Kingdoms of the Night (The Far Kingdoms)

by Allan Cole, Chris Bunch

  The soldiers scattered as the bird dived after the corpse, caught it once more in its talons and soared off into the storm.

  * * * *

  No one opposed us as we marched through the city. All the king’s soldiers had vanished and his citizens slammed their shutters and barred their doors when we passed their homes. The storm had ceased and a bright moon lit our way. There was only the creak of harness and the stomp of our boots to hint of human life, although when we left the docks the people in the caves broke out of their prisons and swarmed down the rocky paths to freedom.

  Before we set out we’d fired our ships and Janela had used a few drops of my blood to cast a seeking spell. When last we’d seen the Ibis and her sisters they were fully engulfed in flame and sailing away — manned only by the spell — to confront, and hopefully cause much grief to Cligus’ and Modin’s fleet.

  There was no one at the city’s rear gates when we reached them. They were sealed by sorcery so we fired them and then dragged them off their hinges.

  We marched along the rough board road that led past the amphitheater where we had confronted Azbaas. We followed it all night, followed it until it became a wagon track and followed the track until morning.

  We camped where the track intersected a broad, rubble-strewn road. Posted along the road were the demon head markers.

  Somewhere ahead, we prayed, that road ended at Tyrenia.

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  THE ROAD TO TYRENIA

  For the first time I wished I’d been traveling with just a handful of men, even though I knew a small party could not have made it so far. But a dozen or so would have been easier to disappear into the countryside with, instead of the nearly seventy I had to worry about.

  At least we’d found the demon-marked way that led to Tyrenia, although that would increase the likelihood of discovery. Once Cligus and Modin found that track they would assume we were on it and wouldn’t have to waste time sweeping the land for our traces.

  I estimated our pursuers numbered between three and five hundred men, although I hoped they’d been decimated in their journey upriver by the crocodiles and every species of plague imaginable. That many troops would move more slowly than mine, even though I knew they were elite forces, and I also assumed there’d be some confusion and delay passing through Azbaas’ city.

  Quatervals exercised what craft he could to conceal, having everyone travel barefoot for a few leagues, since he’d observed most folk in this country went unshod, so our tracks wouldn’t stand out. Beyond that all we could do was travel as fast as possible, always heading toward the mountains.

  The way was overgrown — it had been some time since many people had traveled this way. I wondered if perhaps the jungle folk avoided the remnants of the road as being gods-cursed or just as likely because it led in no direction that interested them, moving east away from the lake into the mountains.

  The road had been built by skilled engineers with much time, workmen and resources. It ran nearly straight for the mountains, not curving around foothills or taking the easiest path. They had carved into the hills and crossed rivers with either low, arched stone bridges or else with paved fords built up from the river bottom so water rushed over them no more than a foot deep. Several times the road disappeared into tunnels but I refused to chance them, fearing not only cave-ins but confrontations with creatures who might have chosen them for dens. Since we were afoot it was a simple matter to find our way cross-country to where the track emerged into the open once more.

  The forest thinned as we climbed up into the foothills — although it blocked more than a momentary view of the mountains ahead — and there were still no signs of the rocky formation we so desperately wanted to sight.

  Five days from King Azbaas’ city Janela chanced a passive sensing spell that required little more than anointing her eyelids and ears with an unguent and putting herself into a light trance. In a few minutes she returned to us and reported.

  There was dark magic behind us, she said, but it still seemed distant — as if Cligus and Modin had stopped in the city. That was good news, although she cautioned me not to rely upon it too heavily. What simultaneously concerned and drew her was the feeling of dangerous forces ahead, swirling, waiting. Dangerous or not we all hoped and prayed they were a sign that we were nearing Tyrenia. We pressed on.

  Despite her report, our party remained cheery. Of course all the sailors complained about being afoot but that was normal. Beran suggested we ought to keep sharp eyes about, looking for wild horses to capture so we could travel more comfortably. I shuddered at the thought. For reasons I’ve never been able to fathom seafarers have a great affinity for horses and all think they are at least potentially half-horse, half man. My own feeling is they are less able than they believe. I hardly fancied the idea of seeing my happy wanderers scattering across the landscape on stampeding horses, flinging our baggage away as we went. That might be one way to conquer Cligus — if he came on us in such a state he and the rest of his murderous crew might well expire of laughter.

  The land around us was barren and uninhabited, laid to waste either in the forest tribes’ internecine warfare or by Azbaas’ relentless raiding for sacrifices. But even though the few huts we saw were deserted, showing the marks of fire and ax, I kept flankers out to the sides and front. The term barren, I should add, is the usual arrogant description people have for land they do not occupy.

  Truthfully there was much life abroad, animals seeming to rejoice where the killers on two legs came no more. Birds flocked heavy in the trees and squirrels and chipmunks raced about gathering stores of food for the winter. Deer bounded across the road and sometimes peered curiously from the brush as we passed. Both Maha and Chons returned their intent interest — not out of curiosity but rather appetite.

