Grim Company 02 - Sword Of The North

by Luke Scull

  The sinister glow that shone through Thanates’ rag flared dangerously. ‘You told me you were familiar with those ruins,’ he hissed. Despite the fact he had Magebane tucked safely at his belt, Cole couldn’t help but shrink back in the face of the wizard’s ire.

  ‘The pale women escorted me there! They used some kind of device to conceal the path from me. All I remember are shadows and mist, and children crying.’

  ‘I can show you,’ piped up a small voice.

  Cole and Thanates turned. Gazing up at them with his watery eyes was Derkin. ‘Ma and I spent years living in the ruins,’ he added. ‘I’ll guide you there.’

  The western section of the ruins of Sanctuary was much the same as the other parts Cole remembered. Ancient walls constructed of sandstone and other weak materials had begun to collapse long ago, resulting in leaning buildings that were supported only by the weight of their neighbours. Rubble and rotting timber covered the abandoned streets. The storm had penetrated even here; water rained down from hundreds of feet above, percolating through cracks in the artificial foundations that separated the City of Towers from the corpse of the dead city beneath. There was little in the way of natural light, but the torch Derkin carried provided sufficient illumination for the three of them to navigate the ruins. Derkin’s ma waited back at the docks, still too weak from her recent brush with death to risk venturing down into the undercity.

  ‘The White Lady was once the high priestess of the Mother,’ Thanates said as they made their way deeper into the skeleton of the holy city. ‘Politically and magically she was perhaps the most significant figure of our time. That much I learned from my research in Dorminia.’

  For a second Cole thought he glimpsed something moving just beyond the edges of the light. He stared at the darkness but saw nothing. He decided it was probably just his imagination. ‘There’s something I’ve been wondering about,’ he said. ‘Does the White Lady have a name? She can’t have always been the White Lady. She must have had a real name at one time.’

  Thanates shook his head. ‘If she did no one remembers it, least of all me. Until recently I could not even recall my own.’

  Cole’s eyebrows rose in surprise. ‘You couldn’t remember your own name?’

  ‘For close to five hundred years I lived as a crow, my consciousness lost in the mind of my familiar. I came to the Grey City searching for clues as to my true identity.’

  ‘What did you discover?’

  ‘My real name, among other things. With the help of another I began to piece together my fractured mind. My memories are still incomplete. I trust I will find the answers I seek in the Hall of Annals.’

  ‘The person that helped you rediscover yourself. What was his name?’

  ‘Isaac.’

  Cole stopped dead. ‘I knew an Isaac!’ he exclaimed. ‘He was about my age, maybe a little older. He was…’ Cole paused. He couldn’t remember what Isaac had looked like. All he recalled was a face of devastating blandness. Absolutely nothing about the Halfmage’s manservant had stuck in his mind, other than the fact he had seemed intent on ingratiating himself with the old barbarian Kayne and the rest of the group of rebels. ‘I don’t remember,’ he admitted, feeling stupid.

  Thanates cocked his head in that peculiar manner of his. ‘You cannot describe his appearance either? Strange. This Isaac was an enigma. In return for his help he had me perform various favours that made little sense at the time. I now believe he was planning something. Preparing a strategy. He was brilliant, a man of endless talents.’

  ‘I thought he was an ass,’ Cole mumbled. Something occurred to him then. ‘Why did you save me? When you found me dying, I mean.’

  ‘I believed I could use you.’

  ‘Use me?’ Cole said warily. He had an unpleasant feeling he knew where this was heading.

  ‘You killed Salazar. You toppled a Magelord. As such, you are a beacon of hope that I will light when the time is right. And you have strange powers of your own. You are a potent tool, child.’

  ‘I’m not a tool!’ Cole snapped back. ‘And I’m not a child. I’m sick of people trying to control me. Trying to use me. It’s almost got me killed on countless occasions. I just want to be left alone.’

  There was a hint of amusement in the wizard’s voice. ‘For a boy who wants to be left alone you have an uncanny knack of finding yourself at the heart of events.’

  ‘Not any more. After this is over, I’m settling for the quiet life.’

  ‘You carry a god’s essence within you, Davarus Cole. The quiet life is no longer yours to choose.’

  An uncomfortable silence followed. Cole looked down at his hands. They were beginning to lose their colour again, the vitality he had stolen from Corvac fading away. What was it Thanates had said to him?

