Song of the Risen God

by R. A. Salvatore

  The words caught in Talmadge’s throat as the humanoid came more clearly into view—a human, a dead human, covered in the dripping yellowish mud of the bog, rotting and filthy, shambling awkwardly with one arm swaying limply at its side.

  Talmadge gasped repeatedly, trying to hold to his sensibilities. He had faced goblins, giant bears, the bright-faced sidhe invaders, the Usgar, even the demon fossa. But this … this was a dead man, a dead man walking, a zombie coming for him. He wanted to run, but his legs would not hear the silent screams in his mind!

  Closer it came, its one working arm reaching out for him. To the side came another.

  Talmadge screamed, finally, and spun, and stabbed his own forehead onto the tip of a sword, angled down from above, held by a person half his size, though he doubted not at all that this creature could put the fine edge of the weapon right through his skull.

  He froze and held his hands out and up unthreateningly.

  “Aydrian Wyndon sent me,” he said, and then again.

  “You do not belong here,” came a melodic response. Talmadge managed to lift his gaze to more fully see the creature, who was of course a Doc’alfar, an elf, he supposed.

  It was a girl—no, a woman, he realized, reminding himself not to be confused by the diminutive size. Her skin was pale, so very pale, her hair raven black, her eyes the lightest blue, her entire appearance a study in contrast that lent itself to an undeniable and exotic beauty.

  A sting in Talmadge’s back told him that she was not alone, and a third sword, slender and fine, came in at his side, resting just above his hip. He managed a glance that way to see a second elf, a male, with dark hair and dark eyes and that same pale skin and undeniable beauty.

  “I came to warn you,” Talmadge managed to stutter with some conviction, though it was only a half-truth. “Enemies are about, bright-faced, red and blue…”

  “No one is about that we do not see,” the elf woman assured him.

  “The sidhe,” Talmadge started to explain.

  “Xoconai,” the elf corrected, and Talmadge’s eyes went wide.

  “Then you know.”

  “The memories of the Tylwyn Doc are long,” she said.

  “They are coming,” Talmadge said. “A great army.”

  She nodded. “They will not find us. They have no business with us.”

  “But—” he started to reply, but was cut short.

  “You have no business with us,” she said, and poked her fine sword a wee bit harder for emphasis.

  “Please,” Talmadge begged, closing his eyes. “I am with friends. We must get through the mountains to warn—”

  “You do not belong here.”

  “My friend is from To-gai…”

  “Do not return,” the elf warned.

  Talmadge looked up at her and, to his surprise, she smiled, then blew him a kiss and waggled the fingers of her free hand.

  A wet ball of mud splattered into the man’s face, a heavy blow that had him staggering back a step—and for a terrifying moment, he feared that he would impale himself on that second sword.

  But he felt nothing behind, just the wet mud caked on his face.

  He felt a sting, then a second, and suddenly a dozen more, as if the bog mud itself was alive and trying to eat him!

  Desperately, Talmadge flailed and slapped at his face, trying to clear it. Through blurry eyes, he looked at a patch of peat in his hand, to see small white worms wriggling there, one crawling across the flesh below his thumb, then biting him.

  He slapped it away, he slapped them all away, and he ran, stumbling.

  Zombies moved at his sides, zombies followed behind, so Talmadge put his head down and ran for all his life.

  * * *

  “There!” Bahdlahn said. He grabbed Catriona by the arm and tugged her down with him as he fell behind a large stone.

  Catriona managed to extract herself enough to kneel, that she could peer over the rock. “Khotai,” she whispered. “Oh!”

  Bahdlahn came up beside her, nodding. In the distance leaped Khotai, the woman crossing large tumbles of stones with a single, magically enhanced bound. The people chasing her, their blue-and-red-striped faces visible even from this distance, could not pace her, but they had spears and sent them flying from their atlatl throwing sticks.

  Khotai descended behind a rocky ridge—these foothills of the Belt-and-Buckle seemed nothing more than one rocky ridge after another—but right behind her came a line of spears.

