The War of the Lance t2-3 Page 7

  I remembered sivaks very well from the war. "Yes."

  "I saw the killin', but I wasn't in a way to do anythin' 'bout it right then and there. Had to travel with 'im for two days, pretendin' he was my friend, all the time knowin' he was gonna turn on me and my buddies and kill us off or take us to an ambush. Got some help in time, though, and we cut that reptile boy down to gully dwarf meat. You may be a dead boy, but after that sivak, nothin' much ever gets to me."

  The dwarf clapped his hands together, then went to get his axe. "'Sides, like I said, you probably leadin' me right to Garith. Gonna be like a family reunion." He lifted the axe to gaze down the blade. "I been dyin' to see the boy. Like as not, he'll be dyin' too — after he sees me."

  Evening came at last. We stopped once more for Orun to rest, then moved on as the sun went down. I told Orun about my "cousins, my uncle, my life, and my death. He walked silently as he listened, asking few questions. I talked until I knew of nothing more to say.

  At dusk, my awareness of my murderer's location arose in my consciousness as comfortably as if it had never left. He was still heading for Twisting Creek, but we were much closer to him now. He'd make it to town before morning, but we'd not be far behind him. His speed picked up as the evening deepened, and so did mine — and I was faster, even with Orun.

  By noon the next day, we were just two hours outside of Twisting Creek. There we stopped at an abandoned farmhouse, one I knew had belonged to a couple who had moved away during the war. The log-and-stone home was overgrown with vines and had been boarded up, but it still appeared to be in good shape. It took only moments to break inside. There Orun slept until early evening. I knew we could afford the break. I wanted Orun in good shape when we found the Theiwar. Orun awoke "ready to do business."

  "Wish I knew what spells he's been collectin'," Orun said for the third time later that evening. The whetstone in his hand made a soft grinding sound as he touched up the blade of his axe. "Garith could turn invisible, hypnotize folks with colors, and make light shine. And make poison gas, which he probably used on them hobs. But he knew lots more than that." He held up his axe and examined it in the dim light coming through the cracks in the shuttered windows. "Damn, I'm lookin' forward to seein' him."

  Orun ransacked the house while I waited for my supernatural senses to focus. He found a moth-eaten gray cloak and dropped it on my lap, as well as a stained pair of trousers and a shirt. I needed something besides my old clothes to wear in town. It wouldn't do to have everyone know who I was — including the Theiwar, right at first. By the way his big nose wrinkled up, I knew the clothes had to stink of mold and mildew. I probably stank worse, but I couldn't tell, since I never breathed.

  It grew darker outside. Energy poured into me like a cold river. When I faced in the direction of town, I could tell that my murderer was just a short walk away.

  "I see him," I said.

  Orun nodded, wrapping up his feet with a dry cloth strip. "Like I said," he replied, tugging on his boots next, "Theiwar hate sunlight. Probably stayed at an inn or in a cellar, hidin' from that sun and heavin' 'is guts out, waitin' for the night. Reorx Almighty, they hate that sun."

  We left at nightfall. Orun had wrapped an extra layer of moldy cloth under his armor to add a little protection from the daggers he said Garith was fond of using. He knew it wouldn't stop a crossbow bolt, though, and I'd earlier told him about the poison I'd seen. Black wax was difficult to use, so it wasn't likely that Garith would have his bolts already poisoned. Still, we couldn't count on anything. He'd slain a dozen hobgoblins in one evening, probably without breaking into a sweat.

  It was a clear night. The stars were out early. A warm wind rolled through town ahead of us. I remembered the last night I had known like that, how peaceful it had been, how everything had gone along fine right up to the end.

  "Gonna miss you in a way," said Orun. His axe was tied to his belt. He walked with a broad, quick stride, matching my pace.

  The comment caught me off guard. "How is that?"

  "Well, you know all you are here for is for findin' your killer man. When it's over, you go, too."

  I had suspected as much, but it didn't bother me. Dying a second time seemed like such a small trade for seeing my killer go first.

  "Just lemme know when you see 'im," Orun added.

  I wanted to laugh, but it wasn't in me. "You'll know."

