Knight Errant

by Paul Barrett

  “Gerard, watch out,” the woman shouted. During the guard’s indecision, while Gerard had his back turned, Partulas had drawn a slim dagger from under his robe. It was enchanted to fly true and strike with deadly precision. Partulas launched the missile. It sped toward Gerard, aiming for the spinal cord at the base of the brain.

  Without even turning, Gerard waved his hand, touched three of his fingers together and muttered a word. The blade struck him. With a flash the magic discharged, and the dirk shattered. The handle clattered uselessly to the stone floor, followed by the slivers of metal that didn’t get snagged in Gerard’s clothing.

  Gerard slowly turned to face Partulas. Sensing his doom, Partulas chanted, hoping to teleport away before the other could stop him.

  “Silence,” Gerard said. He threw his hand forward, his thumb and seventh finger touching with the others flexed back. Partulas’s tongue went numb. He tried to continue the spell; no coherent sounds would come from his mouth. Knowing he had lost for the moment, Partulas laid his head on his bone staff.

  “There it is.” Ashron pointed to the large wooden doors. Unable to levitate like Gerard, they had to reach the throne room by walking. They were all armed from Hawk’s cache box. Trey, in addition to his knife, carried Laura’s rapier, an auto laser slung over one shoulder, and the medical kit over the other.

  Wolf pushed at the doors. They flew open, attracting the attention of everyone in the room. He stepped aside, and the others walked in. He came in last and closed the doors, throwing down the wooden bar that sealed them shut.

  Hawk took in the room’s destruction. “Bit messy, but very impressive. Wolf, disarm the guards. Trey, take the weapons and toss them into the hole.” He pointed to a door about seven meters left of the throne’s previous location. “Laura and Ashron, check that room and make sure there’re no surprises waiting for us. Gerard, you and I are going to talk to our new friend.”

  Trey handed Laura her equipment. “Are you okay?” he asked her.

  She grinned. “That’s my line,” she said as she slid on the medical kit. “You trying to take over my job?”

  He smiled back. “No, I was just worried.”

  “I’m fine,” she assured him. Looking where the throne once stood, she said, “If he hadn’t been such a bastard, he would have been a real gentleman.” She turned back at Trey. “Go help Wolf.”

  “Put down the shields and take off the weapons,” Wolf rumbled at the soldiers, waving his MGoA as Trey walked over.

  “Let’s go,” Ashron said to Laura as the soldiers stripped off their weaponry under Wolf’s gaze. Laura strapped on her weapons, and the two of them headed for the mystery door.

  Trey gathered the discarded weapons and tossed them into the hole created by Gerard’s fiery entrance.

  “Against the wall,” Wolf said. The soldiers moved to comply. “If I find any concealed weapons…” He left the threat unfinished. The glower on his sizable gray face persuaded three of the soldiers to relinquish hidden daggers.

  Gerard and Hawk stood in front of Partulas. The mage’s eyes were wide with terror. “If I free your tongue,” Gerard said, “will you try to formulate an equation?”

  Partulas bunched his eyebrows. Remembering where he was, Gerard rephrased the question. “Will you try to cast a spell?”

  The scared man shook his head vigorously; droplets of sweat flew from his forehead.

  Hawk drew his sword. Partulas backed up, holding up his hands.

  “Stand still!” Hawk commanded the man, and he stopped. “This is insurance.”

  Gerard moved his hand. “Losoda.” He looked at Partulas. “You can speak. Now, what should we do with you?”

  “I’ll tell you anything you want to know.”

  “Yes, you will,” Hawk said. “Let’s start now, and then we’ll decide on an appropriate punishment afterward.”

  “Punishment?” Partulas asked, swallowing. “For what?”

  “You severed my connection to the aether; took away my power to manipulate,” Gerard said, his voice slightly raised, a sure sign to any who knew him that he was close to seething. “You imprisoned my friends and me, and insulted me. With some manipulators I know, instant death would be your fate.

  “However,” Gerard continued as he surveyed the room, “current circumstances aside, I am opposed to wanton destruction. We will think of something appropriate.”

