Hinterland

A FIRE IN THE CELLAR

Tylar heard the shouting from down the hall. He had left the others at the landing. Ahead lay the fieldroom, where Warden Fields had set up a war council and gathered all the heads of Tashijan. The door stood ajar. Knights crowded the hall. Pages paced, ready to relay messages and commands to the various posts.

Kathryn’s voice reached him. “You’re all being stone-headed! The skull must be fetched out of the cellars!”

Tylar hurried forward. While he had questioned the boy Brant, he had sent Kathryn ahead to meet with Argent, to lay the foundation for their request. She was supposed to have softened him by the time Tylar arrived.

Plainly that was not the case.

“Why didn’t you tell me about this skull when it was first brought here?” Argent boomed. “Such a darkly Graced item threatens all of us!”

Tylar reached the door and stopped at the threshold. Two knights drifted out of alcoves to either side, ready to hold him off, but when they spotted his bared face, they recognized him and hesitated.

Inside, Kathryn stepped to the scarred table that stretched the length of the room. It was across this same board that countless strategies had been construed and treaties signed, sometimes in blood. Around the room rose the ancient Stacks, massive scaffolding and shelves, buttressed by ladders, where maps of all the Nine Lands were stored, going back millennia, some said even before the Sundering. A more current chart of Tashijan had been tacked to the broad table with daggers. Additional rolled sheaves littered the top, all but forgotten during the heated exchange.

Kathryn continued. “We didn’t understand the full power of the skull until Master Rothkild examined it and discovered the cursed Grace locked within its bones.” She leaned on the table, palms down. “Either way, now is not the time to cast blame. Best we retrieve the skull before the force below becomes entrenched or discovers such a powerful talisman within their grasp.”

Argent scowled at her. “Who would lead such a sortie?”

Tylar stepped across the threshold. “I would.”

All eyes turned to him.

“I will take a small force below, armed with sword and flame. We’ll assault Master Rothkild’s study and be out in half a bell.”

Argent straightened, his one eye narrowing.

Beyond him, the fieldroom overlooked the tourney fields at the foot of Stormwatch, but for now the great windows were shuttered tight against the blizzard, except for one narrow pane. Movement beyond revealed a knight under a heavy cloak, posted on the small balcony to maintain a watch on the whirling storm that trapped them here.

To either side, the innermost circle of Tashijan lined the table: knights of the highest station, including Swordmaster Yuril, heads of house and livery, like Keeper Ryngold, and several members of the Council of Masters, the last bolstered by the wide girth of Hesharian.

Argent finally spoke. “We thank you for your offer, regent, but surely one of your stature should best be kept with our other guests high in the tower, where you can be protected. Such a raid, if permitted, would best be carried out by knights of the Order.”

“As I recall, I was invited here to be so included in said Order, to be granted cloak and sword. Or was the offer merely feigned?”

The warden’s lips thinned to sharp, unforgiving lines.

“Also,” Tylar continued, “we know the skull, tainted by seersong, can twist Grace to its will. I’ve already proven my resistance to its corruption, so who better to lead?”

Kathryn cast Tylar a withering look. She had not wanted to further split their towers with petty bickering. And here they were, already baring teeth like dogs. While Tylar recognized the wisdom in her cause, Argent seemed to draw the bile from him like no other. And from the flint in the other’s eye, there was little hope of a peaceful settlement here.

The impasse was broken by a most unexpected ally.

A figure stepped out of the shadow of Hesharian’s moon. “I believe the regent speaks wisely, and his design should be considered.” It was the elderly visitor from Ghazal.

Argent swung toward him.

But the aged figure seemed unfazed, his eyes perhaps too clouded to note the fire in the warden’s. Tylar guessed the fortitude arose more from a steely disinterest in the warden.

Ignoring even a pinch on his sleeve by Master Hesharian, he continued, “Such a talisman, removed from below, may serve to protect us. Dark Grace is woven tightly around us-from the storm without and the daemons below. If we masters could find a way to tap in to the seersong, perhaps we could forge a weapon against the forces that gather. To turn their Grace against them.”

A calculating glint of understanding reflected in Argent’s eye. “Get them to dance to our song.”

Hesharian chimed in, now that he risked nothing by taking a position. “Wise all around. It is good fortune that I had summoned Master Orquell to attend here.”

The ancient mage seemed little moved. He kept his focus on the warden. “And with such a ward against black Grace in our hands, who knows what other black acts might be reversed?”

Argent met the other’s gaze. Tylar knew the Ghazalian master had been summoned in an attempt to break the dark spell that had frozen Argent’s swordsworn brother to stone. Here the master offered one more argument for securing the skull, one with a more personal stake for the warden.

