The Black Road

EIGHTEEN

Buyard Cholik stood on the platform above the snake's head and awaited the arrival of his guest. Anticipation filled Cholik as he surveyed the empty pews around him. That morning, he had been enthused to see the large room overflowing with people. Every day the service was larger than the day before. There was no longer seating for all those in attendance. Even building as quickly as they were able, the construction crews weren't able to keep pace with the growth.

Yet tonight there was only one person in attendance, and Cholik's elation soared even higher. He remained silent as Lord Darkulan paused at the great central entrance.

Around the lord, a score of armored guards held lanterns and bared weapons. The lantern light glinted from scale mail and keen-edged steel. Voices whispered, and in their barely heard words Cholik detected fear and hostility.

Lord Darkulan was a young man of thirty. His regal bearing showed the regimen he used to stay in shape as a warrior as well as a leader of men. An open-faced helmet with fierce curved horns framed his lean, hawklike features. A mustache followed the sneering curve up his mouth. He wore a dark green cloak that blended with his black breeches and tunic over a dark green shirt. Although it was hidden, Cholik was certain the lord wore the mystical chainmail armor beneath the tunic.

Impatiently, Lord Darkulan waved to one of his warriors.

The man nodded and stepped into the main area of the cathedral. His metal-shod boots clanked as he crossed the stone floor into the cathedral proper.

Cholik raised his voice, knowing from the way the room was constructed that it would be easily heard. "Lord Darkulan, this meeting time was set aside for you. No one else may enter this part of the church."

The warriors swung their lanterns in Cholik's direction. Some of the lanterns had bull's-eye construction and lit on Cholik directly.

Cholik squinted against the blinding light but did not raise his hand to shield his eyes.

"These are only my personal bodyguards," Lord Darkulan responded. "They will offer you no harm. In fact, after the episode today, I thought you would appreciate their presence."

"No," Cholik said. "You requested this meeting, and I acceded to it. We will keep it like that."

"And if I insist?" Lord Darkulan asked.

Cholik spoke words of power and thrust his hands straight out. Flames leapt from his fingertips and ignited the oil-filled channels around the snake's head. Alive once more, the snake's head leapt from the stone wall toward the guard.

Unnerved, the guard threw himself backward. His metal-shod boots scraped sparks from the stone floor as he hurried to rejoin the other guards. The warriors clustered around Lord Darkulan, trying to draw him back to safety. Lanterns swirled like a cloud of fireflies in the main entrance.

"Would you have your mistress die?" Cholik asked as he rode the swaying snake's head. "Would you have your lady hung by the neck? Would you have your own good name dragged through the mud and dung of this city? Especially when I can change all that?"

Lord Darkulan cursed his men and fought them off him. Reluctantly, the warriors stepped away from him. Their leaders talked quickly to their lord, trying to get him to listen to their reason.

The lord paused at the mouth of the entrance and stared at Cholik atop the stone snake's head. Below Cholik, fireclung to the snake's jaws, and he knew it must be a horrific sight in the middle of the dark cathedral.

"They said you were killed this morning," Lord Darkulan said.

Cholik spread his arms, enjoying the role he played. "Do I look like a dead man, Lord Darkulan?"

"More like he's a zombie," one of the guards muttered.

"I'm no zombie," Cholik said. "Come closer, Lord Darkulan, that you may hear my heartbeat. Perhaps, should you truly not believe, I'll let you bleed me. Zombies and dead things don't bleed as the living do."

"Why can't my men accompany me?" Lord Darkulan asked.

"Because if I am to save the people in your life whom you wish saved-if I am to save you, Lord Darkulan-you must trust me." Cholik waited, trying not to act as though he had as much depending on the lord's decision as he did. He wondered if Kabraxis were watching, then realized that wasn't the proper question. The proper question was from where the demon watched.

Lord Darkulan took a lantern from one of his men, steeled himself for a moment, then strode into the cathedral. "How is it that you know so much about my business and the affairs of state?" he demanded.

"I am the Wayfinder," Cholik declared. "Chosen of Dien-Ap-Sten himself. How could I not know?"

