death's knight 18

 

Chapter 18

 

 

As the afternoon wore on, a patrol of Darkling warriors with two greater toróg as part of their entourage, and a dozen or so trógling came down the valley. One of the trógling was armoured, and looked better fed; the rest were cowed and downtrodden, dressed in rags, and armed with simple spears. They did the work of setting up a camp on the broad mushroom meadow.

“Try not to kill the trógling who are not worshippers of Tor,” muttered Harkon.

“I picked up some torógian speech, both when I was a slave, and from Kaz,” murmured Kuros. “I’ll talk to them.”

Harkon nodded agreement; they did not want to talk too much to risk their voices carrying to the sharp-eared toróg.

Before the sun had done more than sink behind the mountains, a cave mouth appeared to open in the face of the cliff that rose above the meadow. Zog sighed a melancholy sigh as a beautiful, but pallid, woman with brown hair stepped out of the cave. She was accompanied by four undead greater toróg in more or less stages of rotting, and a dozen skeletons, mostly darklings, with the odd human and a couple of trógling. There was also an eidolon, a visible spirit, similar to spirits of retribution.

“The guard from below sleep between the two weeks each year, and wake at the command of Tor to accompany her when she leaves his halls,” murmured Zog. “The air is damp, and preserves the nekrosti as a kind of soap.”

Lelyn sniggered.

“Time to use Kaz’s favourite laundry cantrips then,” she said.

“Time to watch and wait,” said Harkon. “I’ll deal with the undead.” The others nodded; they knew that Harkon had powerful cult spells to do so. “Zog, go to Mycota, and lead her away from the fighting. Kuros, collect the trógling. The rest of you, deploy as seems appropriate, and I’ll join you when I can. The eidolon might take some killing.”

Nobody mentioned that a powerful cult spirit was the heaviest challenge of all.

The red moon rose, full, though that made little difference to the undead of Tor. Mycota danced intricate dances in the moonlight, her feet marking circles for the fungi to grow.

The night passed slowly for the watchers. As the sky to the east greyed at its rim, Harkon used prayer to contact Alethos.

“Any time from now on,” he prayed, laconically.

“Kaz would tease me for brevity if I said that,” his god laughed. “She thinks about two hours.”

 

 

oOoOo

 

“So, back the way we came?” said Thyella. “Not waiting or following to see what happens?”

“Thyella, do you want to personally go head to head with Tor here?” asked Kaz. “I expect Alethos got a volunteer to go in spirit form to watch.”

“Oh, right,” said Thyella. “My lightning is a bit weak down here.”

“Funny that, as we’re in the depths of the underworld, not in the sky,” said Kaz.

“You’re the most sarcastic being I’ve ever met,” said Thyella.

“Well, then, you should count yourself lucky not to have encountered anyone so sarcastic before,” said Kaz.

“She’s unsettled; imagine if you and Harkon had got ripped out of his tent right before you started raining on the rest of us?” snapped Rynn, with asperity. “Give her space; she and Alethos have to hold off until she’s officially been cursed.”

“I guess that would make me sarcastic too,” said Thyella. “Friend Hraazaz! You are very quiet. How do you like being in such disparate company as we?”

“It’s unsettling,” said Hraazaz. “I’m a priestess of my beloved mother the moon, but I’m also a trader, and I enjoy the cut and thrust of trading.  Everything was normal until I first met the Daykaz, who killed one of my bodyguard and took two of my trógling. One of whom is an accomplished warrior, and negating all I have ever believed about trógling, as is the Daykaz. I put my life back together, and then I was captured by the Selenites, who normally have no problem with toróg traders, and we hide our hatred of them, because we have to trade. Being tortured to find out about my mission, a mission I did not have, I find myself rescued by one I had thought an enemy, and aided in becoming what I have always dreamed of but never dared think of too hard; and suddenly we are working together. You will understand why I am quiet, whilst I try to get my thoughts and feelings in order.”

“Ah, but fate rewards those who follow her webs and patterns,” said Thyella, a trifle fatuously. “Now, you are greater, and you know that you can train your trógling further than you realised, and that by treating them well and encouraging them to learn, they will be even more loyal to you, and that will give you greater status and power in your clan and with other clans.”

“This is true,” said Hraazaz. “And having ventured to the underworld, I will have bragging rights over other would-be heroines. The strength potion...”

“There will be enough for all of us to have some,” said Kaz. “I never saw myself your enemy, or only in as far as you would have prevented Rynn and Zon from joining me.”

“You got him killed,” said Hraazaz.

“Yes,” said Kaz, with a bite to the end of the word. “He died in my service and gave his life to save mine, but he is assured a resting place with Alethos, and travels with me still, at his own request, as my familiar spirit. And he has been increasing his own kormajeia in helping me deal with undead. Surely your priestly eye can see how brightly he shines?”

“That is Zon? Then he has done well,” said Hraazaz.

