Demon Sword

by Ken Hood

  He pushed by them or over them, shouting at them to clear the building. Only when he was past them did he realize he had forgotten to speak English, and they were unlikely to understand Gaelic. He did not think they would linger for a repeat. In a passageway at the top, several doors stood open, one with a very old man peering out in confusion.

  "Fire! Leave! Get out!" Toby charged past him and kicked open the door he wanted without checking to see if it was even latched. Most of the chamber was filled by a bed, its curtains open just enough to show that it was unoccupied. The owner lay on the floor near the window. Toby was too late to save him, or perhaps it had been a her. The flickering blue shape of Oswood crouched over the corpse as it had crouched over Lady Valda. The bed and floor and walls were bright with blood; the air reeked of it.

  Oswood reared up in a glowing blur of hatred and sharpness, chittering anger in a sound that was half insect and half clinking of jewels. It advanced on the intruder.

  Toby's Inverary training leaped to his aid. He put his right foot forward and this time tried a saber slash of his green-shining sword. Again he felt resistance, and a slice of blue fire curled off the hellish thing and faded out. With an ear-piercing, inhuman cry, the demon sprang away, faster than a cat, landing on the bed. As he turned to fend off attack from there, the entire room exploded in flame—bed, clothes chest, rug, and even the door. Then the demon was gone, flicking out through the doorway, a blue glow in the smoke.

  Toby leaped after it, gasping and trying to protect his eyes with his arm. If it could do that to a room, why couldn't it do the same to him? If he had thought of it, when would it? Were demons even dumber than he was, or did the sword protect him? The old man was tottering toward the stairs. Oswood enveloped him and dismembered him in a cloudburst of blood. He died without making a sound, falling in fragments to the floor, but his death had delayed the monster just long enough for Toby to catch up with it.

  He flailed at it with the burning green blade. Its screams drilled agony through his head, but again he spalled chunks off it. It was growing smaller. Again it fled from him. It struck the door at the far end of the corridor and burned right through it, vanishing into the room beyond, showering flaming splinters of wood.

  He was balked. He could not cross that fiery floor with bare feet. Shouts from downstairs told him a mob was gathering. Hamish was right—he would never escape from a crowd without being recognized, and that meant he would never escape. Never mind. The main thing now was the fight with Oswood. He must catch the demon and reduce it to nothing at all.

  He waved the dagger until a flash of green told him he had it pointed where he wanted to go: upward!

  He dashed into the nearest room, dropping the dirk in the folds of his plaid to give him two free hands. He was in luck, for alongside the four-poster bed stood a wooden chest. He jumped up on it, laid his hands against the ceiling boards, and pushed. Timber creaked and snapped, nails pulled free. Muscle! He gained a grip and pulled downward. The plank snapped with a reluctant crack. Smoke poured down from the hole.

  After that it was a matter of seconds before he had ripped a gap big enough to pull himself through. The attic was furnished with straw and discarded clothes, but it was also chokingly full of smoke, for the fire below had burned through to the sky. He braced his shoulders against the battens between the rafters and heaved bodily. The thatch above was old and rotten, else even his strength would not have been able to rip it open, but it yielded. With the aid of the dagger, he ripped a hole to daylight. The straw around his feet was already smoking.

  Gripping the rafters, he pulled himself up and stuck his head out through the hole. Only when he had done so did he realize the demon might be waiting for him up there. It wasn't, fortunately. The apothecary's house was a pillar of fire, and this one was already shooting flames up into the fog. He dragged himself out onto the steeply sloping thatch, then scrambled to relative safety on the ridge while he fumbled for the dagger.

  "There he is!" roared voices below. "Up yonder—the hexer! The demon-raiser. Five thousand marks!"

  He turned the dagger until it glowed faintly green. Oswood was either too small or too far off to raise much reaction from the blade—and it had apparently crossed the street.

  Toby would have to cross also. The burgh's roads were narrow. He had jumped farther than that in the Glen Games. But then he had not faced a bone-smashing drop and had been landing on sand, not a steeply pitched slope of hard and slippery thatch. The house on the far side was slightly higher than the one he was on—but he didn't need to run all the way to the eave.

