Her spear took the brunt of them, and there was the sound of deathly shrieks upon the wind. A wailing gust came down and it seemed that a vaporous smoke was rising into the air, borne on the winds of Halés. A spark of lightning still clung to the tip of that spear, and it seemed that each thrust she made with it was as the thrusts of ten spearmen, skewering a dozen dark figures and forcing them to fade away. Then as the next wave drew in close she gave a yell and her companions gave her space, for she grabbed her mace and spun around, clubbing through the shadow in a frightful frenzy.
But not all the Garigút fared so well, for none could see as she could, and they flailed wildly in the darkness, some striking Spectre, some striking nothing, and others striking the heads, backs or limbs of their fellow Garigút warriors. Even those who made a head-on charge, destroying the shadow in front of them, were consumed by a new wave, which flanked them in darkness. The Molokrán bore down on all in sight, tearing them apart, devouring their will. Men and women were sucked into nothingness or thrown into the air, while some were torn limb from limb with an awful wail of agony. All who faced the Molokrán fell, except Geldirana and Galon, who battled to the bitterness of their failing strength. Then the Molokrán withdrew.
“It goes ill,” Galon said, shaking his head.
“It shall go more ill,” Geldirana called, nodding towards the open gate of Nahragor.
“They haven’t closed it yet,” Galon said. “How foolish of them.”
“They are not fools, Galon. Even if we breached their first wave of shadow, another is coming.”
There was a dim glimmer at the door of the Black Bastion. A new power had arisen. A new darkness had awoken from the Crypt of Tol-Úmari, and it travelled the haunted winds until it emerged from the Alar Kalakrán of Nahragor, sensing the power of the Alar Ardúnar set in wait for him.
“This is my battle,” Geldirana said. “My death, my doom. I have faced the evil of death with the Elixir of Life, and no Lord of Shadow shall take that from me. This is the valley of shadow and decay. This is the terrain of torture and tears. I fear no darkness; I fear no end; I fear no evil. And I cry for no one!”
But her speech was broken by a creeping thought, a crawling phantom voice. You will cry for me, it said. You will die for me.
The Lichelord came forth.
* * *
“Here is the entrance,” Geldon said.
“A wall, you mean,” Aralus corrected.
“Yes,” Geldon replied, “and a secret entrance.” He pointed up and they saw that there was a small opening several metres above their head. To the casual glance it looked little more than a groove in the rock, too small and out of reach to even use as a foothold.
“Ah,” Aralus said. “Pity we sent the Al-Ferian boy away. He was as close to the size of a mouse as any of us.”
Délin gave him a sharp look, but was consumed by worries of his own. “I was never very good at climbing, least of all in full plate armour.”
“That matters little,” Geldon said. “These vines in the wall will hold even the heaviest of us, for they grow from whatever evil magic gave life to Idor-Hol. Our scouts have tested them.”
“Were any of your scouts as heavy as Délin?” Aralus asked. “I don’t see much in the way of armour that the Garigút wear.”
“We wear enough,” Geldon responded, tapping his leather breastplate. “Now come! We have little time. Unless you wish for the Molokrán to finish with Geldirana and come after us.”
They clambered up the vines and ducked into the small enclosing, Elithéa reluctantly leaving her thalgarth outside. The inside of the hole was also covered in vines, and it took Herr’Don many long moments to break through the web.
“It’s pretty dark in here,” he called back. “I hope someone brought a torch.”
“We can use no light,” Geldon said. “It will attract the darkness.”
“And it might also get rid of the darkness in this hole,” Herr’Don said, “but fair enough, let us crawl in blindness.”
And they crawled, for the roof was low, and it turned many times without notice. Herr’Don gave a groan as he smacked his head off a wall in front of him, and ever after he held one hand aloft to feel his way.
“I’ve heard you can hear better with your mouth open,” he said after a time of wandering.
“Perhaps,” Aralus said, “but unless it helps you see better, then I don’t think it matters much here.”