“Never say again that Kaz got Zon killed,” said Rynn, marching up to the huge matriarch. “I’d fight you for it.”

“So loyal,” said Hraazaz. “I apologise. I meant to hurt you, Kaz of Alethos, because I feel out of my depth. It was dishonourable of me to do so, and not true blue of me.”

“You get used to it,” said Kaz. “I’ve been out of my depth since I heard the prophesy that I should live forever and desire death, but I’ve learned to live with it, and fumble through the deep passages of the unknown, with friends at my side, it matters little where I am so long as I am going in the right direction.”

“It’s a frightening prophecy, until one realises what it means... I am not accustomed to meeting gods and demigods as a seeming commonplace matter.”

“Alethos broke us into that gently by pretending to be an initiate, and let us supposedly outguess that he was questing for herodom, so it was less pressure; and when he explained it all, I was much relieved,” said Kaz. “I... I remembered a trógling who had displeased his master who was dismembered and healed daily, and thought it would mean something like that.”

“There is no need to practise such wanton cruelty,” said Hraazaz. “Even if trógling were scarcely more than animals as I have always believed.”

“You differ from my mother and her mother then,” said Kaz, with bitter tightness. “Skagarra is coarse of nature and enjoys punishing those trógling unfortunate enough to be born of her womb.”

“That is, unfortunately, true of many,” said Hraazaz. “One is not supposed to acknowledge them, and it is hard to feel any warmth, but to punish them for something they cannot help is wrong. Are you sure she was not just pushing you further as I tried to push Zon and Rynn further?”

“I was on the menu when I ran away, for being too clever,” said Kaz. “They are your get? Then your resentment at Zon’s death is more understandable.”

“I would acknowledge Rynn if she would acknowledge me,” said Hraazaz.

“I don’t know,” said Rynn. “I would have to think about that.”

“I understand,” said Hraazaz. “At least I know better than to serve a trógling to a human trader when the trógling had offended him, as I heard Skagarra did.”

“And I angered her by warning her that it would disgust him,” said Kaz. “Humans find cannibalism disgusting.”

“Cannibalism other than the ritual consumption of those who die by natural causes is disgusting,” said Hraazaz. “Oh. We do not think of eating semi-beasts as cannibalism.”

“And humans consider the eating of any sentient to be cannibalism,” said Kaz.

“Not for the weakest to serve rather than be a drain on society,” said Hraazaz.

“I can understand the reasons behind it,” said Kaz. “But it’s nervous when you’re the one who is going to be eaten.”

“Yes, and if trógling on the whole have the ability to comprehend that, then it is wrong,” said Hraazaz. “I have a lot to ponder.”

“Can’t we leave the subject and sing one of Svargia’s cheerful plains songs where everyone dies but to bright and lively tunes?” asked Rynn.

“Oh, like the one,

Who is the handsome man with the lovely horse?

He is off to the fight in the freedom wars

He will be taken by the red moon troops to serve

Broken in spirit and aged as a slave he will lose his verve,” said Kaz.

“That sort of thing,” said Rynn. “But it reminds them and us why we fight.”

Kaz laughed.

“I understand,” said Thyella. “I’m often over the plains. They call me Pieran, the flash, and I have to appear male. It’s a name considered lucky for their horses. They are a fatalistic people, proud, stoic, brave, and my brother and I love them.”

They tramped back the way they had come, singing. They were well on their way when Kaz was contacted.

“The rampaging geryones have reached Tor’s castle as dawn dances before Solos at the eastern edge of the world,” said Alethos. “Now it is up to Harkon.”

“We will pass back through the gate without tarrying, beloved,” said Kaz.

They continued to Alethos’s halls, and Kaz looked on the marble edifice and turned from it.

It was almost a physical wrench to leave her lover’s domain and to force herself to run through the strangeness that was the gate, and out of the tunnel, twisting over the lip to be standing on the ground in the small room where the pit was locked away from prying eyes.  A lay servant leaped up to open the door for them, bowing as they went through. Alcitha met them.

“Why, Kaz, what is wrong?” she asked, for tears flowed freely from Kaz’s eyes. Kaz shook her head.

“A room for the night, sword sister,” she whispered.  Alcitha put an arm around her, and led her away to guest quarters, Rynn firmly joining her.

Kaz cried herself to sleep whilst the others ate, and Rynn put together a cold meal with a bowl of soup on a charcoal-powered chafing dish for when she awoke.

 

“Rynn, bless you; you take such good care of me,” said Kaz.

“I know how hard it must be for you,” said Rynn. Kaz managed a wicked little chuckle.

“Like iron,” she said.

“Oh, well, if you can joke about it, you’ll survive the parting,” said Rynn.

“I could have sunk myself into his being,” said Kaz, honestly. “And that would be no good for him or for me, never mind the damned prophecy.”

Rynn hugged her friend.