Tylar knew the matter was settled before the warden turned back to him.

“You believe you can get below and back again with the skull?” Argent asked.

“If we are delayed no longer.”

Argent’s eye narrowed. “I’ll send you with enough knights to guard the door below, to keep a fire blazing. You’ll have a single bell. Longer than that, we’ll know you’re corrupted. The way will be sealed.”

It was as much of a concession as Tylar could hope for from the warden. He stared at Argent in his one eye and nodded.

Kathryn turned from the table. Tylar was the only one to note her relieved sigh. She followed him back to the door and out.

Behind them, Argent barked orders, staging his end of the assault.

They would have only a moment of privacy.

Kathryn stopped him halfway toward the stair. “Be careful. I don’t trust that new master.”

He nodded. “We’ll have to worry about that after I retrieve the skull.”

In a lower voice, she asked, “What of the boy? Was he able to cast any light upon the skull’s origin?”

“More than you could imagine.” He didn’t have time to go into his story at length, and he feared speaking of the boy’s black stone, gifted to him by the very god whose skull lay below. “He’s coming with us.”

Thinking upon it, he was glad he had not been more stubborn about permitting him to come. Best to bring the skull and stone together well out of sight of that strange master.

Kathryn looked on inquiringly, but trusted him enough not to press. He squeezed her arm. “I must go.”

For a moment, their eyes met. A flicker of something conflicted flashed across her features. But before he could pin it down, it vanished, replaced with worry and the weight of their situation.

“Come back,” she said.

He let go of her arm. “I will.”

He set off, hoping it was a promise he could keep.

Brant shifted back as the heavy iron bar was lifted from the gate. It was the last of three. The wyrmwood gate itself was constructed of massive planks, woven like cloth under an alchemy of Grace and banded in more iron. Rogger had explained its history, how it was placed at the threshold to the Masterlevels shortly after the founding of Tashijan.

“Some said to keep any wild Grace from escaping the master’s subterranean dungeons…others because the knights had not truly trusted those first masters, men who dabbled with the Grace of gods. The knights were ready to bottle them up if necessary. And maybe they weren’t half wrong. Look where we are now.”

But all had gone silent by the time the last bar was shoved free.

Everyone held their breath.

Giant braziers flanked both sides, roaring with fire. Torches as thick around as Dralmarfillneer’s thigh encircled the walls and continued down the tall halls, all the way to the great doors that led from Stormwatch into the outer bailey.

Brant wiped his brow on his sleeve. The very air steamed from the many flames. But he did not complain.

“Ready your torches,” Tylar said.

They each carried an oiled brand. Rogger also had a lantern hanging at his hip, flame flickered low. The giant had a cask of the oil under one arm, ready to be cracked opened, spilled, and set to flame.

One by one, they lit their torches from the brazier.

Tylar nodded to two knights at the chained mechanism for the gate. The pair began hauling on the wheels, drawing up the barrier. Another knight ran forward and cast a lantern through the widening opening, splashing oil and fire down the mouth of the steps. They dared not risk an ambush outside the gate.

Brant hunkered down and searched the lower stairs. The way appeared empty, free of any black ghawls.

“We stay together,” Tylar said. “No more than an arm’s length apart. Understood?”

Nods all around.

The regent led the way, with Rogger a step behind him, and Sten flanking his other side. Brant went next. He had two guards: the dour-faced Dralmarfillneer and the woman in black ash, the Flagger whose name Brant learned was Calla. Or was it Carra? His heart had been pounding too hard to truly note it.

Behind them trailed Krevan. The large man stood nearly as tall as the giant, though not as bulky. Despite his misgivings about the man’s trade, Brant was still happy to have him at his back.

They headed down the stairs, skirting the fading flames from the broken lantern. As they continued, wending round and round, Brant risked a glance behind him. The fires above were only a distant glow.

Brant had never considered himself a coward, but only one certainty kept him descending into the deepening darkness. He clutched the stone at his throat. It lay as cold as granite against his heated skin. No matter the risk, he would find the end of this path that started with this stone.

“Where are these daemons already?” Rogger grumbled.

Sten glanced to the smaller man with a frown. Brant shared the captain’s distaste. It was like whistling among gravestones. There was no telling what such sentiment might conjure.

They spiraled farther down in silence. Brant peered past Tylar, who still led them by two steps. The blackness seemed to stir away from his flames. It was as if the darkness had turned to oil and feared to be ignited.

But nothing worse arose.

“Here is the level of Gerrod’s study,” Tylar said, stopping at the next landing.

They all closed ranks a bit tighter.

“What’s that smell?”

Brant sniffed. But he stood too near the bearded man. He smelled unwashed and ripe. Then a skittering sound reached his ears. It rose from below. He remembered the rustle when he had been with the wyld tracker and Dart. This was something different.