"A few among those who counsel me suggest that somehow you and this church are behind the troubles that plague me."

"Do you believe that, Lord Darkulan?" Cholik asked.

The lord hesitated. "I don't know."

"This morning you saw me dead, slain by a quarrel from the hand of a treacherous assassin. Yet here I stand. I am whole and alive and ready to help you in your hour of need, my lord. Or perhaps I should turn from you as you have turned from Dien-Ap-Sten and this church since we first began our sojourn among you." Cholik paused. "I could do that, you know. There are some among my owncounsel who believe the assassin who tried to kill me today was hired by you and that you are jealous of my own rise to power within your community."

"Those are lies," Lord Darkulan responded. "I have never been one to skulk around."

"And does Lady Darkulan still feel that is a fair assessment of you?" Cholik asked softly.

Lord Darkulan's hand dropped to the hilt of his saber. His voice turned gruff and hard. "Don't press your luck, priest."

"I stared death in the eye today, Lord Darkulan. Your threats won't carry much weight with me. I know that I walk hand-in-hand with Dien-Ap-Sten."

"I could have you driven from this church," Lord Darkulan said angrily.

"There are more citizens and visitors here who wouldn't allow that to happen than you have army or navy to get it done."

"You don't know-"

"No," Cholik interrupted, causing the stone snake's head to rear up above the lord. "You don't know what you're dealing with."

The snake opened its fanged jaws and spewed fire against the stone floor in front of the guards and drove them back.

"You need me," Cholik told Lord Darkulan. "And you need the salvation that Dien-Ap-Sten can offer. If your mistress is saved, your wife will be saved. If both women are saved, your power will be saved."

"Letting you stay here was a mistake," Lord Darkulan said. "I should have had you banished from the city."

"After the first night of miracles here," Cholik said, "you wouldn't have been able to do that. Dien-Ap-Sten and the Way of Dreams bring power to people. Wealth and privilege. Both are for the taking. Health for the sick and infirm and dying." He silently commanded the snake's head to the ground where it lay prone.

Lord Darkulan stepped backward, but the flame stillroiled where it had struck the stone floor. He was separated from his men, but Cholik was also grimly aware that some of the guards had bows, and even knives could be thrown that distance.

"You did the only thing you could in coming here tonight," Cholik said. He walked down the platform circling the stone snake's neck.

The snake lay quiet and still, but the fiery eyes darted and watched. Its tongue, smoldering and steaming, flicked out rapidly, scenting the air. Deep orange embers swirled through the still air inside the dark cathedral, turning to black ash shortly before reaching the ceiling. Waves of heat rolled off the stone snake.

Cholik stopped in front of the snake, knowing the animated creature outlined him, making him seem like a dark shadow in front of a dreadful beast.

"Perhaps you think you have sealed your doom by coming here tonight, Lord Darkulan," Cholik said softly.

The lord said nothing. Fear etched deep shadows into his face despite the light given off by his lantern and the snake.

"I assure you," Cholik said, "that the opposite is true: you have sealed your future." He gestured at the snake, feeling the furnace blast of heat as the creature opened its jaws. "Walk with me, Lord Darkulan. Give your worries and fears over to Dien-Ap-Sten that he may make them go away."

Lord Darkulan stood his ground.

"You were here today," Cholik said. "You witnessed the miracle that Dien-Ap-Sten performed on the Black Road by separating the two boys locked in each other's flesh. Have you ever seen such a thing done before?"

"No," the lord replied in a quaking voice.

"Have you even heard of such a thing?"

"Never."

"With Dien-Ap-Sten at his side," Cholik promised, "a man who ventures down the Way of Dreams may do anything." He held out his hand. "Come with me that I may show you even more miracles."

Hesitation showed on Lord Darkulan's face.

"By morning," Cholik said, "it will be too late. The poison will have claimed the life of your mistress. Her father will demand the life of your wife in return."

"How am I supposed to save them by going with you?"

"On the Way of Dreams," Cholik said, "all things are made possible. Come."

Trying not to show his fear, Lord Darkulan stepped forward and allowed Cholik to take his arm and guide him.