  Shifty-eyed desperation passed over Partulas’s face. “You cannot be my punishers,” he said brazenly. “I demand an audience before the Council of Mages in Yerefstat.”

  Despite himself, Hawk was impressed with the man. It took guts to stand amidst this destruction and demand anything from the person responsible for it.

  Impressed or not, Hawk had grown dangerously short of patience. He put his sword up to the mage’s chest, forcing him back against a column. “You’ll get what we give you, nothing more.”

  The man started trembling again.

  “We’re not going to kill you. You can thank Gerard for that, but you better answer some questions, or I’ll make sure there’s a great deal of pain.”

  Partulas licked his lips. Hawk could almost see the man’s mind working behind his beady eyes, and wondered what he could be thinking. Partulas’s face suddenly became placid, and he quit shaking. He had made a decision.

  “The consequence of revelation is death,” Partulas said in a flat voice, “So I will tell you this.”

  Before Hawk or Gerard could react, Partulas rolled his eyes upward, flicked both wrists, and muttered a word. With a slight smile on his face, he collapsed to the floor.

  Laura opened the door. Ashron slipped in, body low in case anyone decided to send knives, bullets, or any other sort of projectile his way. He scanned the area and found himself in a large kitchen. A wooden table dominated the center of the room, surrounded by cooking pits, bread ovens, and various other culinary implements. A sizable hock of raw meat sat on the table. Its fleshy odor flared his nostrils.

  One other door sat nestled between a wall rack full of pots and a stained wooden wash tub. Ashron motioned toward the door. Laura sidled next to it, gun at the ready. He joined her, avoiding the pots that hung next to him. He listened for a moment, then pointed at the door and held up two fingers. Laura nodded and signaled that it was probably the young servants. Ashron gave her a questioning stare for a moment and then nodded. He pushed open the door and eased in, gun poised.

  It was a pantry, filled with food-covered shelves. A young man and woman huddled in the farthest corner, shivering with fear. Ashron relaxed. He didn’t wholly lower his guard, but he dropped the gun to his side. The two youngsters appeared more terrified than dangerous. “Clear,” he said.

  Laura stepped in. Slinging her auto laser, she stepped closer to the pair and spoke in a soothing voice. “It’s okay. You’re safe.”

  Whimpering, the girl tried to push further away, shoving the boy out in front of her. He stood and, revealing a substantial meat cleaver he had concealed behind his back, took a resolute fighting stance.

  Laura stopped. “We’re not going to hurt you,” she said softly. “Put the weapon down.”

  The boy advanced, holding the cleaver out and waving it menacingly. Laura stepped back as Ashron walked into the pantry.

  “Nakali!” the girl screamed. The boy backed up, stark terror on his face, but he still held the weapon.

  “What does that mean?” Ashron asked softly.

  “No ideas here,” Laura whispered back. “Friends,” she said to the two, who stared at her with fear and incomprehension. “Did you download a translation program before we left Ship?”

  “Yes,” Ashron said.

  “Now might be a good time to use it.”

  “I was hoping to avoid that.” Ashron clicked a button on his belt, and the program kicked in. Words displayed in his brain, inserting themselves in his synapses. In ten seconds, he became fluent in a language it took most people years to learn. He already dreaded the headache he wa
s going to have later.

  “Nakali means demon,” he explained to Laura. He turned to the two frightened youths. “Seleé ta Nakali. Isva sa acami.” He pointed to Laura. “Isvé sa mekalic, tu acami.”

  The boy and girl looked startled for a moment. “Nê nakali?” the boy asked Ashron, sounding uncertain. He still hadn’t lowered the cleaver.

  “Nê,” Ashron said. He pointed at himself. “Isva sa Lorothian.” He once again indicated Laura. “Isvé sa Earthling.”

  “Lor...othian,” the boy said, the word finding it a tough time in his mouth.

  “I’m going to go see if they need any help out there,” Laura told Ashron. “See if you can convince them we’re friendly and get them to leave here. We might need them to help us.”

  “No problem,” Ashron said, smiling.

  “Whatever you do,” Laura said, walking out the door, “don’t smile at them.”