  At a rest stop one of the Cyralian brothers said he wished to show me something and led me a dozen yards off the track to a small stone arch. It rose over a low altar, with a small statue on it. The statue, aged by years of wind and rain, was unusual — most gods, including our own beloved Te-Date, are pictured as looming, horrible of visage, threatening. This was different. I didn’t know what kind of animal was represented, but assuming the statue was life-size it would have come to just below my waist. It was fat and squatted on its haunches, holding out its paws palms up as if it were begging... or making an offering. It had pointed ears and a full face with almond, slanted eyes. A long bushy tail curled around it.

  These lands were deserted — but placed on the altar were flowers and a piece of fruit that looked like a green peach. I started to pick the fruit up, then stopped and knelt to examine the offerings without desecrating them. Both the flowers and fruit were freshly-picked, the petals and flesh not yet having begun to wither.

  Quatervals spoke from behind me and I started. “Now, who’d be makin’ offerings all the way out here?”

  I said I didn’t know.

  “Animals don’t have gods,” he went on, quietly. “Do they?”

  I started to reply but said nothing. Again, I did not — do not — know. We quietly withdrew, leaving the small god to its worshippers and peace.

  We climbed higher and the forest thinned even more. I heard a halloo and hurried to the front of the formation. Chons was pointing excitedly up. Looming above us was a mountain range whose shape took my breath away.

  The Fish Of The Gods appeared exactly as Janos and I had viewed it so many years ago in the vision we had glimpsed in The Palace of the Evocators. I saw the four black peaks and clenched thumb all dusted with snow with white drifts picking out each digit. I saw the valley rising between the thumb and forefinger and knew it afforded passage to the other side.

  I thought I heard Janos’ voice whispering in my ear: “Beyond, lies The Far Kingdoms.”

  I shivered and then Janela was at my side. She took my had and we looked deep into each other’s eyes. We kissed for the first time — no more than a touching of lips to convey feelings that mere
words could not do justice to. Then we pressed closer — only for an instant — and the kiss became something more. My mind swirled as we parted and Janela smiled at me and I thought I saw a hint of a promise in her eyes.

  I steadied myself. We both laughed as emotion piled on emotion. Ahead was the pass. Ahead was Tyrenia. Ahead lay the Kingdoms of the Night.

  We moved on. Now there was little but scrub brush and twisted pines on the increasingly steep hills. The road held true, due east. The rivers we crossed were far below us — in near-vertical chasms the sun would illuminate for only a few minutes a day — and we could hear the roar and echo of the cascades. Again I admired the builders who had managed such a marvelous bridge that worked no matter whether the water was a foot or half a mile below. All were single arches with never a pier.

  It was fortunate the canyons were narrow enough to allow this, although a few times it had been necessary to lay stone out from either side and reinforce the landing with a buttress braced into the rock before the arch was set. It seemed as if the bridges would hold for another epoch but we took no chances, crossing in small groups and moving swiftly.

  The hills, now small mountains, had stood firm against even the intentions of the Old Ones who built the road and so it lost its arrow-flight directness and curved and wound as it climbed, always toward the Fist, always beyond the next summit. Then we crested a butte and came down the other side to find the road had stopped.

  A bridge had collapsed and there was a gap of nearly thirty feet where the rock fell away for perhaps four hundred feet.

  There was cursing and mutters of disappointment and worry that we could be trapped here. But not from Quatervals or some of the other ex-Frontier Scouts he’d enlisted. Now we were in their element.

  Janela and I stood there, ignored at first, as Quatervals and his team went into what was to them a very familiar drill.

  Then he came to us, pulling a small roll from his pack. He handed it to Janela. It consisted of a handful of straight dowels and small pieces of one-inch rope that had been carefully cut apart. He gave lengths of the rope and two of the pieces of wood to Janela.

  “We need to do the ‘lesser is part of the greater’ spell, my Lady, “ he said. “I know the words and was given the blessin’ to say them when I was in the Scouts. But it’d be more potent if you’d do us the honor of makin’ the castin’.”

  Janela smiled. “I’m familiar with the spell,” she said. “And I’d be proud to assist you.”

  He handed her two of the dowels, considered, then gave her half a dozen of the bits of rope. “More’n we’ll need, my Lady, but it’s best to be safe.” He reached back in his pack and fished for more equipment. “I’m too old to be doin’ this,” he said.

  But there was a broad smile on the mountain-man’s lips as he pulled out forty feet of carefully-treasured climbing rope made of cotton and silk that appeared too weak to support a man’s weight. I knew, however, the line had been specially blessed with a spell of cohesion and three men could hang from it without the rope stretching or snapping.

  He slung it in a coil over his shoulder, stripped to a loincloth, took off his boots and tied a drawstring-equipped bag on a light cord around his waist. Into that went some narrow steel wedges with holes drilled in their ends and little rope loops through them, a hammer, a small grapnel, some rope fragments, two more of the dowels and a tiny pouch containing ground materials for the spell.

  “I’m away,” he announced, and without further ado went straight down the cliff’s edge.

  We crept to the edge and watched him as he went down, moving deftly from rock to crag toward the bottom. Watching him was fascinating — at no time did any of us feel that he was in the slightest danger of falling or even slipping.