  As we entered the broad dirt streets of Twisting Creek, several people walked by us, giving me looks of disgust at the condition of my clothing and probably my smell. None of them even glanced at Orun. Dwarven merchants came here all the time from Kaolyn.

  We passed rows of families sitting on the sides of the road, children chasing each other or fighting. Almost as many people in town had no home as those who did, thanks to the war. I recognized many of them, but none of them seemed to know me in the darkness.

  "You followin' your man?" Orun asked quietly.

  "He's not far."

  Orun sniffed and smiled.

  My senses led me on through town toward the other side. I had a strange feeling of dread when I realized I was walking in the direction of my uncle's farm.

  We rounded the blacksmith's shop and stable. I looked up and saw a small manor house on a low hill, only a few hundred yards away. It was lit by yellow globes of glass set along the sides of the house and up the front walkway. The long rail fence I remembered repairing in life surrounded it and the farm buildings behind.

  There," I said, stopping. "He's in there."

  Orun stopped, too, and squinted. "Nice place."

  I nodded slowly as I started off again. "My uncle's."

  Orun glanced at me, face hard. "He's in there with your kin?"

  I said nothing. My uncle was a good man. He had his flaws, but if he was hurt, it would be one more thing I would owe the Theiwar when we met.

  We turned at the half-circle wagon path that led up to the doors of the manor. Balls of yellow crystal set on posts lit the way. My uncle had imported them from the city of Solanthus — glass spheres with magical light in them that never went out. Always the best, he liked to say. Always get the best.

  No one was outdoors as we approached. The place hadn't changed a bit since I was here last.

  Orun pushed back his oilskin cloak and undid the strap on his axe.

  I needed nothing but my hands.

  We mounted the steps, slowing down, and reached the door. I hesitated, sensing my prey so strongly I felt I could touch him.

  He was inside on the right. That would be my uncle's private study, to the side of the entry hall. Maybe he was holding everyone hostage, or he'd broken in and was borrowing a few things for his own use.

  I wondered if, when I met him, I'd ask him why he'd killed me before I killed him.

  I raised my hand and knocked hard, three times, and listened to the echo. Then we waited.

  The lock clicked. The front door heaved, then pulled open. It was our elderly manservant, Roggis. His face went white when he saw me, his eyes growing big and round.

  "Evredd!" he gasped. "Blessed gods, what happened?"

  "I'm home," I said softly as I pushed past the old man and went in, Orun at my heels. The entry hall was brightly lit. The great curved stairs to the second-floor bedrooms ascended from either side of the room.

  Something inside me tore free. I wanted to see my killer's face, NOW. The study door was closed, but I was there in a moment, with the door handle in my hand, pulling it open.

  The cabinet- and bookshelf-lined study was before me. Yellow light fell from the globes hanging from the ceiling. Only one person was in the room, sitting at the center table's far end with a pile of ledgers in front of him. He was big, fleshy-faced, with a hooked nose and a receding hairline. He looked up with irritation as the door swung open.

  My murderer, sang the cold in my blood.

  My uncle, said my eyes.

  "Can't you — " he began, before he actually saw me. He leaped back from his chair, kn
ocking it over. His face went slack with terror. He grabbed for something on a stool beside him.

  "Uncle," I said. I couldn't believe it, but I knew it. HE had killed me. "What — "

  My uncle swung around. He held a heavy wooden device in his hands. He pulled the trigger. A dwarven-made crossbow. The bowstring snapped.

  The crossbow bolt slammed into my chest with the force of a mule's kick, tearing through my right lung and breaking a rib. The impact knocked me back several steps, almost into Orun, before I caught myself.

  The bolt didn't hurt a bit.

  I ran and lunged across the table for my uncle, my fingers out like claws.

  He flung the crossbow at me, missing, and dodged back. My fingers locked on his clothes, ripping them. I tried to get to his throat.

  There was faint popping noise in the air, a flash of light. My uncle was gone.

