Kingdoms of the Night (The Far Kingdoms)

by Allan Cole, Chris Bunch

  “I guess, followin’ you around, Lord Antero, I’d best not spend much time tryin’ to convince myself people’re any better’n they are or ever will be, eh?”

  * * * *

  Thirteen days crawled leadenly past.

  The wind held true, blowing into the east and the seas were fairly calm. But still our voyage seemed to be taking forever. It grew hot, muggy and I thought I could smell the dark, heavy scent of the jungle. Janela, as promised, did cast a guardian spell over our men to prevent needless worry.

  On the fourteenth dawn I awoke to the cry: “Land! Land ho! Land firm dead ahead!”

  I pulled on clothing and dashed on deck but even in my haste was still among the last to reach it. Janela wore no more than a wrap, I thought perhaps her bedspread, but neither she, I nor anyone else paid mind to her near-nakedness.

  Beyond our bows was a river’s mouth, so vast I could not see but one shore to our north. The land ahead was green, tropical, jungled.

  Far in the distance, so far it was but a blue presence on the horizon, lifted a monstrous mountain range.

  I could make out no details at all, let alone crags that might be the Fist of the Gods.

  Closer, though, standing out from the shoaling ocean, was the white finger of the monolith.

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  CITY OF THE DOOMED

  As we neared the monolith an ice storm of recognition blew out of my past. It was an immense statue of a woman warrior. She was remarkably beautiful, even though time’s blight had pocked the stone that made her. In her hand she held aloft the stub of a broken sword.

  Beside me I heard Janela ask Kele: “Do you suppose it was once a lighthouse?”

  The captain made some response but I wasn’t listening. Instead I was remembering when I’d first seen that image. It had been in moonlight and I’d been in a carriage, instead aboard a ship. I had been summoned to Prince Raveline’s palace and as I approached that black wizard’s abode I was suddenly confronted with two stone guardians whose visages were so cold and pitiless that they struck dread instead of wonder at their other-worldly beauty. It had been long ago and Raveline was dead but when I viewed the statue at the harbor’s entrance once again I felt fear buzz a viper’s warning in my breast.

  We sailed past the monolith, the mole beside us and I heard the others gasp when they saw the statue’s opposite side. I turned, although I didn’t need to look to know what they had seen. Like Raveline’s guardians the woman had a second face, looking to the rear, and that face was a leering, fanged demon. And like that long ago night when conspiracy and betrayal stirred in dank winds I wondered if the artist who carved the original had worked from imagination — or real life.

  I shook off the web of an old man’s memory and took stock. The river mouth we were sailing into was truly immense — I saw something in the distance that might have been the blur of the other bank. The channel was honeycombed with sandbars that had built up over the ages, making navigation difficult. I speculated that the original inhabitants had posted guards at the statue so anyone attempting to sail upstream would have had to pay whatever toll those who held it demanded. Some of the bars were so large that the river had long ago given up the fight to breach them and they’d become small islands dotted with clumps of trees and brush.

  From the statue a mole stretched toward land. Although the rocks that formed it still stood, in many places time and weather had broken through. The harbor entrance was a funnel with the mole on one side and sandbars on the other, making it not much wider than the statue’s hundred foot height. The channel belled out so it looked like fish traps children set in the shallows to catch bait. The shape had certainly been planned by its builders. A sea-borne enemy would have been easily bottled up, then picked off one by one.

  The defenders of the harbor, however, were long gone. In most places thick jungle had invaded whatever river front that had once existed. The delta heat was intense and a thick mist shimmered up from the water, bearing the odor of rot. Clouds of insects buzzed through the mist pursued by colorful birds that swooped and shrieked as they snatched up their small prey. Big, heavy-jawed lizards humped up from the mud banks to watch us with yellow eyes and swarms of monkeys mocked from the trees. Here and there I could make out stone stumps that’d once been the legs of piers and the bones of old dockside buildings made an ideal trellis for fleshy vines that wormed in and out of the ruins.

