“We shall present a target for your forces at dawn. See to it that all your men charge from the City Gates toward it. And see to it also that the Gates are not closed, afterward.”
* * *
Kirjath Arkell worked in darkness. There was a creature inside his skull that banged a hammer against the bone with every heartbeat. There was a fluid coming from his ears that was not blood. He had forgotten what it meant, only that he must hide in the bowels of Ravenscroft, where none of the painful light of day could find his eyes, where it was cold.
It was quiet since they had all gone, but often the silence was filled with hoarse shouts and screams that came from somewhere inside him. They had left him, he remembered that much. He had stolen Dark essence. He needed it. It was the only thing which numbed the pain. It was the only way to call his friends. But he could not remember the pattern.
Things had been getting worse, he knew. How much worse, he couldn’t guess, only that there had been a time, once, when the thousand needles had not resided in his flesh, a time when he hadn’t crooned and jabbered without being able to stop himself. Gone, now. Gone. Only, forward. His task. He must complete the task.
He scratched suddenly on the rock between his knees, using his bloodied fingers to find where he had left off in the pattern. He cackled, and dried the tears from his cheeks. He knew. A triangle, within a circle, that was what he should draw. He remembered it now. Or was it the circle within the triangle? He lifted the rock from his design, uncertain. The flickering lights came again, and he gritted his teeth against the rolling cycle of madness.
He pulled a jurrum leaf from his pouch. There had been many in the store, so many, but fewer now. He chewed absently. The juice leaked into his throat. The mind-splinters were numbed, and the kaleidoscope of thoughts resolved slowly into one, clear objective.
The Morgloth. That was how it would be done. He would bring them all, and set them upon those who had wronged him. He remembered part of the spell. Half of a chanted verse escaped his lips. He ran his fingers over the incomplete outline, where his rock had scored the floor at his knees.
The flickering lights returned and swept all else aside. He pounded his fist on the stone while he twitched and gibbered. After a time, the twitching slowed, and he could summon the Dark to numb his bloodied knuckles. There was a good store left. At least there was that. Enough Dark to raise hell.
He worked at the task of remembering. In every lucid moment, he scored more of the pattern into the floor. Little by little, it began to build.
His first Morgloth was dead. The girl had caused that to happen. He added that crime to his list. The girl and the Swordmaster, they would die. His first Morgloth had been but one of many behind the Gateway. There had been others, lurking deeper in the Underworld. He had summoned only the one because he had been afraid of the others. They were too strong, too immense to contain.
What was fear, when he had survived everything? He had survived! He licked his dry lips, and began to chant. The pattern was clear in his mind. But he could not remember how to summon the Dark essence this time. His shattered Darkstone didn’t help. He roared in frustration, but that only reduced him to a fit of coughing.
Then it came to him, all of it, in a clear drop of sanity; the pattern, the words, the summoning spell. He visualised the Gateway, and guided the Dark essence to take that shape. He felt the air suck past his ears, as the portal to the Underworld was opened.
“Step through the Gate!” he shouted to the void, “and enter my mind!” He didn’t know what name to call, or which presence to channel. Instead, he welcomed them all. He could sense the madness rushing back.
They came as swift as snakes. He felt the force of their presence, heard the sound of many wings. Within moments, the screech of their strange hunger filled the chamber. Kirjath’s thoughts were scattered to the far walls as an alien mind invaded his and burst through every shrivelled thread of his brain. Kirjath had a new master, who emerged from the Gateway last of all.
The Morgloth’s bulk pushed Kirjath back. His foul odour brought Kirjath to his knees. His raw strength left Kirjath weak. Kirjath was glad it was dark. He didn’t want to see the horror before him, and yet he knew every aspect of the horror already, for the Great Morgloth was his master, and commanded his mind. A taloned hand gripped him by his neck, and he was lifted from the floor and set upon the creature’s back as if he weighed no more than a rat.