  In his place stood a waist-high dwarf, clad in filthy black clothing. I held his torn shirt in my hands. His mushroom-white face showed only a dirty blond beard, watery blue eyes that bulged out like goose eggs, and a black-toothed mouth that was open like a wound. He was the ugliest dwarf I'd ever seen, and he gave out a shriek that would have sent me to my grave if I hadn't already been there. My uncle… a destroyed man…

  The Theiwar had used an illusion spell to disguise himself. I knew then what must have happened to my uncle, and why he had seemed to have changed lately. And who had really killed my cousins. Likely, they'd begun to suspect something.

  Garith's gonna live like a huuu-man now, the hobgoblin had said.

  "Garith!" shouted Orun from the door. The dwarf shut it behind him, cutting off Roggis's cries in the hall outside.

  Panicked, the Theiwar ran under the table to escape me. I shoved myself off the table and snatched at a heavy wooden chair, swinging it up and over and down into the tabletop. The chair shattered; the table split in half and collapsed. Books and papers poured across the floor — and a bag full of rotting gray ears spilled with them. Some of the ears were gnawed.

  I stepped back. The Theiwar had vanished.

  "Garith!" roared Orun, his axe high. "You a dead boy, too, now! You a dead little white rat, you hear me!"

  I caught something from the comer of my eye. The Theiwar had reappeared in a comer of the room, far from Orun and me. His hands leaped out of hidden pockets in his black clothing.

  "Orkiska Shakatan Sekis!" he called out in a hoarse, high voice, holding something like a cloth and a glass rod and rubbing them together. He was aiming them at me.

  "Reorx damn us!" shouted Orun, as I leaped for the Theiwar. "Evredd, he's — "

  There was more light then than I'd ever seen in my life or afterwards. My body was suspended in the air, buoyed up by a writhing white ribbon of power that poured from the Theiwar's hands. For the first time since I'd died, I felt true pain. It was unearthly, burning into every muscle, every nerve, every inch of skin, and I couldn't even scream.

  Then it was gone. I crashed to the floor. Smoke billowed from the smoldering rags I wore. My soot-stained limbs jerked madly as if I were the marionette of a bad puppeteer.

  I flopped over on my stomach. The Theiwar was climbing a freestanding wall cabinet like a spider. Orun threw his axe. The weapon struck something in the air just before it reached the Theiwar and bounced away with a clanging noise, falling next to my head.

  "Damn you, Garith!" Orun cried, snatching his axe up. "Damn you and your magic! You a DEAD boy!"

  My limbs began to move the way I wanted them to go, and I staggered to my feet. The Theiwar was on top of the cabinet. He pointed a short white finger down at us. "N'zkool Akrek Grafkun — Miwarsh!" he shrieked, in triumph.

  Greenish yellow fog blasted from his finger. A windstorm filled the room. The overhead lights were dimmed by the thick mist.

  Orun started to shout, but his voice ended abruptly with a shocked gasp, then a loud, hacking cough. I could barely see him through the green fog. He clutched at his throat with both hands, the axe thumping into the floor. He gave a strangled cry, teeth clenched shut, his lungs filling with poisoned air.

  I went for the cabinet. My hands gripped a shelf at the height of my head, and I pulled back hard. The dish-filled cabinet rocked; plates clattered flat. The Theiwar cursed and dropped to his knees, fingers grabbing for purchase on the top. I heaved against the shelf again and saw the cabinet lean toward me, then continue coming. I shoved it aside. It slammed into the floor away from the choking dwarf.

  As suddenly as it had appeared, the greenish fog blew away as if caught by a high wind. Orun's hacking cough and hoarse cries echoed in the now silent room.

  The Theiwar fell to the floor across the room. Rolling, he came up on his feet. He saw me coming around the fallen cabinet, and he tried to flee for the closed door. He jerked a long crystal vial from his belt. His bulging eyes were as big as moons when I tackled him.

  My dead hands locked around his little body. You could hear him for miles, screaming like a spitted rodent with a giant's lung power. He punched and kicked in hysteria. I jabbed one hand through the hail of blows and got my long, cold fingers into the flesh at his throat, sinking in the grip. Gasping, he stabbed at my arm with the vial, shattering it with the first blow and opening up bloodless gashes that went down to the dull white bone.