  Catriona gasped and started over the stone, but Bahdlahn grabbed her and held her back. At least a dozen of the enemies were coming fast up the slopes, and they were well armed and armored, with several riding those huge and terrible lizards.

  “We have to…” the fiery Catriona said, ever the warrior.

  Her desire to help, to almost certainly go to her death for this woman she had only known for a few weeks, touched Bahdlahn profoundly, but it was not enough to make him ignore the reality of the situation, or their responsibility to those back in the camp down to the northeast.

  “What of the others, many of them your people, if we get killed out here, too, and so they are given no warning?” he asked.

  Catriona growled a bit under her breath, but clearly had no answer.

  “We can’no,” Bahdlahn told her. He thought back to that day he had witnessed the execution of his mother at Craos’a’diad, when the Usgar named Aghmor had held him back. How he had wanted to leap over the rocks and run down at the gathered Usgar, to send as many as he could into that deep pit behind his beloved Innevah!

  But if Bahdlahn had gone over those rocks, if Aghmor had allowed that, then Bahdlahn would surely be dead. He wouldn’t have known love with Aoleyn. He wouldn’t have tasted freedom.

  “We can’no,” he said again to Catriona, with more conviction and a tightening grip. “We’ve got to get back to the camp at once and hope we’re in time.”

  “The mountains crawl with the bright-faced bastards,” Catriona agreed.

  Bahdlahn couldn’t disagree, at least among the foothills. It appeared that the xoconai were flanking the towns like Appleby-in-Wilderland here under the cover of the Belt-and-Buckle’s many ravines and shadows.

  The young man and Catriona picked their way carefully down the slope, hiding and sprinting. They breathed a bit easier when they came in sight of the encampment, a collection of bedrolls and lean-tos set up in a small copse of trees, but that relief was short-lived as they neared, for there were forms moving about the shadows of the camp. They at first thought them some of their fellow dozen refugees who had come south with them, but no, they now realized.

  Their companions were lying on the ground, or kneeling, bound, and facing the spears and macana of the enemy.

  The two moved behind another ridge, lying on the back side, peering over.

  “What can we do?” Catriona whispered, and Bahdlahn could only shake his head helplessly. Several enemies moved about the camp, and off in the distance, Bahdlahn spotted another group of them, riding those lizards hard to the north. He held his breath when he saw the reason: a pair of fleeing refugees.

  He closed his eyes when he saw the riding warriors lift their spears.

  Catriona hugged him close, burying her face in his shoulder.

  * * *

  Khotai closed her eyes, throwing all of her concentration into her belt as she noted the lines of spears coming down at her. She pictured them in her mind and threw the magic of the belt at them, the magic of the malachite and the moonstone, anything, for she hadn’t the time to dodge.

  She opened her eyes and swung her bow back and forth before her, swatting away the spears, which seemed now to be floating more than flying, slowing quickly against the moonstone wind emanating from the woman.

  She got hit more than once, but there was no weight to the strikes. She did bleed a bit, though, and she quickly spread the red liquid to amplify its appearance, then lay back with a spear sticking up as if impaling her, though in truth K
hotai was simply holding it under her arm, pressing it tightly against the side of her chest.

  She kept her eyes closed as she heard the approaching footsteps. She heard the xoconai speak, to be answered by a second, who sounded as if it were back up by the top of the bowl.

  Khotai held her nerve and sorted her path, both in terms of her movements here and where she would next try to run.

  The warrior grabbed the spear shaft.

  Khotai called upon her belt with all her strength and pushed off with her leg and arm, rising suddenly, weirdly, unexpectedly into the air. She opened her eyes to see the surprised face of the enemy soldier. She brought her other hand across, brought her knife across, to take the xoconai’s throat before it could cry out.

  She shoved the dying thing down and to the side, the push sending the woman floating back the other way, as she had planned. For she turned as she drifted, lifting her bow, setting an arrow.

  The warrior up on the lip saw her and threw its spear, shouting out in surprise.

