had eaten meat, of course; sometimes with Katrina, or occasionally at Kell's when the grizzled old warrior had enough coin. But it was usually dried beef, softened in soup. Nothing as fresh and mouth-watering as this.
"It's good, yes?" grinned Myriam.
"Very good."
"See! You are my prisoner, and yet you have never feasted so well."
Nienna looked down, then up, into Myriam's eyes. "Why did you poison me?" she said, slowly, after a long connection. "Why did you poison my grandfather? I never did get a straight answer. You were too busy tying me to a tree."
The humour left Myriam's face. She cut herself a strip of venison, and chewed the tip as she stared into the flames. "You have heard of the vachine," she said. It was not a question.
"A tale to frighten children," said Nienna, carefully. Once, in Jalder, only a few weeks previous but feeling like a thousand years, she and her friends had laughed about the Old Tales, the Days of Blood, and the Legend of Three – the Vampire Warlords! And, of course, the vachine. Ghosts from the mountains. But that had been before the invasion of the Army of Iron; that had been before the albino warriors, and Nienna witnessing the cankers. She shivered, even as she thought of the huge, terrifying beasts. Surely, in a world that contained cankers, an ancient race that drank the blood of humans was not so hard to believe?
"They exist. In a place called Silva Valley. I believe they can make me well again, I believe their vachine clockwork technology can cure the cancers inside me."
"Clockwork technology? So that is how the vachine work?"
"They drink blood-oil. Refined blood. It is blessed with a dark magick. It is what makes the clockwork work. Without blood-oil, the vachine break down; they perish."
"And you would become one of these creatures? Just to stay alive?"
"Would you rather die?" hissed Myriam, suddenly. "Would you rather crawl under the earth, have the worms eat your eyes? You watched Styx die earli
er today. Was there joy in that? Pleasure? Or are the wolves and maggots even now feasting on his corpse?"
"But surely we go somewhere… better, after we die."
Myriam gave a savage laugh. "You want to live with the gods? You want to travel the Elysium Halls? It is a dark comedy, Nienna, told to soldiers to make them fight in battle. There are no Halls for the Heroes. There are no rivers of nectar, no fountains of wine, no Eternal Feasts of the Martyrs. It's all a dark, savage sham."
Nienna remained silent. She did not agree with Myriam. Because, if there was nothing after life, then what reason was there for life? There had to be something better. Something more noble. Or it would mean people… like her father, and her best friend Katrina… it meant their deaths had been a bitter, final end.
"Why poison us, then?" persisted Nienna, eventually, after she had watched the passion slowly ebb from Myriam's cheek.
Myriam cut another slice of venison, and ate it thoughtfully. "Kell has travelled to Silva Valley. He knows the vachine."
"What? My grandfather?"
"Aye. Your grandfather."
"He would have told me," said Nienna, after a thoughtful pause.
Myriam grinned. "Told you everything, has he?"
"I know he was in the army. And I know he went through the Black Pike Mountains. But – knows the vachine? I don't understand?"
"He knows them, because he worked for the king; an elite group, under King Searlan, the mighty Battle King. They hunted down and destroyed vachine. They were assassins, Nienna." Her voice was soft. Her eyes glowed like jewels by the light of the fire, fuelled by passion, and a need to save her own life. "Kell knows the vachine better than any man alive; for to kill something as deadly as vachine, you have to understand it. And Kell understood them all right."
"My grandfather was no assassin," said Nienna, voice firm.
"Well, you can ask him when he arrives. For he has only days. The poison will be biting him now; he will be suffering, a great pain in his veins, in his muscles, in his bones. The worse the pain gets, the more he will strive to save himself."
"Then, why do I feel no such pain?" said Nienna, suddenly, sharply.
Myriam gave a small shrug, staring into the fire.
"It was a lie," whispered Nienna, eyes wide, as sudden understanding flooded her. "You told him I had been poisoned to make him come here! That was… evil!"
Myriam shrugged again. "I thought the trophy of his own life might not be enough. However you, my sweet little apple," she reached forward and cupped Nienna's chin, "you are precious enough to be worth saving."
Nienna shook her head, disengaging Myriam's grasp. "You are evil," she repeated, her eyes narrowed.
Myriam stood and stretched, a languorous movement of long limbs. She was every inch the hunter; the killer. "Maybe so. But my priority lies with myself, so don't get too high and mighty, child. At the end of the day, you're simply a bartering tool and to me, worth more than my soul."
"It must be savage to live in your world," said Nienna, her face dark thunder.
"Indeed it is." Myriam's face was twisted and sour. "I welcome you to try it, sometime."
They rode for long, silent hours, hooves clopping through hard-packed snow, wrapped in blankets and furs against the cold of a now mercilessly chilling winter. It was late afternoon as they appeared from the edge of scattered deciduous woodland to see the full majesty of the Black Pike Mountains rearing before them. Whereas under the woodland canopy they had been afforded glimpses, nothing had prepared Nienna for the sheer exhilaration of the Pikes.
The books and stories told of at least three thousand peaks, each a jagged tooth in a maw which split the land in two; not a single peak was under two thousand feet in height, whereas many topped seven and eight thousand, where the air was thin and crevasses seemingly endless. There were few paths which led into the Black Pikes, and of those who discovered a route, few returned. It was said all manner of creatures lived in those echoing valleys, in caves and tunnels and on high treacherous ledges; it was also said such creatures were best left to the imagination.