"Be brave, Lord Darkulan," Cholik advised. "You are going to see wonders seldom seen by human eyes. Step into the snake's mouth, and all your fear will be taken from you if you but believe."

Lord Darkulan followed a half-step behind Cholik. They stepped over the stone snake's sharp teeth and followed the black, smoldering ribbon of tongue down into the snake's throat, where it became a black road that wound down into a long hallway.

"Where are we?" Lord Darkulan asked.

"On the Way of Dreams," Cholik replied. "We're going to find your destiny. It takes a strong man to follow the teachings of Dien-Ap-Sten. You will become an even stronger man."

The hallway widened and changed a number of times, but the Black Road remained constant beneath Cholik's feet. He'd talked to several parishioners who had ventured along the Black Road to be healed or receive a blessing, and all of them had described the path differently. Some had said they'd journeyed down familiar hallways, while others were taken through places they'd never seen and hoped they would never see.

A green sun dawned in the hallway before them, and suddenly they were no longer in a hallway. Now the Black Road clung to a cliffside. The path they followed was so high that clouds obscured the view below. Still, the harsh mountain range towered above. Ice glinted on the peaks only a little farther up.

Lord Darkulan stopped. "I want to go back."

"You can't," Cholik replied. "Look." He turned and pointed back along the way they had come.

Flames clung to the Black Road, twisting and curling three times the height of a man.

"The only way open to you is forward," Cholik said.

"I've made a mistake," Lord Darkulan announced.

"This was not the first," Cholik replied.

Spinning abruptly, Lord Darkulan raised his sword, bringing it to within inches of Cholik's unprotected throat. "You will let me out of here now, or I'll have your head from your shoulders!"

Secure in the knowledge that Kabraxis watched over him, Cholik grasped the sword. The sharp edges cut into the flesh of his hand. Blood trickled down the blade and dripped to the Black Road, giving birth to fist-sized fires at their feet.

"No," Cholik said, "you won't." Power coursed through him, turning the sword red-hot in a heartbeat.

Screaming in pain, Lord Darkulan released his weapon and stumbled back. He held his burned hand in disbelief.

Cholik ignored the sizzling pain of his own burning hand, ignored the stink of scorched flesh and the smoke that curled up. Much worse things had happened to him during the trips down the Black Road that Kabraxis had led him on. He could still occasionally feel the demon's talons rooting around inside his brain, scraping against his skull.

Swiveling, Cholik flung the lord's sword over the cliff's edge. He held out his burned and bleeding hand for inspection.

"You're insane," Lord Darkulan said in disbelief.

"No," Cholik stated calmly. "I believe in Dien-Ap-Sten and the power of the Way of Dreams." He held his hand up. Even as he watched, the cuts knitted together, and the burns healed and went away. In less than a moment, his hand was completely healed. "You can believe, too. Hold out your hand, and accept what I am telling you."

Trembling, afraid, and hurting, Lord Darkulan held his hand up.

"Believe," Cholik said softly. "Believe, and you will be given the power to heal yourself and end your misery."

Lord Darkulan concentrated. Sweat popped out on his brow. "I can't," he whispered hoarsely. "Please, I beg you. Make the pain go away."

"I can't," Cholik said. "That is for you to do. Just come to Dien-Ap-Sten willingly. Only a little faith is needed. Trust that."

Slowly, then, Lord Darkulan's hand began to heal. The burns scabbed over, and only a moment or two after that, smooth flesh remained where the horrible burns had been.

"I've done it." Lord Darkulan gazed at his uninjured hand in disbelief. His fingers still trembled.

"Yes," Cholik said. "But the worst is yet to come."

Without warning, the ledge broke away, dropping them into the abyss over the clouds.

Lord Darkulan screamed.

Cholik controlled his own fear. He was on the Black Road now. The warriors and priests who had become part of his inner circle had all experienced much worse than this. All of those men who had reached this point had to relive a horrific nightmare that was their deepest secret.

The bottom of the long fall through the cottony clouds wasn't the bone-breaking stop against jagged rocks that Cholik had expected. Instead, he landed light as a feather in the midst of a moon-dappled bog under a clear night sky.