  19

  Frightening Revelations

  Gerard bent down to the prone magician and checked his pulse. “Damn,” he said.

  “What?” Hawk asked.

  “He committed suicide.”

  “How?”

  “He overloaded his brain with aetheric power. I’m afraid he won’t be telling us anything. Sorry I couldn’t stop him.”

  Hawk shrugged. “Not like you had any way of knowing he would do something like that. I wonder who had him so frightened he would rather die than tell us anything.”

  “What happened?” Laura asked as she came back in from the pantry.

  “He killed himself,” Gerard said.

  She turned to the unarmed soldiers “Are any of you hurt?”

  They stared at her in incomprehension, then the commander turned to his men. They held a quick, whispered discussion. He turned back to Laura.

  “We…” he paused, obviously not as fluent in Standard as the better-educated nobles.

  Still, she mused, considering the restrictions on the planet, none of them should even know the language.

  “We…okay. What…do with us?”

  “That’s a good question,” Laura said. “What are we going to do with them?” she asked Hawk.

  “That depends on them.”

  Ashron returned from the kitchen, followed by the two young servants. As everyone turned toward them, Ashron said, “This is Kalae and his sister Kerlai, and I think they may be able to help us. They’ve seen some strange things in the past couple of weeks, in addition to the usual oddities like guns and hovercraft. They’ve been telling me about mysterious objects being carried into an ‘unholy place’ behind the castle, followed by people being carried into the dungeons, followed by loud screams at night, followed by objects wrapped in sheets being brought back out. I don’t know about you, but my interest is certainly piqued.”

  “Sounds like what we came here to find out,” Hawk said. He eyed the soldiers. “If we let you go, will you try to attack us or will you leave us be?”

  The soldiers stared at Hawk, while the captain’s yellow face grimaced as he struggled with the words.

  “Allow me,” Ashron said. “Might as well get the most out of this before it leaves my brain.”

  He spoke to the captain, who responded with his own words and a shake of his head. Kalae joined the conversation, pointing at Ashron and the others. The captain appeared unconvinced; Kalae and Ashron persisted. Eventually, the captain nodded to Hawk.

  Ashron translated. “He said they’ll remain in the castle and not hinder us. Kalae convinced him we were here to destroy the ‘unholy place’ and stop the destruction and chase away the demons. That seemed to do the trick.”

  “Demons?” Gerard asked. “Is that figurative or literal?”

  Ashron stared at Gerard. “Try again in words I understand, please.”

  “Are they saying demon because of the strangeness and the killing, or have they seen creatures they would consider demons?”

  Ashron looked at Kalae and the captain. “Avtu vivû nakali?”

  The captain shook his head, and Kalae said, “Nê. Balo stalos casol tánakali.”

  “They haven’t seen the demons,” Ashron said, “but Kalae says only demons could make they screams they’ve heard..”

  Gerard relaxed. “As long as they haven’t seen one.”

  “What does it mean if they have?” Laura asked. To her surprise, Trey answered.

  “It means the technology here has created a hole to ripspace and the creatures there have come here.” Trey shivered.

  “That’s right,” Gerard said. “And that would not be good. We may be in time to stop this from getting any worse if we can go to this ‘unholy place’ and destroy any technology in there.”

  “Then let’s get a move on,” Hawk said. “I guess it would be too much to hope the guards would want to help us, so tell them they’re dismissed and thank them for being so cooperative.”

  Ashron translated. The captain gave an open-handed salute and the men, in orderly fashion, opened the throne room door and departed.

  “Okay, Ashron, take point. I’ve got your back. The two locals can stick with me and give you directions. Gerard, Laura, and Trey take middle ground. Wolf, you’ve got rear guard. Let’s go.”

  Ashron translated instructions to Kalae and his sister as the others took up their positions. They left the throne room and, following Kalae’s directions, marched toward the courtyard. Unconcerned about attacks from the surviving guards, they made good time and soon stopped at the edge of the courtyard. Ashron and the servants held a quick conference, Kalae pointing as he talked.