“Back!” Tylar ordered, low and urgent. “Against the walls.”

His warning came not a moment too soon. Brant flattened against the stone as darkness flowed out from below, swallowing the gray stairs.

“Rats,” Rogger said with disgust.

A horde burst up to them, jammed together, climbing over one another. They whisked through the group like so many stones in a flash flood. One rat leaped, landed on the lip of Brant’s boot, and bounced to the next step and away. As suddenly as they had arrived, they were gone again, streaming up the stairs.

Brant shivered all over. Not so much at the number of rats as their silence. Not a single squeak. Only the scrape of tiny, frantic claws on rock. Brant knew the sound would haunt his nights-that is, if he lived to have more nights.

“Those rats can’t seem to find a safe place to roost this night,” Rogger said, glancing meaningfully at Tylar.

“We’ll heed their instinct this time,” the regent answered. “Especially as there’s no reason to traipse deeper.”

“Thank the silent aether for that,” the man answered.

Tylar lifted his torch toward the passage that led off the landing. “This way. Keep alert. By now they must know we’re down here.”

Brant followed, but he stared down the spiraling stairs one more time. Was that the message from the rats? That something stirred once again in the bowels beneath Tashijan?

He hurried after the others.

Dral hunched next to him, all but filling the passageway. Calla- or Carra -was forced back with her leader.

“How much longer?” Dral whispered, sounding like boulders rubbing together. “Those rats reminded me that I didn’t get to finish my dinny. Did you see how plump some of them buggers was? I like them roasted with their own giblets. Mal says-”

“Dral,” Brant finally barked out louder than he intended, earning a glance back from Tylar.

“Apologies, Master Brant. It were just that my belly was growling and I thought-”

He turned a hard glance to the large man.

The giant slowly closed his mouth.

Brant felt a tad shamed at his outburst. He read the edgy twitch to Dral’s eye. Despite his size and strength, he was plainly rattled, too. And the cramped quarters of the passage only squeezed his fears closer to his heart, loosening a nervous tongue.

He touched the giant’s hand, acknowledging both his forgiveness and his own apology.

At last, Tylar halted before an arched doorway. “Here we are.”

“I got it,” Rogger said, slipping a large iron key from a pocket. “Not that I really need this.”

He touched the door-and it creaked open on its own.

Unlatched.

Even Brant knew this was not good.

Rogger backed away.

“Stay here,” Tylar said. “But be ready.”

The regent edged the door open with a toe and thrust his torch through the gap. Brant cringed as Tylar followed the flames into the room. The regent’s torchlight reflected off a pair of iron braziers at the back of the room. They cast monstrous shadows on the back wall. Tylar’s movement set them to dancing.

Brant had a horrible feeling about what was to come.

Tylar crossed to another door in the back wall, some inner chamber, the alchemist’s study. It stood ajar. The regent approached, kicked the door wider, and stepped to the threshold.

He paused for a moment, his back to all of them.

“Tylar?” Rogger whispered.

The regent swung around, his cloak billowing out. He rushed to the door. “Gone,” he said, his voice stiff and angry. “We’re too late. Only by moments, I suspect.”

He waved them back to the stairs. “We must get out of here.”

They retreated, in reverse order as before, mostly as the giant blocked Tylar from passing. Krevan led them back to the stairs.

Still, Brant could not escape that horrible feeling he had had only a breath ago. It remained with him as much as the stink off Rogger. But it grew worse with every step. He felt something building. The very air seemed to suddenly weigh more. Each breath took effort.

Somewhere on the back of his tongue he tasted a hint of spiced oil, a whisper of scent, more memory than real, of pompbonga-kee.

Oh, no…

Dral cleared the passageway and reached the broader stairs. Brant stepped after him, glancing back to warn the regent.

Too late.

The torch tumbled from Brant’s fingers. Both hands grabbed for his throat. Fire ignited his chest, burning through his skin, turning bone to ash.

He fell to his knees.

Arms reached for him.

“Master Brant…?” Dral asked, his voice mirroring everyone’s confusion.

Except one.

“It’s the stone,” Rogger said. “Somewhere they’ve exposed the skull. Cleared the black bile.”

Brant fell farther, catching himself with one hand on the steps. “It’s near…” he gasped.

Then Tylar’s face was in front of his. “Where?”

Brant sat back, bones burning. He lifted an arm, fighting the pained trembling of the effort. He pointed.

“Down,” Rogger said.

“Can you lead us?” Tylar asked.

Arms lifted him, to his feet, to his toes. He shook to keep his heels to the stone. He nodded. “Down,” he gasped. “Down…”

“Where the rats fled from,” Rogger said.