  As much as I wanted to keep watching him, I was just as interested in Janela’s task. I knew the bits of wood had been cut from fully-shaped logs and the pieces of rope were fragments from other, far longer lines.

  She turned each piece of wood in an intricate series of movements, as if they were wands, and the same with the line.

  “This isn’t the traditional way of doing things,” she explained, but one that takes a lot less work and no real materials.”

  She drew a bit of red chalk from her bag and marked a single symbol on the wood, then simply touched the chalk to the rope ends. Janela placed the wood on the ground, each piece about three feet apart.

  “Stand clear,” she warned, and began chanting. As she did, she moved her hands in a pattern that looked identical to the motions she’d made with the wood.

  Children you listen

  As you were

  So shall you be

  Stretch out

  Stretch far

  You are the whole

  You are your fathers

  Stretch far now.

  Although I knew what would happen, I was startled to see the transformation. Now lying on the roadway were large coils of rope and in front of them two perfectly smoothed logs of the clearest pine that might’ve been cut, aged, smoothed and shaped for a boat’s mast. They were about a foot in diameter and twenty five feet long.

  Without orders, some of the former Scouts busied themselves and tied the logs into an X-shape and lugged them out to where the bridge had fallen away.

  One of them grinned at me and said, “Damned sure better doin’ it like this, me Lord, than havin’ to leg it back down to the closest tall trees — which, I rec’lect, were a couple days distant.”

  Mithraik was looking about nervously and I reassured him that I’d sent scouts back and we’d have plenty of warning if Cligus’ soldiers came into view.

  “It’s not him I’m worried about, my Lord,” he said. “’Tis this road itself, sir... and its builders. Stinks of demons and their works, it does.”

  Janela eyed him. “You needn’t worry,” she said. “The magic worked on these stones was cast before your ancestors’ ancestors drew their first breath.”

  “I feel different, my Lady, ” he persisted. “I still feel ’em about.”

  Janela eyed him. “I didn’t know you had such talent,” she said. “You’ve never spoken of it before.”

  Mithraik looked at her and I swear his expression was almost contemptuous for a flash. Then his look turned humble. “Beggin’ yer pardon, my Lady,” he said. “It’s just a feelin’ in Mithraik’s old bones.”

  I sensed he was lying. I had no doubt he was afraid. But exactly what caused that fear was another matter.

  “He’s at the bottom,” someone shouted and the moment was broken.

  We all went to the edge to look.

  Quatervals had reached the base of the cliff and was fording the small river. Now we did hold our breath as he was caught and nearly swept away twice by the racing current. But then he was across and climbing once more.

  Here the rock was less striated than the cliff on our side and twice he had to tap in wedges, tie himself securely into the rope before venturing off on seemingly blank rock. Once he fell and we gasped as he dropped about eight feet before the rope caught and held him. Undismayed, he instantly found a hand-hold and tried once more. When he’d made his passage, again he pounded a wedge in, tied the rope to that and went back down to free the wedge and rope below.

  Watching Quatervals work, I could see it was more than just skill. His abilities came from years of experience. Added to that was his superb physical conditioning. Without showing any strain he could reach his foot above his waist, find a toe-hold, then hang by that and a hand below his body and stretch upward for another purchase. He looked like a spider, placidly moving across the wall of a room.

  With no further problems he reached the top. He didn’t even seem to be winded because he tied the grapnel to one end of his climbing rope, coiled the rest at his feet except for a long loop that he held in one hand and took the grapnel in the other, hanging almost to the ground. Underhand, he swung it around until it was blur. At some chosen instant he let go and sent the hook spinni
ng out across the gorge.

  Not only did it make the distance in his first cast but fell just at the feet of Levu, another ex-Scout, who had it firm before it could skitter back over the edge. Quatervals allowed himself to look mildly pleased.

  Levu tied the rope to a close boulder and across the way Quatervals secured his end to a massive chunk of the fallen bridge’s springing. Levu took off his own boots, held up crossed fingers to the heavens, muttered a prayer and slipped out onto the rope, hand-over-handing across to the other side like a lemur. After him went other men.

  Quatervals was paying no mind to them, no doubt assuming if they were stupid enough to fall they didn’t deserve recognition from him and was laying out his own sticks and rope. He sprinkled what was in the pouch over them and whispered the spell he’d been taught as a Scout and, as on our side, the wood and ropes writhed and grew.

  I noted that the growth was much slower than when Janela had used her own magic and wondered if the spell was better or, which I thought more likely, that an experienced Evocator would have greater powers than the non-wizard — no matter if he’d been blessed and given permission to use minor tactical magic, as were all officers and most senior warrants in our army.

  Those logs were also X-tied and carried to the verge. Meanwhile three larger ropes were laid out and small ropes, about four feet long, fastened them together at six foot intervals. The climbing rope was used to pull those heavier ropes across and now three inch-thick lines stretched across the chasm. These were tied to the notched ends of the X-ed logs and to the center and then the two wooden X’s were lifted to the vertical. All that remained was to brace the logs’ feet and to lash them to secure moorings and we had a bridge.