“I would not leave my mouth open in this place,” Délin remarked. “Corrias only knows what foul things lurk within.”
Soon they were free of the darkness, for Herr’Don nearly fell from an opening within the Bastion itself, and this led into a small storeroom, dimly lit with a single torch in the corner. When all had clambered out from the tunnel and brushed the dust, moss, and cobwebs from their clothes, they peered into the corridor that led into the room.
“No one to be seen,” Herr’Don said.
“If our Siege was not active there would be guards everywhere,” Geldon told them. “But there may still be some, so we must be careful.”
“My idea of careful is run where we need to and run back out again as quickly as we can,” Herr’Don said. “Who needs a hunter if the prey walk right into the cage? Why guard a trap?”
“Herr’Don is right,” Délin said. “There is something evil here, something amiss.”
“Of course there is something evil here,” Geldon said. “This is the fortress of the enemy. Everything here is evil. Everything is amiss. But come, we tarry when we must hurry, for each word spoken is the death of ten of my people.”
“Only ten?” Aralus quizzed, and he smiled. “Ah, count that twenty then.”
They sneaked towards the corridor, which was dimmer than the room they were in, for there were no torches or shafts of light. But their eyes had adjusted to the darkness of the tunnel they had come from, so they could yet make out their way in the dullness ahead. Onwards they crept, stalking through the corridors, turning here and there where the passage shifted suddenly. They passed several barred doors which Délin and Herr’Don tried to open, but they would not budge, and the company considered this luck, for they did not want to know what evils were kept locked inside.
“Geldirana was shown in a dream where the Kalakrán lies,” Geldon said. “It is beneath the foundations, at the centre of the building.”
“Like all the others,” Herr’Don added.
“So we go down,” Aralus said.
“Nay, we go up,” Geldon replied, “for she saw that there was but one way to reach the chambers where the Crypt lies, and this is from the very top tower of the Bastion. We must ascend ere we plummet down, and then when we strike ruin upon it we must ascend again ere we flee down the way we came.”
“Sounds easy,” Aralus jested. “If the Molokrán don’t get us in the mean time, perhaps we’ll die of exhaustion from running up and down so many stairs.”
“I’m sure it will be nothing,” Herr’Don boasted. “Stairs never stopped me.”
“The lack of stairs might,” Geldon said, “for I know not if there are stairs to these places. Perhaps we may need rope or ladder, or worse we may need to make our way down a slope with little for hand or foot to hold.”
“Perhaps the Molokrán will give us a hand back up again,” Aralus suggested.
“Perhaps,” Geldon said, “but let us think less evilly. We may die in our attempt, but we must still forge ahead.”
“This will not be my grave,” Herr’Don said. “Even if I have to crawl back here from Halés to haul my body to a more fitting resting place.”
“You may yet,” Aralus said.
* * *
The Molokrán made a second advance on the Garigút armies. The Lichelord watched from the Gate as the shadow spread, and then he cast his eyes upon Geldirana, who cleaved and stabbed and sliced and thrust. Her vesture was as an Aelora unrobed, light flaying this way and that, striking the darkness with more force than any spear against b
ody or ram against door.
Snarling like a thousand wolves, the Lichelord shot forth, and his movement was as a tide that knows no bounds. All who stood in his way were struck down and washed away by the wall of blackness that arose before them. The shadow flayed and lashed and whipped like torn and battered cloth. It rose from the ground like smoke and it clung to it like bony claws, thin probing fingers worming through the soil. Horns grew up from the shadowed head like the arising of dark towers upon a hill of black, and the body dripped down into a vast silhouette of gloom, where no legs were visible.