Tylar descended with his torch held before him. The others followed. The giant supported the boy, whose face remained clenched in agony.

“Is this wise?” Rogger whispered.

“There’s a chance the daemons don’t fully grasp what they have yet. If we can reach them before they understand…”

Rogger nodded.

Tylar tightened his grip on the torch. “I could still smell them in there. We were only moments late. If we’d not dragged our heels…”

“Or let so many others know what we sought,” Rogger added pointedly. “I know Kathryn meant well. But I find it strange that the ghawls should discover the skull shortly after you made your plea in the fieldroom.”

Tylar pictured Master Orquell. Even beyond the man’s clouded eyes, Tylar had noted the hunger shining through. Had word somehow reached Castellan Mirra down here? Or was it pure happenstance? Suspicion had already weakened Tashijan, stoked by Mirra’s manipulations. So which path was the more dangerous: to be too trusting or not enough?

A moan arose behind them.

“Left…to the left…” Brant choked out.

Out of the darkness, torchlight revealed another landing. The passageway headed the correct direction.

Tylar led the way and lifted his torch toward the passage. The flickering glow revealed only darkness and sealed doors. But that did not mean the shadows did not hide a legion.

“Close…” Brant confirmed it with a moan. He was now carried like a babe on the hip of the giant. One hand clawed tight to his throat.

Tylar turned to Rogger and held out his free hand. “Your lantern.”

The thief unhooked the bronze-and-glass lamp from his belt and passed it to him. Tylar thumbed the flame higher, then tossed the lantern in a high arc.

Glass shattered and flames spat with the angry hiss of a cat.

Darkness shredded and swirled away like burning ash. A bit of cloak caught flame and whisked down the hallway. A keening wail fled with it, setting all his hairs on end.

The daemon knights were here, buried in the darkness.

“Keep your torches up!” he ordered and entered the hall.

The firelight pushed back the shadows and anything hidden within. They gave chase, but Tylar did not forgo caution. If he had to burn through the bowels, he would have that skull.

He headed deeper into the level as it branched. Brant pointed the way. Passing a sealed room, the boy gasped. His hand raised, palsied and weak, pointing toward the door. Agony stole the boy’s words.

Tylar tried the latch. Locked.

Rogger passed him his torch, then slipped to a knee and worked with a thin dagger. A click of release sounded. He stood and took back his torch.

“The cask,” Tylar said. He would take no chances.

The giant passed him the small oil barrel he’d been carrying. It trailed a twist of soaked cloth. Rogger lit it with his flaming brand, then rested a hand on the latch.

Tylar nodded.

Rogger cracked the door open, and Tylar rolled the barrel through the gap. He joined Rogger and pulled the door closed, together bracing it shut. The small whooshing boom sounded. Flames lapped under the sill, then retreated.

Tylar shoved the door open, expecting to find a nest of burning knights. And though the oil had lit tapestries and flames chased across chairs and tables, there were no knights.

A single figure stood in the middle of the fiery room, untouched by any flame. Tylar noted a mist of Grace surrounding her, one of water and air, a cocoon of protection.

“Castellan Mirra.”

The brightness of the flaming room had no effect on her. She was not a creature of shadow like her legion. In truth, she looked little changed from when last Tylar had seen her. Same snow gray hair, secured plainly behind her ears, framing a serious face, but not necessarily a cold one. She wore a simple ankle-length gray shift, sashed with black at the waist, and soft black boots.

The only difference: She usually leaned on a cane.

Instead, she lifted the skull between her two hands. Blood dripped to the floor from sliced palms. She smiled warmly at him, welcoming.

Then she sang his name. “Tylar…”

And he was lost.

Through tears of fire, Brant saw Tylar fall to his knees at the threshold to the door. The torch tumbled from the regent’s fingers and rolled across the floor. Krevan collapsed in a similar posture, dropping both sword and brand. The woman Flagger went to her leader’s aid.

In the room, the old woman whispered in a lullaby voice, melodious and sweet. “I’ve been waiting so long for you.”

Though Brant’s bones burnt with fire, he still heard the lilt in her words. And he knew it for what it was.

Seersong.

Rogger grabbed Tylar by the back of his shadowcloak and yanked him back into the hall. “What are you doing?” he asked. Graceless, he seemed deaf to the melody.

“Come to me…” The old woman continued to sing.

Tylar fought Rogger. Krevan crawled.

Rogger threw an accusatory arm toward the old woman as if to scold her-but instead, a dagger flew from his fingertips.

She laughed.

The knife was swept aside like a leaf in a swirl of wind.

Doors opened up and down the hall, creaking ajar or banging wide. The daemons, cloaked in shadow, crept from their hiding places with a familiar rustle, filling the darkness, surrounding them on all sides.