  Death itself resides in you. Feed it and you will grow stronger. Resist… and it will feed on you.

  He shook his head angrily. He was determined not to feed anything. He would refuse to become a killer like the Reaver’s essence seemed to want him to be. He hadn’t asked for this.

  Suddenly, Derkin gasped and raised his torch as high as his stunted arms would allow him. ‘The Abandoned are coming,’ he whispered.

  Cole glimpsed dark shapes at the edges of the torchlight. He concentrated and thought he could hear heartbeats. Dozens of them, faint and highly irregular. ‘The Abandoned?’ he whispered.

  ‘They rarely venture into this part of the ruins,’ Derkin explained. ‘Something must have drawn them here.’

  Cole placed a hand on Magebane’s jewelled hilt. ‘Are they dangerous?’

  ‘They feed on waste from the city above and normally avoid people. But they can be dangerous if they haven’t fed in a while.’

  The misshapen figures inched nearer, drawn to the three intruders like moths to a flame, though they seemed reluctant to step inside the circle of light. Cole became aware of a faint rasping sound, like a dying man gasping for breath. A tense moment passed. Then the first of the Abandoned stepped into view.

  Cole recoiled in horror. The thing that emerged from the shadows was the size of a large child. It was entirely naked, its pale flesh so thin that it was nearly translucent, revealing the dark shape of vital organs beneath. Oversized eyes the colour of soured milk stared from a face the features of which were poorly defined, as if the creature were somehow incomplete. Every breath seemed a tortured rattle in its underdeveloped lungs.

  The Abandoned raised a hand, its webbed fingers reaching towards Cole, who drew Magebane and held it protectively before him. ‘Back!’ he shouted. ‘I don’t want to hurt you.’ Surprisingly, he found that he meant it. Something about this apparition brought to mind a lost child. A twisted mockery of a child, but a child nonetheless.

  The horror inched closer. It opened its mouth, a simple hole in its face that contained no teeth, only a tongue that flopped out, drooling thick white mucus. In a broken voice it rasped a single word.

  ‘FaaAAAther…?’

  A moment later there was a blinding flash. Cole reeled away, clutching his face. When his vision cleared, he turned back to see the creature smouldering on the ground, one smoking arm extended in the act of reaching for Cole before it died. The rest of the Abandoned were nowhere to be seen.

  ‘They’ve fled,’ Thanates said. ‘At least for the moment. I fear not these wretches, but I can ill afford to expend my magic chasing them off.’

  Cole was still staring at the corpse. Something was troubling him ‘Did… did that thing call me father?’

  The wizard shrugged. ‘There are many mysteries in this city yet to be solved. Perhaps the godly essence you carry within you is in some way related to these creatures.’

  Cole couldn’t help but sigh at that. ‘Great,’ he muttered.

  ‘Don’t let it concern you now. We must hurry to the Hall of Annals.’

  ‘It’s just ahead,’ Derkin said. He hesitated a moment. ‘The Hall is forbidden. The White Lady’s handmaidens hunt down anyone that dar
es go near it. A whole community of us disappeared three years ago after someone trespassed there.’

  ‘Then my instincts prove sound,’ Thanates replied grimly. ‘If there still exists a place where the truth of what happened to Sanctuary all those centuries ago might be found, it is the Hall of Annals. The White Lady wanted to erase history… and yet I suspect she could not bring herself to destroy everything. A tiny part of her clings to the memory of that which she once cherished. In this she is not unlike other women.’

  ‘How do you know that?’ Cole asked.

  When Thanates eventually answered, Cole thought he heard something like uncertainty in the wizard’s voice. ‘The White Lady and I once were lovers. This I remember.’

  The shelves stretched out as far as he could see, disappearing into the darkness at the far reaches of the cavernous chamber. Cole stared at the towering bookcases in wonder as Thanates led him and Derkin deeper into the Hall of Annals. They had found the great doors unlocked, but the thick carpet of dust coating the floor suggested no one had seen the inside of the great domed building for many years. In contrast to the rest of the crumbling ruins, the Hall of Annals was in a near perfect state of repair.

  ‘A holding spell,’ Thanates announced, sniffing the dry air. ‘The walls of this place are kept in perpetual stasis by the White Lady’s magic. They will not falter until she does.’