Geldirana struck the wall of shadow, and she was thrown suddenly back, for the force could stay an avalanche, or set one in motion. The breath was knocked from her, and she gasped, and the impact of the earth kicked a second puff of air from her lungs. Galon ran to her and pulled her to her feet, but there was no time before the Lichelord was upon them again. Galon saw naught but a sudden blackness, as if his very eyes had been plucked from his head—and that would have been mercy, for the Lichelord seized him, and the grip of those claws was as the icy touch of death. Galon felt the blackness seep into him like water, and then it felt as though worms were burrowing through his body, eating away at him, tearing him apart from inside. And it was not mere feeling, for so it was that the Alar Molokrán stole his life, devouring him and leaving a frail shell of a body mangled on the ground below. Then the Lichelord swelled up, bulging with the fullness of his feast, like a monstrous fat spider that had sucked the juices and the jelly from its screaming prey.
Geldirana cowered, for the sight was like staring into the heart of terror itself. She saw it not with her eyes alone, for it seemed to filter into her. It was said that all who looked upon the Lichelord and his prey would be struck with an affliction of shadow, and they would rock in the deepness of the night, and they would be fey and frail and frightened, for all things would remind them of the horror they had witnessed. But such was not so for the Way-thane, for the light and life of the Ardúnari swelled within her, just as the Lichelord swelled with the light and life of Galon. She stood again, her golden hair unleashed, clattering against the wind as her dress was sent affray.
“A brave one,” the Lichelord said, and it seemed as if he were licking his lips, as if a long, black tongue were sliding out of an eternal abyss. “Know that the Shadow quells all fires, for naught but darkness can exist in the Void.” He lunged a great, long arm at her, but she ducked out of the way and hewed at it with her sword.
“Nothing can exist in the Void,” she said. “If you can reside there, then you are nothing, and I do not fear you.”
“But you shall,” he replied, and it seemed then that a cloak had been cast in her face, but in reality it was her mind that fell under the shawl of shadow. She felt as one blind, and then she felt a myriad of clawing, crawling things upon her. She dropped her sword, screaming, and she batted her body, striking naught but her own flesh, for there was naught else there.
Then she heard a voice as if from afar, and it was Oelinor’s. “Ardü,” he said, but his voice was like a gentle water that washed over her, and she felt the crawling cease, and then the blindness was dispelled, for a burst of light came from the centre of her being. Now she was aglow, beaming with a subtle light that stayed the darkness.
“I am an Ardúnar,” she cried, and she took out her mace and held it aloft. “I am a Warden of the Light, and you shall know me in the bitter moments of your sleep, for my strikes shall be as torment itself, and you will quail and quake before me!”
It seemed then that the Lichelord grimaced, as if the words she spoke were like a bad taste in the abyss of his mouth. His shadow lessened, but he did not quail or quake. “You think too highly of yourself, Warden. But think all you will, for you are not yet high enough.” He reared to his full height, which was as tall as three of the tallest people, for his normal nature was to stoop low to the earth, where he resided before he was torn from it in the moment of Molok’s cruel creation so many ages ago. It seemed then to Geldirana that she looked upon Tol-Úmari or some other tower of darkness, but she would not baulk to its might, even if death came hastening.
And it did, for soon the Lichelord was upon her again, and he threw her once more. Even as she landed he swooped in another time, and she felt the icy touch as he mauled her—and she was paralysed. The Lichelord drew his face towards her as he crouched over her body, a mountain of black, and she saw that he had no eyes, and yet she could see her own in that gloom; she could see the fear and the horror, and she could watch as the life was sucked from the very essence of her being. She struggled to avert her gaze, and the struggle was as life against the cold grip of death. She fought against the bondage of paralysis to grip again the mace that had slipped from her hand, but all was to no avail. The darkness took her.
But it was not the end, for suddenly the Lichelord’s attention was seized, as if by the hand of a more potent power. A lasting wail spread across the battlefield, and then the Shadow Host seemed to cease and fade away, like a black smoke in a heavy wind. All but the Molokrán remained, and they faced a vast Garigút army, huge even with heavy losses, and there was a sudden fear upon them, for a Telm-cry had been called, and it came from the vaults of Nahragor, where Ifferon read aloud the Scroll of Mestalarin near the Crypt of the Alar Kalakrán.