  Janela nudged me. “Over there,” she whispered — it was the sort of place where one instinctively spoke in wary tones.

  Some distance inland rose the ruins of an ancient city, strangling in the jungle’s grip. Here at the end of the mole would have been the customs and guardposts, I imagined, and on more defensible ground the city itself. It was a grim gateway to the river beyond.

  My skin prickled and I saw Janela frown with effort as she pushed out with her magical senses.

  “Do you sense any threat?” I asked.

  Her frown deepened, then she shook her head.

  “I can’t say with certainty, Amalric,” she said. “There was once much suffering here. A battle, perhaps. And magic. Of the blackest kind. But it happened long ago.”

  “As long ago as the Old Ones?” I asked, thinking of the monolith — and Raveline’s guardians.

  “Yes,” she said after a moment. “Perhaps as long as that.”

  “Let’s give it a miss,” Kele said. “Find another landin’ place.”

  I wanted to agree; to give the order that would have us all hoist sail and sniff down the coast for a more pleasant entrance to these Eastern shores.

  I did not like this place. It seemed a realm of short life spans and vengeful ghosts.

  But Janela plucked a set of bones from her purse and knelt to cast them on the deck. I heard their dry rattle and saw the shape they made when they came to rest. Perhaps it was my excited imagination but to me they did not look unlike the statue’s demon face.

  She looked up, eyes glittering. “This is where we must begin,” she said.

  Kele growled but went to work with a will as I issued the orders. The people of the Pepper Coast are a fatalistic lot.

  “B’sides,” I heard her chastise a griping sailor, “only a lummox wi’ a boil fer head an’ pus fer brains w’d be arguin’ wi’ a bone caster.”

  I wished I had her confidence. It has occurred to me from time to damp-palmed time why one would think nothing of checking the dice when a fat purse is at stake but never question a wizard when one’s skin depended on the outcome of the toss?

  * * * *

  We landed with caution. Janela and I were to take small force toward the heart of the city, consisting of Pip, Otavi, three of Quatervals’ scouts and four tough country lads — the Cyralian brothers — known for their skills as stalkers and bowmen.

  We would strike for the city and, I warned Kele and Quatervals, most likely would be forced to remain there until the next day since I had no intention of discovering what surprises the jungle between us might hold after nightfall.

  Our three ships would hold back for any water-borne threat and Quatervals would stand ready with a landing party. If we had not returned to the beach by mid-morning, or if he heard the sounds of battle in the night, he was to come to our support at first light.

  He heatedly disagreed with the arrangement, saying it was his place to be by my side. I said we expected little difficulty — whatever enemies might lurk in the jungle could be subdued with the Cyralian brothers’ bows and Janela’s magic.

  Besides I wanted the bulk of my fighters to stay on the ships with an experienced leader to command them. I had no desire to be stranded afoot before our journey had truly begun. Quatervals mentioned those small flags that Janela and Kele had devised, but Janela shook her head, saying they wouldn’t work in a place seeping with so much ancient sorcery.

  He didn’t like our arguments and I’m certain he had ample retorts at hand. But I was in no mood to be challenged and so he wisely held his tongue and d
id as I wished.

  We beached our boat on a narrow, muddy shelf. There was a short, brush-clogged stairwell leading up from the shelf and from there we could make out what been a road leading the city. Quickly, Janela set up a small, brass tripod. I gingerly handed her the decorative pot, filled with smoldering magical embers that I’d juggled on my lap since we left the ship. She slung it from the tripod, swung around and began gathering bits from the ground: moss skinned from a rock, a dry leaf that had fallen from a tree, a small, green beetle that scurried from under that leaf when she lifted it.

  As she worked I felt a stirring, as if things, were coming awake from an uneasy sleep. I heard the low mutter of many voices and looked reflexively about, as did the other members of our party. But there was nothing to be seen. To one side something heavy stirred in the thick brush that filled the stairwell. Acting as one the Cyralian brothers lifted their bows. Meanwhile the others had drawn their swords or raised their spears and moved forward to make certain the brothers had time to practice their deadly skills.