  ‘Stasis?’ Cole repeated. ‘Salazar had something he called a Stasiseum in the Obelisk. There was a giant egg suspended over a fire frozen in time. And a big green savage imprisoned behind glass. He was unmoving, like a statue. But he looked real enough.’

  ‘I dare say he was real,’ Thanates replied. ‘I wonder what became of this creature. Orcs once ruled the north. I had believed them long extinct.’

  ‘Orcs? I thought they lived in the Frozen Sea beyond the High Fangs. They’re a kind of whale. I read about them in a book once.’

  The way the wizard’s jaw clenched angrily made him shrink back slightly. ‘You are confusing two different words,’ Thanates growled. ‘Don’t test my patience.’

  Cole stared down at the floor glumly. Then he remembered Corvac had made similar mistakes and a shiver passed through him.

  Surely it’s just a coincidence, he thought, I got confused, that’s all.

  They continued down the long aisles between shelves. Glow-globes in the gently arched ceiling high above provided a soft light. At first Cole had been afraid they were the same as the glow-globes in Newharvest, produced from the tainted magic of the Blight. Thanates had stated that was not the case and the globes had in fact been created centuries ago, much to Cole’s relief. The blind mage hardly needed further provocation to stir the flames of his hatred. It was visible with every flicker of black fire across his body, every crunch of his teeth grinding together. He was a man skirting the edge of a precipice, liable to lose himself to sudden and terrible rage at any moment.

  Cole slowed his pace to walk alongside Derkin, who was struggling to keep up. ‘This place is huge,’ Cole observed. ‘I thought there were a lot of books in the Obelisk’s library, but there must be ten times as many here. A hundred maybe.’

  ‘It is the largest known collection of books in the world,’ said Thanates. ‘Even the imperial library of the Wizard-Emperor cannot compare. According to Isaac, the dwarves of Mal-Torrad once had a collection to rival it – but it went up in flames during their civil war. Isaac’s knowledge of history was astoundingly complete, in stark contrast to your ignorance.’

  Cole frowned and kicked up a cloud of dust. Gods, he hated that bastard Isaac. Derkin began to cough and he immediately regretted his act of petulance. He leaned over and slapped his friend on the back as Derkin choked on the dust he’d just thrown up. ‘Sorry,’ he said meekly once the little man had recovered.

  ‘It’s fine,’ Derkin replied, blinking his mismatched eyes. ‘I got used to it when I lived down in the undercity.’

  Thanates stopped suddenly, and Cole had to grab hold of Derkin to stop his friend blundering into the back of the wizard. ‘Here. This is what I am searching for.’

  The row of books beside them looked much the same as any other. ‘How can you be certain?’ Cole dared ask.

  ‘Watch.’ Thanates reached towards the shelf before him. Silver sparks immediately crackled into life around his gloved hand and he flinched away, smoke steaming from his scorched fingers. ‘The White Lady warded these tomes for a reason. I could dispel her magic and remove the wards, but it is hardly necessary. Not when I have you.’

  ‘Me?’ Cole replied uncertainly.

  ‘Unsheathe your dagger. Place the point against the bookshelf.’

  Cole did as he was asked, bringing Magebane hesitantly forward until the tip was almost touching the spot where Thanates had activated the ward. At any moment Cole expected silver sparks to burst into life and fling back him backwards. Instead, all that happened was that the hilt in his palm grew warmer as Magebane absorbed the magic. Just as it had the night he’d assassinated Salazar.

  ‘As I said,’ Thanates remarked ‘a powerful tool.’ It wasn’t clear if the wizard was talking about Magebane or Cole. ‘That should suffice. Now put that weapon away. If it should happen to touch my flesh while you are holding it, the consequences would be disastrous.’

  Cole sheathed his dagger and moved out of the way. Thanates ran his hands along the spines of the ancient tomes for a moment and then pulled out a large green volume. ‘This one,’ he said. ‘What does it say?’

  Cole peered at the spine. ‘The Dalashran.’

  ‘Open it.’

  Cole suppressed a sigh and thumbed the book open at random. ‘It’s a history of some place called Dalashra,’ he said. ‘It doesn’t look very interesting. Wait, what’s this? There are some illustrations.’

  ‘What do they depict?’