All a trap.

And Brant had led them here.

“No…” he moaned.

Brant’s single word broke Tylar’s gaze upon the woman and back toward the others. Tylar tried to push away with one hand. “Go…run…!” he called to the others.

From the room, a hummed melody flowed again and drew Tylar’s attention back. His head swung around, swayed by the Dark Grace of the song. To the side, Krevan continued his slow crawl toward the room, dragging the ash-faced woman with him.

Surprisingly it was Sten who finally seemed to comprehend the depth of the trap. He backed a step. “Away-we must be away. They are lost.”

The captain drew his blade, while Dral hauled Brant up into his arms. The movement only stoked the fire inside him. He screamed, but the sound seared in his throat, unable to escape.

Unrelenting, Rogger attempted to haul Tylar, but the regent, lost to the song, swept out his sword and came within a hair of removing his friend’s head. Rogger stumbled back, letting him go.

And still she sang, humming, encouraging, welcoming.

Tylar and Krevan were caught in its melody, like flitterbees in a web.

“We must flee!” Sten cried out.

Brant wanted nothing more than to escape-from here, from the cursed fires that flamed out of the stone. But he had not come this far for nothing. His road had led him to this ruin. He would not turn back.

No…

But no one heard him. Maybe he hadn’t even said it aloud. Did he still have a tongue? He tried again, coughing feebly to clear the flames from his throat.

“No…”

Dral glanced down to him. “Master Brant?”

Thank the Grace-blessed oversized ears of the giant.

He could manage no more than a whisper, all but mute to the others. “Get…me…to her.”

Brant did not have to explain whom he meant. Dral glanced into the room. The way stood open.

The giant searched down at Brant, studying his face. He had no strength for words, but Dral must have read the desperation shining through his pained tears. The giant turned to the door, hitched Brant higher under one arm, and charged forward. He knocked the regent aside and bulled across the threshold and through the smatter of oily flames.

The old woman’s eyes widened at the attack. She lifted her arms but dared not let go of the skull. “Stop!” This was more a screech than a song.

Dral merely lowered his shoulder and lunged. Though Grace-born, the giant was not blessed now. The song held no sway. Brant felt a scintillation of power in the air, but Dral was no mere dagger on the wind. He was born of loam. Water and air were no match.

The giant was upon her in three strides. A massive fist shot out and smashed her square in her surprised face. She flew off her feet, blood spurting. The skull tumbled from her slippery palms and clattered to the floor. A tooth broke from it and skittered away.

Brant wriggled from the giant’s arms. He fell to the floor beside the skull. Fire continued to consume him. He stretched with arms that were surely sculptures of boiled fat and ash.

“Stay back!” the woman cried.

Dral strode toward her.

Brant’s hands closed upon the rogue’s skull, where all his heartache had begun. It would now end. Let them both be consumed together.

As his skin touched bone, the fire inside him snuffed out. There was no relief, no cooling balm, simply gone. It left Brant hollowed out. He had been gutted by the fire, and like the charred husk of a burnt stable, he collapsed inward on himself.

And kept falling.

Tylar’s wits returned like a fall of brass pinches, rattling and heavy in his head. Chaos surrounded him. He could make no sense of it for a breath. Beside him, Krevan rose from hands and knees, face screwed with equal confusion.

Tylar found the Godsword in his hand, but he had no memory of drawing it.

“The boy…” Rogger said at his shoulder, nodding his head to the room while keeping a torch high toward the passageway on the right. To the left, the Oldenbrook captain and Krevan’s woman did the same. Tylar’s torch lay at his toes, guttered and blown.

Beyond the torchlight, darkness stirred against the waning flames, drawing down upon them. They were being herded together, driven toward the room.

“Stop the boy!” Rogger said again, rattling those pinches in Tylar’s head back to some semblance of order.

He lifted his sword.

Brant sat in the center of the floor. Past the boy’s shoulder, the giant had Mirra by the throat, pressed against the far wall, dragging her off her toes. Tylar remembered enough.

Seersong.

He swung back to the boy. Brant stared toward him, but his face was empty. Yet, still something glowed behind the glass of his eye. Tylar knew it wasn’t the boy.

Brant opened his mouth.

Tylar rushed forward, sword high. He would not be snared by the lilt of Dark Grace again.

Too late.

Words flowed out the boy’s stretched mouth, echoing from deep within. “HELP THEM…”

It was no song. The agony behind the two words stayed Tylar’s hand. Also there was something oddly familiar about the sibilant cast to the voice.

Though Brant’s lips did not move and no breath seemed to escape his chest, words still flowed.