  If he didn't jump, the crowd or the fire would get him.

  He pulled the amethyst from the fold of his plaid. "Hob!" he said. "Fillan, I'm talking to you. If you want to see the world with me, then you'd better put some spring in my legs!"

  He popped the gem in his mouth for safekeeping, bounded down the roof, and leaped out into the fog. For a moment he seemed to hang in the air above the crowd.

  He landed, pitching forward on hands and knees, and then flat on his belly. He began to slide. He thrust the dagger into the straw and came to a stop with his legs hanging out over the drop. With fingers and blade, he scrambled up the slope to the crest. Then he was on his feet, running along the ridge.

  What followed was a mad chase across the rooftops of the burgh. Jumping streets and alleys, he soon outdistanced the angry, roaring mob below. He caught up with the demon. It was wounded, or just diminished. Perhaps it was dying, but he dared not count on that. He cornered it against a chimney, his demon sword blazed joyfully, and he hacked the monster away to nothing. The light in the blade faded out.

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  So much for Oswood! The next problem was to save Toby Strangerson.

  He leaned for a moment against the chimney, catching his breath and prodding his wits. The fog swirling around him was hardly thicker than the fog inside his head. The mob had lost him for the moment, but word would race through the burgh that the wanted hexer was at large. Every sword and kitchen cleaver would be after him.

  He could not see the spire of the sanctuary, which would have been a useful landmark, nor could he locate the presence of the tutelary itself, as he had the previous evening. He had no idea of the way to Fergan's house. He was lost.

  However, the roofs that faded off into the mist like miniature mountains did not extend very far to his right. Either the harbor or open country must lie in that direction. There was certainly no point in waiting around on the housetops until the fog lifted. He found a low eave overlooking a cramped little yard, clambered down to the roof of a privy, and jumped. Then he went out into the street, trying to move with the confident stride of the innocent. A high-piled wagon was heading the way he wanted to go; he walked alongside it, accepting the horse's deliberate pace, keeping back from the driver's notice.

  He came to the harbor and found it almost deserted. No vessel could arrive or leave in this weather; there was nothing left to load or unload. Everything in sight was soaking wet, and even the water of the river itself looked leaden and depressed. He helped himself to a lobster trap and put it on his shoulder to hide his face. Then he walked out along the pier, blurred and damp. A Highlander with no bonnet and carrying a burden was acting out of character, but the few men he passed did not react with alarm.

  So he came to The Maid of Arran. The plank had been hauled in. He dropped his burden, grasped the side of the ship and hauled himself aboard. Then he squatted down so he would not be visible from the pier. Three crewmen were working at repairing ropes. Another was scraping the deck.

  "Hey, you!" shouted an angry voice, and Captain MacLeod himself came marching over. "Longdirk!"

  Toby looked up with a hopeful grin. "Morning, sir."

  "Trouble?"

  "Aye, trouble!"

  "Come inside."

  The captain's cabin was under the raised deck at the stern where the steersman stood. It was very small, with a bunk on one side, a chest o
pposite, and a built-in table under the window at the back. It contained one chair, and no space for more. With a shelf of books and charts on the wall, it was businesslike, but the rumpled bedclothes and the dirty dishes on the table made it homey. Toby had his usual problem with the ceiling.

  "Sit!" said the captain, waving at the chest. He closed the door and stood with folded arms, solid and bulky in a cloak of oiled leather that glistened with the moisture of the fog. Under a conical leather hat, his weathered face was solemn, but not unfriendly. He had a tangled, reddish beard that seemed to have been windswept into a state of permanent confusion. It sparkled with fine drops of damp.

  "I'm lost, Captain. Would you send word to Master Stringer's house for me?"

  "I could have a man take you there."

  Toby shook his head. "There's a hue and cry after me.

  A faint smile softened the sailor's stare. "And a price on your head. He told me."

  Had the king admitted what that price was, though? For a moment, MacLeod seemed to weigh possibilities. If Toby had betrayed the cause, he would not be asking for word to be sent to the rebel headquarters. He nodded.