  ‘Men. Kings seated upon their thrones.’ Cole squinted. ‘This… this one looks like you. He’s younger and well, he doesn’t look blind, but… Yes. It is you.’

  Thanates nodded and turned to Derkin. ‘Can you read?’

  ‘Yes,’ Derkin said proudly. ‘My ma taught me how. We only ever owned three books but I read them cover to cover more times than I can count.’

  ‘I want you both to pull out every book on this shelf. Find anything that relates to Dalashra or the White Lady’s personal life. Anything that documents events in and around Thelassa in the time leading up to the Godswar. I want to know who I was. I want to know why she did this to me. Why she stole my memories and extinguished all hope from the world.’

  ‘There are a lot of books here,’ Cole said doubtfully.

  ‘Then you had best get a move on,’ the wizard replied.

  Angels and Demons

  She squinted through the rain and the tears that blurred her vision. The palace was just ahead.

  Screams and shouts tore through the city as she walked unsteadily down the broad avenue in which the Seeding Festival had taken place months earlier. Soldiers streamed past, the cloaks they wore as white as the wet powder smeared over her nose. No one made to stop her. If they tried, she would kill them. She had killed before, on the battlefield outside Dorminia’s gates. Put a sword right through a man’s face. The image had kept her awake sometimes. It wouldn’t any longer. There were worse fates than an honest death to cause her sleepless nights now.

  In her mind she saw the nightmarish visage of the woman in the tank, her mouth yawning open, tortured scream swallowed up by the putrid blood surrounding her body. She saw again the tiny body of an unborn child scraping against the glass. She wondered if the woman tied to the chair in Fergus’s laboratory might have been its mother.

  Sasha thought she heard the cruel snip of scissors then and looked around wildly – but no, it was just the clank of a Whitecloak’s sword as he hurried by.

  One face above all was fixed in her mind. It was achingly beautiful, with bewitching violet eyes and perfect skin, and she wanted to smash it apart, shatter the lie it told
, tear away that outrageous façade of benevolence and expose the ugly truth for the world to see.

  The White Lady’s servants would stop her before she reached the Magelord, she knew. Maybe her own sister would be the one to do it.

  Sasha didn’t care. Ambryl was a monster too. There was no point lying to herself any more. There’d been enough lies. This entire city was built on lies.

  Somehow she reached the stairs leading up to the palace gates. There were no guards on duty; whatever chaos was unfolding elsewhere in the city had drawn them away. She pushed open the gates and strode through the entrance hallway, ignoring the rainwater that dripped from her soaked clothes, the muddy footprints her boots left on the lustrous marble floor. She wanted to smear the whole palace in filth. Everything was so damned clean in Thelassa, so pristine. It sickened her. She had never imagined she would miss Dorminia, but at least there was no pretence in the city of her home. No demons wearing the faces of angels.

  Her nose burned. She wiped it with the back of her hand, glanced at it and saw that it was smeared with blood. She’d snorted the entire bag of hashka back in the alley. Inhaled it right there in the rain, desperate to take the edge off the horror. The silver powder had chased her terror away… but now that the fear was gone, only anger remained.

  She approached the pair of gilded doors that she knew must lead to the throne room. There was a guard standing before them, one of the White Lady’s handmaidens.

  One of the Unborn.

  The pale woman moved to intercept her, but Sasha didn’t slow. She wasn’t afraid of these creatures any more.

  ‘You are not permitted to be here,’ the Unborn stated in her emotionless voice. The woman’s colourless gaze met her own. That gaze that had once filled her with dread now brought only pity.

  Sasha didn’t hesitate. She stepped forward and embraced the White Lady’s handmaiden. ‘I’m sorry,’ she whispered. ‘I’m so sorry for what they did to you.’

  The Unborn seemed to flinch. It could have flung her away as if she were a leaf blown in by the wind. Could have broken her in half like a stray twig. But it merely stood there unmoving as Sasha pulled the gleaming dagger she’d stolen off Ambryl from her belt and drove it through the back of its skull. She gave the hilt a twist, heard bone crack. Black blood ran over her hands. The sudden stench of rot and decay and death filled her burned nostrils, but she ignored it, resisting the urge to drop the body and reel away gagging. Instead she lowered the shuddering creature to the floor as if it were a child.