“HELP THEM… LET THEM ALL BURN… FREE THEM… LET THEM ALL BURN… FIND THEM… LET THEM ALL BURN… ”

It sounded almost like an argument. Even the cadence shifted back and forth, echoing up from some other world. Tylar paused with uncertainty.

But another had no such hesitation.

“What have you done!” Mirra wailed through the throttling hold of the giant. Her wild eyes found Tylar’s, fired with terror. “Kill the boy…before he wakes them! Tylar, kill the boy! ”

Refusing to be swayed again, Tylar backed a step.

“No!” the former castellan cried out. Her hand rose, bearing a small bone dagger. She drove the yellowed blade into the shoulder of the giant.

He bellowed, stumbling back and letting her free. But one arm swung out as he spun away. He cuffed her on the side of the head, felling her to the ground.

The giant caved to his knees. An arm lifted toward them, the same limb that had been wounded. From the impaled blade, a rotting spread out from his shoulder and down his arm. Flesh melted and putrefied to bone. Fingers fell away. The rot flowed to torso and neck. Half the giant’s face sagged on the one side, sloughing from the skull beneath. He screamed, wafting out an exhalation of pus and virulence-then collapsed face forward.

The stone floor silenced his scream.

Forever.

To the side, the boy continued his litany, like the rote cadences that clerics cast to the aether.

“HELP THEM…HELP THEM… LET THEM ALL BURN… ”

Then Rogger was there. He scooped the skull from the boy with a wrap of cloth. It stank of black bile. He shoved it into an empty sling over his shoulder.

Brant collapsed backward, sprawling out on the stone floor.

Was he dead, too?

Then an arm trembled up. Fingers scribed a pattern of confusion.

“Get the boy!” Tylar ordered Krevan. “We must get free from here.”

A moan escaped the boy as he was lifted up and tossed over the large man’s shoulder.

But Brant was not the only one to stir.

To the side, Mirra shoved to the wall, sitting up. “No escape…” she shuddered out.

Tylar turned to the door.

The Oldenbrook captain and Krevan’s woman backed away from the doorway and farther into the room. Beyond the threshold, darkness ate the light. The black ghawls had closed off their only escape.

Closer at hand, the captain’s torch sputtered out with one last gasp of embers and ash. They were down to two flaming brands, one borne by Rogger, the other by the gray-cloaked woman.

Too few to hold back a horde.

Proving this, shadows stretched into the room and spread across the walls. They were forced back. Knights formed out of the gloom, shifting in an ever-flowing weave of malevolence. Mirra was swallowed up along the edge of them.

Rogger sidled next to Tylar. “We need a way through them. Mayhap a little help from that black dog of yours. Turn daemon upon daemon.”

He nodded, sheathed his sword, and waved everyone behind him.

They needed some wedge here.

He grabbed his smallest finger of his left hand.

Agee wan clyy nee wan dred ghawl.

He yanked and snapped the digit straight back. From the sharp pain of the tiny break, a tide of pain spread outward, growing and swelling, a trickle becoming a flood. The world spun, and out of the tempest of pain, it burnt a hole into this world. Cloth burnt to ash over the black handprint on his chest, freeing what lay beneath. Gloom flowed out from his body, and the naetherspawn swept into this world, taking shape and sculpting itself from the smoke.

Wings unfurled, and a snaking neck stretched, sprouting mane and muzzle. Both wyrm and wolf. Fiery eyes opened on his world.

As the naethryn filled the room, it drew off all of Tylar’s strength and sturdiness of limb. His back was bent, joints callused, and his knee turned askew. He was no longer regent, no longer knight -only a broken man again. Gnarled fingers brushed through the tether of smoke that linked to the naethryn.

It needed no guidance, this black dog of his. It knew his heart.

“Keep back!” Rogger warned their party. “One touch will kill. Burn the bones right out of your flesh.”

Even the shadows heeded the thief’s admonishment.

Like a wave receding across a beach, the darkness retreated out the doorway, taking Mirra with it. She was nowhere to be seen.

The naethryn hunched, wings high, head low. It bellowed, maw stretched wide, baring fangs of Gloom and tongue of black fire-but not a sound escaped it. Still, a mighty wind blasted outward. At the door, darkness shredded away under the force of the silent gale, ripped and scattered. The shadows emptied of any lurkers hidden within its folds, becoming lighter, weightless.

Rogger pulled Tylar straighter, supporting him under a thin shoulder. The thief was stronger than most imagined. “Let’s go!” Rogger ordered and passed the Oldenbrook captain his torch. “Keep ’em high! Don’t let any of the buggers near.”

Krevan-burdened with the boy who still lolled in a half-daze across one shoulder-grabbed one of the fallen torches. There was still enough oil to ignite its end from his cohort’s torch.

They stepped as a group toward the door.