  "I'll send the boy. You want to write a note?"

  Writing was not Toby's specialty. "No. Just have him say I'm here, and in trouble." He wondered about asking for his sporran with all his money in it and decided not to mention that. Dead men had no use for silver. He felt a stirring of hope—the captain was a bluff, honest man. He might throw Toby to the sharks if he thought that to be his duty, but not without saying so.

  "We'll not be casting off lines for a whiles yet. You smell like you've been in a fire. I'll bring you some water to clean that soot off your face. Could you use food?"

  Toby tested his teeth with his tongue. He thought he could chew again, if he was careful. "That would be more than kind of you, sir."

  MacLeod smiled almost bashfully. "I saw you fight, lad. Och, a braw show that was!" He turned quickly and went out.

  Toby relaxed in a great wallow of relief. It was good to have friends.

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  Less than two weeks ago, he had been odd-job boy in the laird's castle. Now a king came to call on him.

  They trooped in, filling the tiny cabin to suffocation—King Fergan, Father Lachlan, Kenneth Kennedy, and Hamish. Captain MacLeod followed, pulling the door closed behind him with difficulty.

  The tall king smiled faintly at Toby's efforts to stand, for he had the same problem, if not quite so severely. "Be seated," he said, taking the chair for himself. "And the rest of you, gentlemen."

  Toby settled on the chest again. Kennedy joined him. Father Lachlan and Hamish perched on the bunk. Then they could see one another, although there was barely room for all their feet. The captain remained on his feet by the door, as if to demonstrate that on his vessel he took orders from no one, not even a monarch.

  Toby braced himself for a struggle. He was fairly sure his life was about to make a sharp turn. It might even come to a sudden stop, because he was a serious danger to the rebels now. The king, the captain, and Kennedy were all armed.

  Father Lachlan looked haggard and worried. His white robe was cleaner than usual, but the conspicuous dust stains on the skirt suggested he had been spending much time on his knees.

  Hamish was wearing Lowlander disguise. The doublet was too wide for him, and his breeches were pleated at the waist, pulled in by his belt. He was obviously relieved to see his hero alive and well, but he lacked his normal chirrup—Hamish looked as Hamish looked when in trouble. He smiled weakly at Toby and tugged at a bulky object in his pocket, drawing it out far enough so that Toby could recognize his sporran and know that his money was safe.

  Kenneth Kennedy slouched in morose silence. He stank as if his overnight carouse had ended in an attack of vomiting.

  The thin man in the chair might be balding and in need of more chin; his kingdom might be purely hypothetical, but he could dominate a cabin full of his own followers. They waited on his word. He began by directing a cold glance at Toby.

  "The boy knows who I am. He claims you did not tell him."

  "I didn't, sire. He knew before I did. He recognized you from your coins."

  "So he claims. His mother has one of them. But why did you not report this?"

  "I suppose I... I should have done so. I believe that he can keep his mouth shut, sire. I know he usually has it open, but he can be discreet when necessary."

  The king's expression did not thaw very far. "Don't ever make that mistake again! Now, he tells a remarkable story. I want to hear your version of it."

  Toby was not going to enjoy reciting his litany of failure. "Lady Valda sent a creature to summon me. It hexed me into following it to a house on the edge of the burgh. Then she bound me to complete obedience, hanging a bottled demon around my neck." He pointed to the silver chain he still wore there. "Hamish had followed me. I caught him and... and I handed him over." He shuddered at the odious memory.

  "We all know the evil of gramarye," Fergan said sympathetically. "How did you break free of it?"

  "Hamish released me. He smashed the jewel with a poker. The demon turned on Valda and killed her."

  "What about the other one, though, the creature? How did that one die?"

  "Hamish again," Toby admitted. "He stabbed it through the heart with Valda's dagger. He was the hero of the whole affair, and I was just a dupe, worse than useless."

  "I see!"

  All eyes were on Hamish, who looked more startled than flattered. He stared oddly at Toby.