They crawled from the catacombs of Ravenscroft as the dawn broke the eastern sky. They took to the wing. Kirjath’s eyes smarted, and he could see nothing. He clung to the foul flesh of the Morgloth’s neck, and shivered in the shrieking wind.
* * *
Dawn was a weak affair. A red-streaked overcast sagged across the sky. Dark essence swirled about the buttresses of Stormhaven, bringing a chill which pulled warmth from the bones, worse than a winter storm. Garyll allowed the numbness to spread, but King Mellar tucked his hands under his armpits, and stamped on the battlement beside him.
They surveyed the gathered forces. Stormhaven was besieged, by only sixty figures, or so it seemed. It was difficult to count the Shadowcasters in the midst of their writhing mass of motes, a mass which spilled across all of the island between the city walls and the lake.
None of the loyal defenders had returned from the head of the Kingsbridge, where the night mists swirled still. That knowledge only made the waiting worse. Garyll just wanted it all to end.
He considered setting a foot on the edge, and leaping. That might save Stormhaven and his King. But it might not, and the horror of what might be done to Tabitha thereafter kept his feet where they were. He was the only reason she was safe. He wasn’t sure he believed that, any more.
“You are strained, Glavenor.”
“The Darkmaster has taken too much already. I fear he shall take it all.”
“Stormhaven is secure inside these high walls of stonewood. We can wait, and consider what is to be done.”
“While we are trapped in place, your Highness?”
“No man would march to the door of his enemy with such a small force if he were not supremely confident. There is some fact about this siege I have missed. I am loath to order the counter-strike until I know what it is.”
Although he fought the words, Garyll knew he had to speak them. “We should attack them now, while they are gathered before us. We have enough men for the task.”
Down behind the Gates, the rear-guard were assembled in readiness. A double line of cavalry, their chargers stamping, and snorting steam. Behind them, foot-soldiers glinted dully in their armour. Garyll had been about to command their charge, when the King had demanded this meeting, to survey the battleground, and review the tactic. Mellar could not have chosen a worse moment to question his Swordmaster’s judgement. Garyll tried to keep the rancour from his voice, but failed.
“Waiting breeds fear and weakness.”
“There is something amiss, and I will know what it is, first.”
Garyll shifted on his feet, but remained tight-lipped. Out in front of the Gates, a circle was clearing in the blackness. It became evident that the Shadowcasters were not the only ones assembled there. As the Dark drained from the road to collect in a ridge on either side, kneeling men emerged, strung in a line. Men in armour, but bound hand and foot. Swords. Near to one hundred of them, bloodied and weapon-less.
Another Sword walked stiffly into position at the end of the line of captives. Garyll knew it was not the same kind of man who readied his blade, as those who knelt before him. The Darksword pointed his blade at the sky, for a long moment. Then he brought it down, with wicked precision, on the neck of the man at his feet.
The head of the first captive fell, struck the hard-packed road, and rolled. The other men cried out, and thrashed against their restraints. The Darksword took a position at the second in line.
A great number of the Shadowcasters turned and marched away then, heading through the tide of motes toward Levin. They dis
turbed the essence like moles running a head of earth, but their figures were unmistakable. Fewer than ten Shadowcasters were left to control the kneeling captives.
“Where do you think they are going?” asked the King.
“To collect more sacrifices.”
The executioner’s blade fell, and this time, the dull thump of its prize was carried on the wind. King Mellar tensed, as if struck himself.
Garyll allowed a few moments for the words to sink in. The King paled visibly as the next victim was lined up. Garyll drove another wedge into Mellar’s vulnerability.
“They could do this with every man, woman and child in Eyri, until we surrender. There are no Swords remaining beyond the Isle, to defend the people.”
King Mellar turned his head quickly away from the scene before them. “What do you suggest?”
“We must try, your Highness. It is a short way to fight, to reach them. There shall be more men to fight their way out. We shall outnumber them nearly four to one, when we free our men. The longer we wait, the fewer there shall be.”
The sound of another head falling upon the road was unmistakable.
“And if you fail?”