  The brush parted violently. An enormous shadow pushed through. It was not a thing of substance or flesh. I could make out the jungle behind it, although dimly, so dark was our visitor. It raised what I could only call a head. A hole opened where a mouth might be. A chorus of voices boomed out, as if the shape were made of many souls.

  The form stepped forward — we could see the impressions of huge footprints in the mud.

  “Steady,” I told the men.

  It kept moving forward, mud oozing out from its weight. It came slowly but with steps so large that it could only be moments before it was on us.

  The brothers bent their bows.

  “Not yet,” I said.

  Janela was at the tripod, dropping the moss, beetle and other things into the flaming pot. A bitter-smelling smoke boiled up.

  The shape kept coming and the voices were growing louder and louder.

  I heard Janela chant:

  Old Ones.

  Old Ghosts.

  We come for knowledge.

  We come to admire.

  Wanderers from the West,

  Where you once ruled.

  The dark shape came to a halt a few feet from our formation. The voices dipped to a low muttering.

  Janela dribbled water from vial into the pot’s embers. It was from our river in Orissa.

  Flames sheeted up, so bright they hurt my eyes. I rubbed them, then looked about and saw the shadowy form was gone.

  Pip placed his boot in one of the muddy prints. It was swallowed, with room to spare.

  An impish smirk glittered through his scraggly beard. “Twice mine, easy,” he said. “I’m thinkin’ we oughta get double shares for this bit o’ work, lads.” The men snickered.

  The tallest and youngest of the brothers eyed Pip up and down. It wasn’t a long journey. “I’d say you was right,” he said. “But, everythin’s twice yer size, Pip! Lord Antero’d be outter coin afore we even started this bitty walk in th’ green.”

  Somewhere a jungle beast howled.

  Pip grimaced. “Some walk in the green,” he said.

  We all laughed, a little more heartily, perhaps, than the jest deserved.

  Janela ignored the by-play. She was setting up another spell, dipping into that wondrous purse of her and laying out vials and small pouches on her cloak, which she’d spread on the ground next to the tripod. The drabber side was turned down so all the bright Evocator’s symbols were displayed.

  It came to me that she’d acted mere moments before there was even a sign of a threat.

  “Did you know what would happened?”

  “No,” she said. “I only knew something would happen. And then I made a most fortunate guess. Thank Te-Date we only had to face a few cranky old ghosts. If it’d been a demon, like the late Lord Senac, we would’ve been for it.”

  “Thank you for setting my mind at ease,” I gritted.

  Janela laughed, full of youthful daring and confidence. “Never fear,” she said. “I’m sure I would have thought of something. I hope.”

  She pumped tiny bellows, re-lighting the embers in the pot. Then a sprinkle of herb, a splash of magical oils and there was a lively, colorful blaze pleasantly crackling and smoking in the vessel.

  I wondered what she was about and surprised myself when I realized I was studying her lithe form and graceful motions with less than grandfatherly interest. Apparently my renewed vigor had revived more than the color of my hair and beard. It embarrassed me and when I saw her give me an odd look I covered by asking what she was doing.

  “If we’re going to investigate the city,” she said, “we’ll need some sort of a guide.”

  She crumpled parchment into a ball, chanting:

  The power of the gods

  Never dies

  But is transformed

  And waits for those

  Who seek.

  Janela dropped the ball into the fire. It exploded into flame and she shouted:

  Behold, the Seeker!

  Her arms shot up and the fiery ball rose from the embers until it floated just in front of her face. She blew on it and it began to turn, faster and faster until it was a blur, like the spindle of a busy yarn maker. Then it shot away, as if it had a life of its own. It darted into the old stairwell, firing the brush, which burned so quickly that in a few blinks of an eye it was nothing but ash. The burning ball hovered over it as if waiting.

  “All we need do is follow it,” Janela said. She started re-packing her things.