  But Khotai kept moving and the spear missed.

  The hours and hours of practice with Aydrian all came to fruition in that one moment, when Khotai’s arrow flew true, stabbing the spear thrower right in the forehead, his head snapping back as he fell backwards to the ground.

  Khotai leaped away to the north and west, pushing with all her might, calling upon her magical belt with all her magical strength. The other xoconai cried out and took up the chase quickly as the woman bounded away.

  But now Khotai knew where she might go, and soon enough she came to the banks of a small pond fed by a waterfall and feeding another waterfall.

  She had to trust in Aoleyn. She went to her belt again, this time focusing on the third song she heard there, one from an orange stretch of crystal within the leather wraps. She leaped out onto the pond, touched down lightly but securely, and ran across the water.

  She heard the protests from the pursuers as they came up behind her, heard the splash of spears landing behind her, and spun about in her next leap.

  She saw three of them, on lizards. They entered the water and swam at her, but they couldn’t pace her, and she made the far bank well ahead of them.

  Up she went, scaling the cliff beside the waterfall with the help of her belt. When she came to the top, she looked at a long and majestic view before her to the south, with many more mountains to cross to be sure, but with her beloved To-gai beyond them.

  Khotai glanced back to the east, to the north. Talmadge was there, along with the others, unless they had already been killed.

  But the way to To-gai was south.

  She had no time to consider the choice, for she knew that those lizards with their sticky footpads could easily bring their riders up the cliff.

  With a heavy sigh, Khotai took a giant stride.

  * * *

  Bahdlahn nearly jumped out of his shoes when a hand slapped on his shoulder. He spun to strike but found a filthy Talmadge there beside him, the man tapping a dirty finger emphatically against his pursed lips, begging the other to remain quiet.

  Bahdlahn leaned back and scrunched up his face as he considered his friend, for poor Talmadge’s face was covered in red welts like bee stings and he was as disheveled as if he had face-dived into a mud puddle.

  “What happened to you?” Catriona whispered, moving to Bahdlahn’s side.

  “Doesn’t matter,” the man said. He nodded toward the captured encampment. “All?”

  Bahdlahn held up his hands and half nodded, half shrugged.

  “Khotai?” Talmadge asked desperately.

  “She is out,” Catriona answered, and Bahdlahn didn’t miss the halting manner of her deceptive reply.

  “We know not where,” the young man played along, and it was true enough, but still he had to work hard to keep his voice steady. “The enemies are in the foothills, thick about. We cannot cross.”

  “Did you find the tunnel?” Catriona asked.

  “No,” Talmadge answered. “There is no way to be found. We cannot go near the lands Aydrian told to me. We are not welcome.”

  “We have to try,” said Catriona.

  “We cannot,” he answered. When the woman seemed less than convinced, he added, “There are worse things than death, and I think I’ve just seen one of them.”

  Bahdlahn and Catriona exchanged a look.

  “We have to get back to Appleby and warn them,” Talmadge said. He moved to the rock and peered over, Bahdlahn moving right beside him.

  “We can’no fight them,” Bahdlahn told him.

  “When it gets dark, we run,” Talmadge said.

  Catriona nodded her agreement.

  “But what of Khotai, then?” Talmadge suddenly added, and Bahdlahn saw the man’s grimace and felt his pain.

  “Trust in her,” he told Talmadge.

  “I left her once before,” Talmadge whispered. “I cannot again.”

  “We saw her,” Catriona admitted.

  Talmadge glanced from the woman to Bahdlahn, who looked back at Catriona and nodded.

  “They were pursuing her,” Catriona went on. “She ran down over a ridge, chased by spear throwers on their lizards. We could’no get near her. She is caught or she is dead, I fear.”

  “Then we have to find her,” said Talmadge.

  “But what of them, then?” Bahdlahn asked, pointing over the stone toward the distant camp and the other refugees.

  “We cannot help them.”