“You shall be within the walls of Stormhaven. I shall see to it that the Gates are closed at the first sign of the Shadowcasters returning in force. If the men are still outside at that point, then they must fight.”
“This is a brave charge you propose, Glavenor.”
Garyll grimaced at the lie, and hoped the King took his expression as trepidation. Somewhere out beyond the rim of the battlements, a long scream was cut suddenly short. Mellar was haggard.
“Do it.”
* * *
The crank handle turned, and the ropes tensed against the strain. Two men worked the winch, another shot the bolt free. Dark essence seeped through the widening crack of the drawbridge. The Gate creaked against its hinges, and resumed its ponderous descent. The horses balked at the touch of Dark, but their riders held them firm. The foot-soldiers stood tensed and ready in the gloom.
As the rope unwound, the tension wound tighter.
“This is a dash and rescue!” shouted Garyll, over the glinting helms. “Be quick about it. Reclaim our men, and return, do not haver for a battle. We have lost too many to the Dark already.”
“Swordmaster!” challenged a Captain, “Will you not lead the charge?”
“I shall hold the Gate. Make sure you get back before the approach of the Shadowcasters, or you will find it closed.” He turned to the winch operators. “Enough! Let it go!”
The two men released the handle, and the wheels and pulleys of the mechanism rattled and spun. The mighty Gate fell through its final angle to strike the ground with a thunderous boom.
Despair swept in with the wind, and the cries of those wretches who still lived, out on the road. Only the ten Shadowcasters were visible beyond them, though the ridges of Dark essence on the roadside had swollen and come close to either side of the end of the drawbridge. The distant executioner raised his blood-stained sword again.
“Ride!” shouted Garyll.
The chargers galloped over the hard planking of the open drawbridge, and the infantry followed on their heels. The rear-guard of Stormhaven poured from the Gates, and rushed between the two arms of slick essence. One rider streaked ahead of the others, and was the first to fall upon the acting headsman. The Darksword put up a brief fight, but he was soon outnumbered. Another rider reached the first of the Shadowcasters, and swung his blade. The black robe became a swirling dirty mist, before the motes sank to join the essence at his horse’s knees. Illusions, one and all.
The real Shadowcasters were far closer, and they flowed into the Gate of Stormhaven, bringing their cover of Dark with them. Motes choked the giant archway, and poured past Garyll into the city.
The men at the winch had only enough time to cry out in alarm, before they were engulfed with Dark, and silenced. A moment later, the winch handles ran under the guidance of two Shadowcasters. The rope sprang taut, and the drawbridge climbed into the blood-red dawn. With every crank of the handle, the Gatehouse became darker.
Garyll did not move, or draw his sword. He wished for the end, more than ever. The Shadowcasters arrayed themselves around him. One figure came closest, and Garyll recognised him by the way he made his skin crawl with cold.
“The King?” wheezed the Darkmaster.
“The battlement overhead,” Garyll answered.
Cabal turned to his Shadowcasters. “Bring Mellar to the forecourt. Round up all the citizens you can, and bring them to witness. Today is the day when history will change.”
* * *
The King cried out, his voice full of rage and righteousness.
“Enough! Show yourself, let us see who dares challenge the rule of Eyri! You will be denied the crown. You will be denied!”
It never ceased to amuse Cabal how witless men became in the grip of a proper disaster. He guided the motes so that Mellar’s words were drawn away, as if by a wind. He kept himself shrouded in darkness, and cast a spell of Silence, which he laid thickly upon the people. No one but his Shadowcasters knew where he stood. He watched the shivers and nervous glances run through the crowd. They were like sheep, the citizens of Stormhaven, gathered into the forecourt with his wolves all around. The web of motes encircled them, and the approach of dawn had been reversed.
Cabal savoured every moment of the theatrics. He had waited so long for this, and now it was all before him, handed to him on a plate borne by the Swordmaster. He kept a hand on Glavenor’s shoulder, to strengthen the bond. There was one final task he had planned for the mighty man. For the moment, it would do to keep him at his side, like a faithful dog, hidden in the dark.