Beyond the threshold, words reached them. “Kill the naethryn,” Mirra ordered. “Then bring me the god’s skull…and the head of the boy.”

As the naethryn gathered its wind for another assault, Tylar sensed a shift in the shadows. Something approached the threshold. The daemon bellowed again, blowing back the thickening darkness yet again. But this time the retreating shadows revealed a form in the doorway, resolute against the assault.

A knight, his cloak billowing in the naethryn’s wind.

One of the black ghawls.

The knight stepped forward, little intimidated by the wan firelight, emboldened by the horde at his back, the entire legion’s power flowing into him, armoring him against the flames.

Tylar recognized the bloodless countenance under a fall of white hair.

“Perryl…”

The knight lifted a sword carved of Gloom. As he shifted it higher, streaks of emerald flowed along its length, glinting with malevolence and poison.

“Kill the naethryn!” Mirra screamed from the darkness.

And her daemon obeyed.

Kathryn stood on the first landing with Argent. They had a view to the hall below that separated the tower from the Masterlevels. The yawning archway stood open.

At least for now.

Two knights manned the gate’s greatwheel, ready to lower it at the warden’s command. Another two knights stood with sledges, prepared to break the clutches on the chains and bring the barrier crashing down if necessary.

To either side, flames blazed from giant braziers. Wall torches spread outward down both hallways. Still, all the light offered little illumination of what lay below. The stairs spiraled away into the depths, dark and silent.

“They should’ve been back by now,” Argent said.

“A little longer,” she urged.

“A time was set. Longer and they are surely corrupted or dead.”

She turned to Argent, ready to argue, ready to fight. She had no strength for it. Worry had worn her hollow.

Argent read something in her face. In turn, the steely sternness softened at the edges of his lips. “A moment more,” he whispered and turned to face the same dark gate. “No longer.”

Tylar faced Perryl-or rather the naethryn did. Two creatures born of Gloom. The Godsword had failed to kill the daemon earlier. Would Meeryn’s naethryn fare any better?

“Stay back,” Tylar warned those behind him.

Perryl stepped into the room, long of limb and somehow moving with an unnatural grace he had never shown in life. His sword carved a path through the air, leaving a smoking trail. A noxious miasma accompanied it, like the vapor from a bloated corpse.

Tylar’s naethryn eyed his path, cocking its head one way, then the other, sizing up-then striking with the speed of a serpent. It snapped at Perryl, but he was no longer there, a blur of shadow to the side.

The knight stabbed his sword.

The naethryn coiled back to avoid the point and struck out with an edge of wing. Perryl was clipped in the shoulder and spun away. Still, the blow did damage. The misty darkness on that side collapsed to mere cloth and bony arm.

Perryl backed, shook the limb, and the foggy darkness wrapped him up again. He circled wide, searching for a weakness. He took another step to the left. Then, faster than the human eye could follow, he ducked under a wing and thrust his sword toward the throat of the naethryn.

The naethryn reared back from the blade.

Perryl stumbled as he missed. His sword point dropped.

The naethryn lunged forward.

“No!” Tylar yelled. He had recognized the feint. He had taught Perryl the move, as all knights taught their squires. It was called Naethryn’s Folly.

And so it proved to be.

As the beast snapped at the knight, Perryl turned heel and wrist, catching himself. The sword point jabbed up as the naethryn lunged down. At the last moment, perhaps heeding his yell, the creature hoved to the side. Instead of the blade driving square into the exposed throat, its edge sliced the left side.

Tylar felt it as a searing pain across his own ribs.

He gasped, his legs going loose under him. He thought Rogger would hold him up, but the thief was gone. His knees struck the stone floor. The naethryn reared up and back, wings spread wide, eyes fiery with pain.

Perryl moved under its guard, going for its exposed belly.

But Rogger had slid under the right wing of the naethryn. Glass glinted in both hands. He threw one, then the other. Snowballs made of crystal. Repostilaries. Small vessels full of humours.

Perryl, focused on the fight, had failed to note the thief.

The globes smashed-one at Perryl’s toes, splashing his legs, the other full on the chest, drenching him.

Rogger rolled to the side, circling back.

Perryl’s legs staggered, stiffening. The cloak that billowed with Gloom and shadow turned to cloth, tangling the knight further. Perryl wrenched away, barely avoiding the jaws of the naethryn.

Again Tylar caught a glimpse beneath the flowing cloak: of naked, translucent skin, beneath which something squirmed and kneaded, writhing under the surface. Then Perryl dove into the waiting darkness at the door, seeking refuge and escape.

Rogger returned to Tylar’s side and hauled him to his feet. His left side still burnt, but he found enough strength to stand and stumble alongside him.

“Now!” Tylar said. “Before they regroup.”