  “We can’no help her,” Bahdlahn retorted. “Your love for her doesn’t change that. She is dead or she is not. She is caught or she is not, and if she is not, then Khotai can move faster than any of us, especially over the mountain ground. Trust in her, I beg. We have to get out of here, to Appleby, to warn them.”

  “You two go, then, and I’ll—”

  “We’d no even find our way back,” Catriona interrupted.

  “It’s due north…” Talmadge replied, but his voice trailed away and his words became a resigned sigh. These two would never find their way without him, especially with so many xoconai about. He looked back at the rising foothills behind him, then to the camp.

  He took out his lens and held it up, then peered through to get a better view.

  He saw the dead and the captured and the bright-faced enemies milling all about.

  “As soon as it gets dark,” Talmadge told his friends. “Keep a watch.”

  He went back to his crystal and turned his attention to the mountains, catching glimpses of places far away, hoping against hope that he might see Khotai up there.

  Somewhere.

  The three crept out as twilight deepened around them. The larger encampment was empty by that point; several of their fellow refugees had been dragged off by the xoconai, tethered to lizards and running behind, stumbling, falling, dragged along, until the poor folk could not get back to their feet.

  Talmadge, Bahdlahn, and Catriona went into the destroyed camp cautiously.

  Three bodies lay where they had fallen, two of them from Fasach Crann and well known to Catriona.

  “I convinced them to come with us,” she said, standing over them.

  “And I convinced you,” Bahdlahn told her, moving close and draping his arm about her.

  “Coming south was my idea,” Talmadge reminded. The two turned to him, and he just shrugged helplessly.

  “He’s right,” Bahdlahn said, nodding to show that he had gleaned the man’s point. “Placing blame is foolishness. We all chose this path of our own accord, and we knew the risks.”

  “And we do’no know that those we left behind have fared any better,” Catriona added. “Our enemies have come fast and far.”

  “We should bury them,” Bahdlahn said.

  Talmadge was fast to shoot that notion down. “No,” he said. “We should leave them where they lie. If that were me dead on the ground, I’d not want those who found me to further risk their own lives by tarrying here or by telling the sidhe that they missed a few targets in their
raid. Say your prayers over them. Catriona, bid your friends farewell. Then we leave, with all haste, back to Appleby.”

  He had spat the word sidhe with utter contempt, an emotion Bahdlahn could certainly understand at that dark moment.

  “Or to To-gai, as we had planned,” Bahdlahn surprised him by saying. “As Khotai desired, to warn the To-gai-ru.”

  “We can’t get through.”

  “We can find that tunnel,” Catriona offered.

  “No!” Talmadge bluntly and emphatically replied. He thought of the zombies rising all about him, dripping mud, reaching for him with rotting hands. “I’m never going near that place again. We can’t go there, and we can’t hope to get over the mountains, crawling as they are with our enemies.”

  Before Catriona could argue, another voice chimed in. “He’s right.”

  The three spun, eyes wide, faces brightening as Khotai glided into their midst. She had barely touched down when Talmadge threw a great hug upon her, Bahdlahn and Catriona quickly joining in.

  “We thought you dead,” said Bahdlahn.

  “So did I,” the woman admitted. “The value of Aoleyn’s gift to me can’no be measured. It kept their spears from my flesh and kept me moving far ahead of them.”

  “We need to go, now and swiftly,” Talmadge said. “Appleby-in-Wilderland.”

  No one argued this time, and the four set off to the north. Khotai took the lead, repeatedly springing up into trees to better scout the region, while Talmadge used his crystal lens as often as he could manage to try to see the path ahead. They found a place to hide and sleep before the dawn, but, with no signs of the sidhe anywhere about, broke that camp soon after midday and started out again.

  Every day brought more confidence that the way was clear, and soon enough, early one evening, they came in sight of the window candles and hearth fires of Appleby-in-Wilderland, with one other, open campfire, burning brightly near the southeastern corner of the town.

  The place appeared peaceful and quiet—perhaps too much so.

  “They should have sentries set about,” Catriona remarked, when the small group pulled up in a copse of trees not far from the campfire.