King Mellar turned in the centre of the forecourt, not knowing which way to face to receive the answer he expected. The coveted crown glinted on his head, even in the gloom. Cabal watched it turn.
Cabal modified his Messenger spell so that it would spread his words out wide. The voice produced was mighty, booming, vibrating, it resonated in their bones. Women clapped their hands over their ears, children cried, dogs barked.
“This is the day when history will change.”
History will change. Will change. The words echoed off the walls of the taller buildings.
“The crown shall be raised by a more powerful hand.”
More powerful hand. Powerful hand.
“This is the day when you shall witness your new king, and the Dark shall finally be complete.”
The Shadowcasters had done well to weave the motes so densely for him. Now, when he separated them to form an outline, the contrast of the light beyond was startling.
“Behold! I am your Master!”
Though the citizens shut their eyes and turned their heads away, Cabal knew that the image was burned in their minds, a figure created of the dark, outlined by light, a man, huge and terrible, standing astride the northern edge of the forecourt on legs which were each the size of tall trees. His arms spread out to embrace them all.
Then the illusion was gone, with only the sharp sting of a Despair spell in its wake. Cabal allowed the hope to drain away into the walls of Stormhaven before he spoke again. This time the words were a deafening hiss, sharpened by the whine of a sudden wind.
“You shall surrender your crown, Mellar. For every minute you hesitate, a citizen shall lose a life.”
People wailed throughout the forecourt.
“No more killing,” Glavenor whispered, but the Darkmaster knew he had not intended to speak aloud. He ignored the man and his misery.
“I deny you the crown!” shouted Mellar, a pitiful sound in the face of the booming volume which had addressed him. The King spun stupidly, talking to the wind.
Cabal sent a vortex spinning up to the ceiling of the Dark web, and spread the motes apart. Sunlight lanced down and cut a circle from the gloomy forecourt. He nudged Glavenor on, with the boy in his charge.
“There is the place o
f your surrender, where all can see,” Cabal announced. “In exchange for your crown, the life of this first sacrifice!”
Two figures moved across the flagstones and into the circle of light. The big Swordmaster held the end of a noose which was tied around the smaller figure’s neck. A youth with red hair, and a pale face, and an unmistakable bearing—his father would recognise him, no doubt. Mellar would not realise at first how much the Prince had changed during his confinement at Ravenscroft.
The King staggered visibly. He stood on the one edge of the illuminated circle; his son and the Swordmaster on the other.
Cabal kept the motes circling in a sickening gyre, all around the forecourt. He spoke from everywhere at once, all-powerful, all-mighty.
“I expect a decision within the minute. The entire realm expects your decision, Mellar. Surrender, or defiance. Life, or death. Which do you choose for your people? Which do you choose for your son?”
Mellar called out to his boy, and approached him with arms outstretched. The Swordmaster followed his briefing, by blocking the King’s passage with the point of his sword. Mellar looked even more distraught than ever. Cabal shifted closer to hear their discourse. The crowd needed no urging to back away from his aura of Dark essence.
“Your son, or your crown, which do you wish to keep?” asked Glavenor.
Mellar swayed on his feet, disbelief in his eyes. He looked from the sword at his throat, to his son, to the Swordmaster’s impassive face. His expression hardened then.
“Why? Why did you do it, Glavenor?”
The Swordmaster fretted at a buckle behind his head. He pulled the studded collar away, revealing what lay beneath. The obsidian crystal was perfectly smooth, as dark as midnight.
“It was the only way I could save what I loved.”
The two men locked eyes. The silence had little to do with the work of the motes. Cabal used the time to gather more essence to his hand, in case he needed a Despair spell to aid Mellar’s decision.
“Then I must do the same,” said Mellar, at length. He knelt, and took the crown from his head. He placed the golden Kingsrim gently on the stone before his knees. From somewhere within the spectators, a woman sobbed.
The Riddler's Gift: First Tale of the Lifesong (The Tale of the Lifesong) Page 74