  “To what end?” I asked.

  Janela shook out her cloak. The air stirred and I caught the cool scent of spring blossoms.

  “There would have been a seat of power,” she said. “A throne or a place where the most important spells were performed. I’m hoping enough of a magical residue is left for us to sniff it out.”

  She rolled the cloak into a blanket roll, pulled a leather strap from her purse and slung the cloak across her back.

  The parchment ball wiggled back and forth and bobbed up and down, trailing off a fat smoke tail so it looked like an impatient puppy.

  I laughed at its antics. Janela grinned, saying: “I thought I’d try something different for a Favorite. My wizard teachers always invoked the same grim little things, with fangs and talons and scales.”

  “You forgot to mention evil dispositions and even worse body odor,” I said.

  “That too,” Janela said. “Mean-souled Favorites have their place, I guess, but in this case it doesn’t hurt to have a little fun.”

  The grins of the men bore her out and even Pip’s grousing was of a light tone as they all formed up and we headed for the city.

  The parchment ball shot up over the stairwell and we followed, picking our way through the broken and upturned pavement of what had once been a broad main road leading up from the harbor.

  You could still make out the big promenade that had once been a teeming market place with fresh food and exotic wares from all over the Old Ones’ empire. The road led to an enormous entrance — gates long gone — and the ground and thick walls were smooth black and buckled as if broken by an enormous force, then fused by intense heat. Our little fiery guide hesitated, then soared above the walls.

  “I think it wants us to climb,” Janela said.

  So, climb we did scrambling and slipping on the smooth surface as we mounted the wall. At the top it was wide enough for freight wagons to pass with ease and we could make out the wreckage of towers placed strategically along the wall. The entire city would have been enclosed by this wall, an almost impregnable barrier. It stretched before us, its streets now clogged with vegetation, many of its building tumbled off their foundation, while jungle trees had burst through others to tower over the remains. Far away on the opposite side of the city a double-domed structure loomed up. Burnished metal reflected the mid-morning sun, glaring at us.

  The parchment ball swung toward the domes, and we followed its course, keeping on the top of the
walls and curving around the city toward our goal.

  * * * *

  It had once been a grand metropolis, with broad avenues, pleasant parks and spacious public baths fed by crisp underground springs. The buildings were made of thick stone faced with white marble. Some were tall, some long and low slung but all bore the mark of master builders at their prime. Here and there were the remains of frescoes and wondrous statuary hailing the exploits of a graceful people, people of taste, people of spirit. People who were doomed. Now the city was Hag Misery’s corpse. Jungle choked her streets. Vines with spindly brown roots ravaged the marble facing. Beasts stalked the parks and from the safety of the high walls we saw a troop of baboons warring with a pack of jackals in one of the bathhouses.

  The scars of war showed us, as we circumnavigated the city, she had not died a natural death. Buildings had been blasted, stone crushed and fused by the city’s besiegers. Idols of their gods and heroes had been toppled. Inside the barren ground of what had once been an arena we looked down and saw some scattered human bones. For this many to have survived the aeons meant there’d been a bleak slaughter that history should well have remembered.

  It was frightening to see how the Old Ones — despite all their mythical powers and knowledge — had been humbled. Who had been their enemies? Did they still exist somewhere? And what had been the nature of the wrong the Old Ones had committed, whether real or imaginary, to earn such terrible repayment?

  I was roasting those hard nuts in my mind when I heard a hooting erupt from the brush-filled streets below. We all stopped to see, weapons at ready. Another hoot answered the first but it seemed to come from a greater distance.

  “Over there!” Janela said.

  I swiveled my head just in time to see a glimpse of a brawny, fur-covered arm.

  “Some sort of animal,” I guessed.

  “Better’n ghosts, my Lord,” Pip said. “If he ’n he’s mates get too close like I can allus fire a warnin’ shot ’tween ’is ooglers.”

  His jaw snapped shut with a loud click as a whole chorus of hooting broke out, as if in answer to his boasting.