  Abruptly, he stiffened. I grabbed his arm with my free one and held it steady for an instant. I had seen it coming.

  A red stream, mixed with strands of oozing black, was running down his arm. His huge, watery eyes focused on his hand with an expression of complete terror such as I had never seen on a living face before. His eyes rolled up then, and his body shuddered and went still.

  Garith had just learned what the Nerakans had learned about black wax, with the same results.

  I released his body and fell to the floor. I tried to keep myself up on my hands and knees, but my strength poured out of me now like water through a collapsed dam. In the background, I could hear Roggis wailing and Orun coughing. The door to the study burst open, and everyone in the manor surged in to shout and point. But they all kept away from me. They knew.

  "The boys warned me that he wasn't the same!" Roggis was saying, in tears. "I didn't believe them. When they were killed, he acted as if he didn't care a whit. I thought he was mad, but I didn't dare speak to him about it. I was afraid he'd become violent. He hardly seemed himself!"

  The racket was fading away, far away. I struggled to get up. It was no use. I'd done what I'd come back to do. I was more tired than I'd ever been before in my life.

  "Evredd," wheezed a hoarse voice near my ear. "You still there?"

  I managed to nod, but that was all.

  "Good work for a dead boy," Orun said. "Right on target."

  High praise. I wondered if I'd see Garayn and Klart soon, and my uncle, and what they would say about it. Family business.

  I fell forward into the darkness. Everything was right again, and there would be no coming back.

  War Machines

  Nick O'Donohoe

  There was a great blast of steam in the passage through the mountain. Gnomes came sliding down the rock sides, a few dropping from above and caught, heartstoppingly, by nets; two popped out of compressed-air tubes in the ground and tumbled in the air before plummeting toward a landing-pad near the steam source. One landed on the pad, the other in a bush. The assembled gnomes pulled levers, rang bells, turned cranks, and shouted directions at each other without listening to the directions shouted back.

  Mara dashed from rock to rock like a child playing hide-and-seek, each sprint taking her closer to her objective. In her whole life in Arnisson she had never heard this much whistling, clanking, and general noise. She resisted putting both hands over her ears and edged quietly and quickly through the assembled gnomes until she arrived at a narrow ledge at the point where the passageway met the inner crater wall of the mountain. She slid onto it, staring down in fascination at the array of gantries and cranes and at the almost continu
al rain of equipment and gnomes. Far below, she could see a trap door.

  A loose cable drifted toward her.

  Mara leapt nimbly out of the shadows, catching a hanging cable with her cloth-wrapped hand. She slid down, touching the mountainside lightly with her feet, then sailing back into open air. She vanished into a pit in the ground.

  She saw above her, in a brief flash, layer on layer of gnome houses and workshops, cranes, nets, and the occasional flying (or falling) gnome. She congratulated herself on passing unseen and unheard, but part of her grudgingly admitted that any gnome who saw her would have assumed she was just testing a new invention, unless the gnome was also close enough to notice that she was human. And no one could have heard her over the clanking, whirring, grinding, and intermittent steam whistles.

  The cable swung against the edge of the pit, which was now a skylight, above her. She climbed up with the rope, pumped with her legs to accelerate its swinging, tucked, sprang, rolled over in midair and landed noiselessly on the stone floor next to a gnomeflinger.

  "Perfect, of course," she said with satisfaction. Mara unwrapped her hand from the rope, took three swaggering steps forward, and accidentally knocked down a gnome who was looking the other way. Mara sprawled backward, legs in the air and arms flailing.

  The gnome scrambled up and offered her a hand. "Awfully sorry; it was my fault, after all I was busy thinking, there must be a defect in the — "

  "It was my fault really," she began. "I'm sorry — " Then she realized that he hadn't stopped talking.

  " — a little borrowed hydraulic gear would make it more efficient yet, if it didn't make it top-heavy — and a spring with a trigger-catch might store the energy — "

  "Stop."

  He did.

  "Now," Mara said, "what are you talking about?"

  "I was just telling you," the gnome said impatiently, "about the idea I had when I watched you trying to sneak down here — "