Geldirana was spared, and the Lichelord shot back across the battlefield, as did the other Molokrán, who were closer to the Keep. They ignored the Garigút, who hacked and hewed at them as they passed. The Garigút gave chase, but their speed could not match the fleeing shadow. It passed in a moment and went suddenly up the walls of the Black Bastion itself. Wisps of dark and drapes of black crawled upon the rock, dragging across the cracks and crags. Long, flayed fingers mauled the stone, their shadow seeping into the brick and mortar. The Molokrán made their way up the walls of Nahragor, like phantoms returning to a nightmare.
* * *
“Quick!” Geldon called, but they needed no encouragement, for they felt the attention of the Molokrán set upon them from afar. The company had sneaked through the empty passages of the secret ways of Nahragor, had come to its summit, and had broken the door that led to the Crypt. There they had descended a thin, frail ladder, and it seemed that they had climbed into the depths of Halés before they reached the bottom. Time was not tarried, for Ifferon immediately took the Scroll out and read aloud the words, and an earthquake struck, rupturing the foundations. The Alar Kalakrán collapsed in on itself, and the company struggled back up the ladder, hoping they would not walk into the mauling hands of the Molokrán.
When they had reached the summit again the first of the Molokrán had come to the window of the room. He crawled in and rose before them, until the specks of stars that could be seen from the window were swallowed in his mass. The company froze for a moment, but then Herr’Don pushed them; some tripped and fell, and Ifferon struck a candelabrum near the doorway. It toppled over like a tower crumbling, and its withered candle struck the Scroll that the cleric held aloft; the flame snatched the edge of the parchment, and Ifferon felt a fever in his soul as the fire spread across the page like a plague. A deathly shriek filled the air, the cry of Telm before his end, and it forced the Molokrán back towards the window, where it fell like a rag from a great height. The Scroll still burned, but there was no time for pause, no moment to douse the flames. They made for the door with a haste as if Death were behind them.
They charged down dark chambers, through long corridors, and around steep bends. Even though they could not see the shadow in pursuit, their hearts were as the battering of fists against fortress doors, and their limbs were as the feet of hurried gods. No trip or fall could slow them. No bruise or sprain could stop them. Onwards and downwards they went, until suddenly they turned another bend and saw Théos standing before them. This would have been their death, for the shock slowed their limbs and left them speechless, but fear was now an ally, and it urged them on and gave them voice.
“Théos
!” Délin cried. “Quick! Back! Run!”
The boy was as dumbfounded as they and stood confused until Délin ran up and grabbed him in his arms, never slowing in his flight. The heaving pants and heavy footfalls of the fleeing company rose to a roaring clamour, yet still they could hear the faint words that drifted from Théos’ lips.
“Nan ahí!” he called. “Nan ahí!”
Elithéa suddenly slowed, and Herr’Don turned to her, urging her for a translation with expectant eyes. “No way,” she said.
“No way?” Herr’Don quizzed, but before he or any other could ask further they made another turn, the last remaining to them, and found that they were in a large storeroom. There was no other way out but back up the passage from where they had come, back where the Molokrán were advancing. There was no way out. It was a dead end.
“Back!” Herr’Don cried, but they could not go back. Already a darkness came down behind them, and they recoiled from the entrance.
“Barricade the door!” Délin shouted. They shut the door and jammed it with wood and crate and anything they found nearby. Soon it was sealed, and they backed away and took new breath again.
“I don’t understand,” Herr’Don said. “Where did Théos come from?”
“I thought you sent him away?” Thalla said to Délin.
“He was obviously lying,” Aralus remarked. “He’d rather bring him into danger.”
“Adon took him last night,” Délin explained. “I ... He rode out many hours ago to Boror. This does not make sense!”
“There’s some evil at work here,” Herr’Don said. “It’s toying with our minds.”
“How can this be a dead end?” Aralus asked. “Théos came from here. How can it be a dead end? How did he get in? How did he even know we were here?”
Then Théos seemed to answer, and he pointed to Ifferon, saying: “Éal.”
The Children of Telm - The Complete Epic Fantasy Trilogy Page 26