Obeying the desire in his heart, the naethryn drove through the door ahead of them, clearing a path. They followed, encircled by flames. But the legion appeared in full rout.

As they fled, his beast lunged out into the shadows and yanked something squirming in its jaws, like a waterstrider spearing a fish. The naethryn shook its catch and tossed it far down a side hall with a flip of its snaking neck. A keening scream marked its flight.

Tylar glanced to Rogger. “You saved us back there.”

“Actually, you did.”

Tylar frowned at the thief.

“Those were repostilaries of your own saliva. Delia gave them to me before we headed down. Thought we might be able to use them.”

“Why-?” Then Tylar understood. Each humour had its own effect on Grace. Saliva weakened an aspect.

“Wasn’t sure it would work against Dark Grace, but apparently Grace is Grace. Figured it might dull him, knock his legs out from him.”

It certainly had. If Perryl had finished his blow…followed through with Naethryn’s Folly…

Tylar rubbed the fiery slash across his ribs.

Before they knew it, they had reached the stairs.

Tylar reversed their roles. “Burn a path up!” he ordered the others.

He followed behind, leaning on Rogger. Below, the naethryn filled the lower stairs. It nabbed another shape out of the shadows and flung it back down the stairs.

Still, Tylar knew it hadn’t been Perryl. He could almost sense the ghawl’s malevolent attention, a burning hatred. Was there anything of his former friend left in that husk?

Round and round, they climbed up toward the warmth and flames above. Light again bathed around them.

A shout rose ahead. It came from the Oldenbrook captain. “They’re closing the gate!”

Krevan bellowed. “Wait! We’re coming!”

Tylar limped around a turn of the spiral. He watched the flaming eye of the gateway slowly winking shut.

They all began to shout.

The lowering eyelid stopped. They hurried forward, but Rogger slowed Tylar’s step.

“Perhaps you’d best rein in your dog first. Not the time to be piling out of the cellars tethered to a smoking daemon.”

Tylar nodded. He patted his cloak.

“Here,” Rogger said and passed him one of his daggers.

Tylar took it, sliced his palm, and allowed the blood to well. It was the only way to recall the naethryn once it had been set free. With his own blood. He reached the red palm to the smoky link between him and the naethryn.

It knew his intent and glanced back. Fiery eyes met his. Then Tylar’s bloody fingers closed on the tether of Gloom. With his touch, a fine scintillation washed out, cascading over the naethryn, erasing features-then all collapsed back toward him.

Tylar braced for the mule-kick of its impact. Still, it struck with more force than he had expected. This was the second time in one night he had summoned the beast. He prayed it would be the last. He welcomed the return of his hale form. After a year, what had once felt familiar-his broken body-now felt foreign, like the life of another man.

And that troubled him.

The hobbled form was his true form. What he wore the rest of the year had been the illusion, born of Grace to hold the naethryn. Releasing the beast only reminded him of the truth.

It was foolish to forget it.

The force struck his chest and knocked him back a full step. His arms cartwheeled and his legs tripped on the stairs. He stumbled to keep upright-and with limbs now straight and hale again, he succeeded, leaning one palm against the wall to stead himself.

As he lowered his arm, a twinge of pain flashed in his hand. He lifted it before his face. The smallest finger remained bent at a crooked angle. He had snapped the digit to free the demon. Always in the past, once he returned the naethryn to its roost, all would heal.

He stared at his palm. As usual, even the cut had vanished, as though it had never happened.

Rogger noted the broken finger. “That’s troubling…”

Tylar lowered his arm. He’d worry about it later. The others had already cleared the gateway.

“Tylar?” a voice called. Kathryn stood framed by the fires. “Is everything all right?”

He climbed back up into the warmth and brightness. Still, as his hand throbbed, he feared he carried a part of the darkness out with him.

Ducking under the half-lowered gate, he joined Kathryn.

“Lock it down,” he ordered.

The knights again wheeled the massive wyrmwood barrier into place. The heat of the hall, flames all around, should have warmed him. But they didn’t. It was not over.

A shout erupted down the hall.

All eyes swung to a pair of knights guarding the far gate, the one that led to the outer bailey of Stormwatch tower.

Even from here, Tylar noted ice and frost sweeping across the inner surface of the gate. Timbers cracked with echoing pops.

The two knights on guard at the gate retreated-but not fast enough.

The entire barrier blew away in an explosion of frozen wood and brittled iron. An ice fog rolled into the hall. Torches on either side of the hallway flickered, then died.

Through the fog, a shape formed, stepping out atop a sheen of ice that flooded across the stone. She stopped and stood naked to the world, rimed in frost.

A lost ally returned.

Tylar stared in horror. “Eylan…”