“Phaedros can be a bit overwhelming at times, so I have some idea,” she said.

“And at least he has no idea of how powerful he is,” said Kaz.

 

 

oOoOo

 

“My watcher tells me that Tor himself is engaged on the sport of the hunt of the geryones,” Alethos told Harkon. “Move now.”

“Show time,” said Harkon. “We all know what to do.”

Harkon and his band approached the guards openly as Zog moved to one side to intercept Mycota. Kuros stepped away from the armed group  and moved towards the trógling.

Harkon smiled brightly.

“Hello!” he said.

He was already drawing on Alethos’s power for abjure undead, adding his own power to overwhelm the four big nekrosti and the skeletons.

The two High Toróg lifted their weapons; one favoured a maul, the other an axe. The half dozen darklings fell in with them, and the armoured trógling, whilst the other trógling hesitated, gripping their spears defensively.

“Get out while you can, human scum,” said one of the high toróg. “You don’t know what you’re tangling with.” He couldn’t see the undead behind him; didn’t realise that the skeletons had collapsed into piles of dust or that the soap-monster nekrosti would be unlikely to be needing any laundry cantrips as the dead flesh flowed off their bones before collapsing. That was a powerful spell!  Meanwhile, Harkon had the living to deal with, though some of the darklings were backing away in fear at what had happened to the undead.

“The Hell I don’t,” said Harkon. “You’re the Avalanche Twins, aren’t you?”

“Little human has heard of us but isn’t running away. Is little human stupid, or just rooted to the spot in terror?” asked the other.

“My god doesn’t like you. I don’t like you either,” said Harkon. He was going to die on this mission. But that was not a problem. He felt a pang of regret that he was not with Thyella, but at least she could visit his spirit.

“Alethos, into your hands,” he murmured, as they moved forward, purposefully.

“Remember what spells you know,” said Alethos, irritably. “Your brain is a weapon too.”

“Is it right to use spirit sword on the living not blood suckers?” asked Harkon.

“His spirit can fight back. You face two heroes of Tor; use my power,” said Alethos.

Harkon pointed his sword, and directed the glyph spell at the toróg with the axe; he considered it a deadlier weapon than a maul. His kormajiea slammed into that of the big warrior, shaped like a sword and aimed at the heart of the toróg, an invisible struggle to most. Harkon was aware of Protasion beside him, guarding against the one with the maul, Lelyn backing him up. Polia and Vulk were on his other side, Vulk in wolf form, going for the throat of one of the Darkling warriors. Evgon was aiding Polia with another, and Svargia on another. Kuros was talking to the trógling in their own tongue, taking advantage of them being cowed already by the undead, the toróg, and the daylight. The armoured trógling produced a whip, and threatened them.

“Kill him and come with me,” said Kuros.

At that moment, the high toróg with the axe slumped to the ground; it seemed to break something in the trógling, who turned on their fellow with the whip, and all drove their spears into him at once.  He died very surprised.

Terrified at what they had done, and possible retribution, the trógling huddled together, looking to Kuros for support.

“Move back behind the ridge and wait for me,” snapped Kuros. “There’s a green pack with food in it; help yourselves.”

Anyone who offered food so freely was to be obeyed, and they scuttled away, at least half of them abandoning their spears.

Kuros shook his head and went to back up Svargia.

 

As the big toróg fell to the spirit sword spell, his brother bellowed in rage and raised his maul over Harkon’s head whilst Harkon fell back a step, the spirit of the hero toróg attacking his in retribution.

Harkon could not give any attention to the other toróg and his maul; he could only fight the spirit of the dead hero, preventing it from ripping into his own spirit and reaching his kormajiea. Fortunately, the enraged toróg did not notice Protasion wait for the opportunity to come in with a beautifully timed blow into the toróg’s armpit.

It would have killed a lesser being, but it hurt and distracted the massive warrior, who dropped his maul, which caught Harkon on the shoulder, knocking him to the ground. Harkon tried to ignore the pain. He was aware that he was screaming, partly in anger. He turned his anger on the spirit he was fighting, using the wring cantrip with which Kaz had had such good results on spirits. It seemed to work, and cause the toróg much distress.

And then, the other hero twin was in trouble, as suddenly mushrooms sprouted from his nostrils, ears, mouth, and other parts of his anatomy. He was screaming in a rather muffled sort of way as fruiting bodies and strap-like roots appeared all over his body and he fell to the ground.

Protasion’s sword bloomed in flame to fight the spirit of the other twin and Harkon cursed himself for forgetting the spell. He drew a knife, which would do as well, since his right arm was pinned down under the maul, and activated the spell, hacking at the spirit which attacked him, as a spell could do direct damage. Toval’s spirit had been valiantly aiding him, but Harkon was afraid for his brother against such a vicious and powerful foe.  With Protasion fighting the other, and Mycota and Zog returning, the two notorious toróg heroes spirits fled.