"Big," was all Nienna managed, awe caught in her throat like a plum stone.
"They'll take you in and spit you out," said Myriam, kicking her horse into a canter. "Come on. There's our destination."
The rugged landscape, scattered with a million jagged rocks, sloped down towards an ancient black fortress which spanned the neck of a valley. The walls were black, and seemed to gleam in the weak afternoon light. Weaving around thick grass and irregularly shaped rocks, many larger than a cottage, they progressed across the land until Nienna's eyes took the tiny toy fortress and reassessed its size and scale. The Cailleach Fortress was mammoth. And it was subtly ruined, Nienna realised, the closer she came. Her eyes began to pick out fault lines in the very structure of the fortress. In some sections of the towering, defensive walls, great cracks ran from battlements to foundation, and in other areas towers leaned, and the whole structure took on a disjointed air. Closer they moved, until Myriam called a halt and they squatted like tiny insects against a giant world canvas. And Nienna realised quite clearly that the Cailleach Fortress arraigned before them was twisted. Nothing was straight. No wall, no tower, no archway, no section of battlement.
"It is said," came Myriam's voice, a soothing whisper, cutting through the eerie silence which Nienna realised with a start had descended, "that the Black Pike Mountains, offended by this intrusion of man, sent roots under the fortress and twisted this great monument of war into a mockery of Man's achievement."
"Really?"
"Yes. Others claim a dark sorcery resided here, committing evil necrotic deeds, and the magick twisted and broke every stone used in its vast construction. Whatever the truth, there is no doubt the place is haunted. Nobody will live here. Nobody will even camp here."
"And we are going in?" Apprehension.
"Yes. I have learnt that if you keep your head down, the ghosts leave you be. They are nothing but sighs in the wind, the whispers of the dead in your ear, and in your nightmares. You must be strong, Nienna, but do not fear; nothing can hurt you in this place."
"You are sure?"
Myriam gave a narrow, nasty smile. "Nothing but me, that is."
Nienna returned the thin smile. "I had not forgotten. I don't think I ever will."
Night was falling fast, huge storm clouds filling the skies in a tumultuous celebration. Thunder rumbled, a deep-throated exhalation. In the distance, hailstones drummed the earth.
"Come on. At least there is shelter."
Nienna followed Myriam at a fast trot, and thoughts flitted through her mind. Escape! Turn her horse and run. But then, a sensible part of her soul realised: where to? How would she find Kell in this wilderness crawling with cankers and albino soldiers from the Army of Iron? He could be anywhere. Better to let him come to her. Better to let him take the initiative, and be prepared for chaos when he found Myriam. For Nienna knew, with a sour feeling in her belly, with images of death in her brain, it would be better to aid Kell, for she did not have the power nor the skill to finish Myriam alone. With a bitter nod to reality, she realised she had little enough will to kill in the first place. Killing was for soldiers. Killing was for assassins. And Nienna was neither; she celebrated life, and love, and honour. Death was for fools.
They moved on, and within minutes the Black Pike Mountains were swept with a sheet of pounding ice. It flooded the world, obscuring the sky, obscuring the mountains. Nienna bowed her head as hail slammed her like needles. She lifted the edge of her cloak, but still ice stung her face, and no matter how she tried to shield herself the storm always found a way in. It crept around collar and cuffs, around ankles and tiny vents at the edges of her boots that she didn't realise existed. Cold air crept into her clothing and chilled her, and she cursed it. The Black Pike storm seemed to have all the advantages.
"Not long, now," said Myriam, unnecessarily, and Nienna looked up. The fortress loomed closer, slightly askew
and slick with ice and snow. The black walls seemed darker. The battlements glossy. The world was dark, except for the Cailleach Fortress – which gleamed with a sort of eldritch witch-light of dark energy.
"What kind of stone is that?" said Nienna, slowly, as they grew closer and closer, and the toy fortress reared above them, towered above them at an angle which made the world feel wrong. When everything was out of the vertical, it made a person's brain hurt.
"It's not stone."
"What is it, then?"
Myriam threw Nienna a dark look. Shut up, that look said, and Nienna's teeth clamped tight. "I don't know," she whispered, mind distant. "Something alien".
From a distance the Cailleach Fortress had appeared of normal proportions, but now Nienna realised her perceptions, as well as every vertical wall, were askew. It was big. No, bigger than big. It was massive, but also out of proportion. The doorways could accommodate a man twice the normal height, and every single archway or window or archer's firing slit was double the size, as if the fortress had been built to accommodate an army of giants.
They slowed as they approached the main gates, which were open, like the sleeping mouth of a waiting predator. Myriam halted, and her horse pawed the frozen earth nervously. A warm wind sighed from the gates in an easy rhythm, like breath.
Myriam glanced back, and gave a tight smile. "Do not be afraid," she said, and led the way into the corridor of darkness.
From the edges of the world shadows rushed in with a tumbling swirling hissing, like a million snakes trapped in the vortex of a storm, and Nienna's hands came up clasping her ears, clasping her skull as her eyes widened and her horse whinnied in fear, head lowering, hooves booming ancient cobbles, and as her pupils dilated to accommodate the gloom she saw the blurred shapes of the dead converge on Myriam… and then turn, blank black faces focussing and fixing and tilting, and then rushing towards her with a gestalt scream, a merged noise of agony from a thousand years past…