  When they finished, Ashron turned to the rest of the crew. “We have a choice. We can go out the front or the back. The back is closer to the building, and there’s a wall that can provide some cover, so I suggest we go that way.”

  “They have a back door?” Hawk asked.

  Ashron shrugged. “So they aren’t big on defense.”

  “With the force field they have around the wall, they didn’t have to worry,” Gerard said. “If they hadn’t wanted us in here, it would have taken me days to breach the defense.”

  “What about getting out?” Hawk asked.

  Gerard shook his head. “Shouldn’t be a problem. All the energy is directed outward. Once we leave, we won’t be coming back in.”

  “That’s fine; I wasn’t planning on spending the night anyway.” Hawk turned to Ashron. “Tell them we’ll take the back door.”

  “Rada tu akess,” Ashron told Kalae. Nodding, the boy pointed across the courtyard. They started marching again, crossing the yard and entering another doorway. A trek down a hallway put them at the keep’s rear wall, where they found a wooden door.

  Ashron cautiously opened the door and peered out.

  “Tesvê sa urhöla,” Kalae said, hovering over Ashron’s shoulder. He pointed to a structure that had been set up in a large field of purple vines. Ashron nodded. Though the building didn’t appear particularly “unholy” as Kalae put it, it didn’t belong on this planet.

  “Single story structure about twenty-five meters away,” Ashron reported to the others. “Two guards, two heavy laser emplacements. There’s a stone wall five meters away, surrounding the field. If we stay low and quiet, we can reach it without being spotted.”

  The castle wall exploded two meters from Ashron’s head, grey stone showering outward. Ashron ducked back into the hallway as Kerlai screamed.

  “I think we’ve been spotted,” Ashron shouted above the ringing in his ears.

  “Move,” Hawk said. “Low and fast.”

  Ashron dashed out the door, dropping into a crouch. He felt the searing heat of the laser fly over him as another section of the castle wall disintegrated. Flecks of stone dust peppered his back as he raised his Sub LazGun and fired, crab-walking until he reached the low stone wall.

  Wolf came next, mini-gun in hand, and laid down suppressing fire as Hawk ran to the wall and dropped behind it. A blast chewed up the ground in front of Wolf; he flung his large body sidewa
ys.

  Hawk peered through a low spot in the wall and spotted one of the guards standing behind the large laser panel. He prepared to rise and fire when the guard slumped and fell to the ground. A quick peek toward the other laser revealed the guard there doing the same thing.

  “Gerard,” Hawk called back over his shoulder, “was that you?”

  “Yes,” Gerard said from inside the castle.

  Hawk stood and turned to Gerard and Laura, who waited at the doorway of the keep wall. “Stay put. We’ll reconnoiter the building and call you when it’s clean. If we need help, we’ll scream.”

  “Roger,” Gerard said.

  Nodding, Hawk turned back to Ashron and Wolf. “Everyone okay?”

  Ashron reached around and poked himself in the back, “Medium rare, I think, but otherwise good.”

  “Wolf?”

  Wolf nodded, brushing out clumps of dirt stuck in his black hair.

  “Move out,” Hawk said.

  They stepped over the wall and made a cautious approach toward the structure. They scanned the surrounding field, focusing most of their attention on the building’s single doorway.

  “Smart,” Hawk said when they reached the building.

  “What’s smart?” Ashron asked, also looking at the building. “I know you’re not talking about the baby-puke-green paint.”

  “That’s not paint, that’s part of the building,” Hawk said. “It’s a pre-fab organotech lab. The whole building is suspended microorganisms. Activate them, and they consume themselves and anything inside the building within hours. No trace, no evidence, no crime. Moran and UCT have certainly covered their bases.”

  “You’re convinced it’s them?” Wolf asked as Ashron moved to disarm the unconscious guards.

  “I’ve been convinced since day one,” Hawk said. “I’m just searching for the smoking gun.”

  “Well,” Ashron said, standing by one of the large laser cannons. “That explains why they couldn’t hit us. These are just excavation lasers. Lots of power, no accuracy. You realize everybody inside is probably aware something happened out here, right?”