  "My apologies for doubting you, Master Campbell," the king said, and now his ice was melting. "Modesty and discretion are both noble virtues, but when you report to your king, you must tell the truth, and the whole truth."

  Hamish muttered, "Yes, Your Majesty," and frowned again at Toby. "But Toby rescued me from the burning house, sire. And then he went off into another, chasing the demon, even though he knew the crowd would recognize him from the wanted poster and—"

  "Yes!" the king snapped. He turned to Toby. "And what happened then? The fire is still burning. The town is in an uproar."

  "I killed it." Toby produced the dagger. "Father, you said you had never seen a demon sword. See one now. It works."

  At the sight of a naked blade in the presence of their king, both Kennedy and MacLeod reached for their swords. Then they stilled and fell silent, all eyes fixed on the legendary weapon.

  Footsteps drummed on the ceiling as sailors went about their business. The light was growing brighter, and faint sounds of bustle on the pier revealed that the fog must be lifting. Men were getting ready to set sail and catch the tide.

  Father Lachlan broke the hush. "Praise to the tutelary! It has guarded you well, my son."

  Hog swill! "With all respect to the spirit," said Toby, "I don't think it did anything, except perhaps send the fog. I sensed it last night, when we arrived. I can sense it now. It returned a short while ago. But it wasn't there when I was battling Oswood. What did it tell you, Father?"

  The little man pushed his glasses up his nose, glanced unhappily at the king, and said, "Nothing. It is not responding to prayers. The acolytes are very disturbed, for they have no record of this ever happening before." Then he blinked. "You can sense the tutelary? Like you saw the specter in the hills? From here, even?"

  Toby nodded.

  Lachlan stared. "Ah! You have solved the mystery?"

  Again, Toby nodded. Obviously Hamish had not mentioned the amethyst, any more than he had yet told Toby how he had known about it. But now was the time to confess the alarming truth.

  "Your Majesty, in Inverary, I swore to be your man, and I had no reservations when I made that oath. But when Valda hexed me, I betrayed you and swore to be hers."

  The king scowled. "I am well aware that a man's honor can be perverted by gramarye. I do not hold that against you."

  No. King Fergan couldn't, for he had once betrayed his country by doing homage to King Nevil.

 
"But it now seems that I was not free to swear allegiance to you in the first place, sire. I am another's man and have been ever since I left Strath Fillan."

  The king broke the deadly, accusing silence. "Whose?"

  "No mortal's. Years ago, Valda and King Nevil conjured a demon named Rhym, which turned on them. Did Hamish tell you? The demon took possession of the king and banished him to the jewel on this dagger. In Castle Lochy, Valda moved him from there to me, so that I would become Nevil, or Nevil's man at the least—Nevil's creature."

  Hands were creeping to sword hilts again.

  "But I swear to you, sire, that I am not aware of him at all. I am Toby Strangerson, not the rightful king of England. She said I suppress him. I suppose I must, for her demons could see signs of possession on me. I don't know how I manage to do this. For what it is worth, though, you must know these things, because if the Nevil soul ever manages to emerge in me, then I shall betray you."

  Father Lachlan said, "That does not explain your superhuman powers, my son."

  "No, Father. There is more. The powers do not come from me at all, but from this." Toby pulled on the silver chain. While waiting for a response to his message, he had fixed the amethyst into the wires that had once held the Oswood sapphire. He had tucked the gem under the shoulder of his plaid, and now he pulled it out for all to see. It twinkled purple fire as it spun.

  "A demon?" snapped the king, easing away from him.

  "Not quite, sire. This is Fillan, the hob from my village. Granny Nan gave me the gem as a farewell gift. Somehow she had talked the hob into it. It must have bottled itself voluntarily, for certainly she knew no gramarye."

  They all reacted to some extent, but Father Lachlan reared back in horror. His head cracked against the wall and his glasses fell into his lap. He fumbled for them without taking his eyes from the jewel.

  "A bottled hob? I never heard of such an abomination!"

  Toby sighed and put the jewel away, out of sight. "Neither had Valda. But that's what's been protecting me."