Lord Darkulan plummeted into the bog, disappearing with a huge splash that threw black mud in all directions.

Cholik grew worried after a time that something had gone wrong. Initiates had died along the way of the Black Road, but generally Kabraxis was selective about who was brought into the inner circle.

"He's fine," the demon said. "Give him a moment more. I found this place and this event in a tight secret place that he seldom goes to these days. Pay attention."

Cholik waited, amazed that he could stand on the bog's surface tension.

Then Lord Darkulan shoved an arm up through the bog, clapped it onto a semi-submerged tree trunk that had fallen a long time ago. Mud covered his head and face, stripping away the regal look and leaving only the frightened man behind.

Lord Darkulan reached toward Cholik. "Help me! Hurry!"

"What is he afraid of?" Cholik asked Kabraxis. Neither of them made a move toward the struggling lord. "The bog is not so deep that he will drown."

"He fears the past," the demon said. "And he should."

Fearfully, Lord Darkulan gazed over his shoulder at the swamp. Naked and dead trees stood out from the loose mud. Dead brush with ashy, curling leaving lined the shore. Skeletons of small creatures, some of them recently dead so that patches of fur clung to them, lay partially submerged in the swamp and on the shore. Dead birds clung upside down by their claws from naked tree branches. Frog corpses floated in the bog.

Lord Darkulan screamed, then was pulled under the bog by something strong and fierce. Bubbles erupted from the mud.

"Is he going to die here?" Cholik asked.

"He will," Kabraxis answered, "if I don't save him. He can't fight this nightmare. It's too strong for him."

The man's arm shot out of the bog again, found the tree trunk, and succeeded in pulling himself out of the muck. When he appeared, a skeleton clung to his back.

Years of submersion in the bog had turned the dead woman's skin to leather, and it sank in tightly to her skull. Once, Cholik knew, she might have been pretty, but there was no way to know that now. The soft blue dress that might once have hidden womanly curves now clung to the emaciated form of the horror that rode Lord Darkulan's back. The dead woman bent close to him, teeth showing through her ruined flesh. She licked out a dead, leathery tongue that caught his ear, then drew it back between her broken teeth. When she bit down, crushing the earlobe like a grape, crimson sprayed.

Lord Darkulan screamed in pain and flailed, trying desperately to shove the dead woman from him and haul himself onto the tree trunk.

"Help me!" the lord called out.

"Who is the woman?" Cholik asked.

"Once," Kabraxis said, "she was his lover. It was during the early years before his marriage. She was a common girl named Azyka, a shopkeeper's daughter. Before the marriage, she told Lord Darkulan she was going to have his child. Knowing he couldn't allow that, Lord Darkulan killed her and left her body in this bog outside Bramwell."

"The girl was never found?" Cholik asked.

"No."

Cholik watched the horrified lord fighting to maintain his grip on the moss-encrusted tree trunk. The dead woman's weight steadily bore him under. Cholik was not amazed by Kabraxis's story. As a priest of the Zakarum Church, he was no stranger to the special privileges invoked by royalty. In Westmarch's history, several murders had been forgotten about and the murderers absolved by special dispensation from the church.

"Help me!" Lord Darkulan screamed.

Kabraxis strode forward. His large feet left only small ripples on the bog water and never once became wet. "Lord Darkulan," the demon called.

The lord glanced up, seeing the demon for the first time. For a moment, Lord Darkulan froze, but the dead woman chewing his ear into ragged, bloody bits caught his attention again. He fought against her, losing his grip on the tree trunk and plunging into the bog up to his chin. The dead woman's hair floated on the bog water.

"Lord Darkulan," the demon said. "I am Dien-Ap-Sten. I am your salvation."

"You're no salvation," Lord Darkulan cried. "You're a demon."

"And you're a drowning man," Kabraxis stated. "Accept me or die."

"I'll not be tricked by one of your illusions-"

The dead woman reached up behind Lord Darkulan and knotted her skeletal fingers in his hair. When she yanked, Lord Darkulan vanished beneath the black muck of the bog.

Kabraxis stood patiently waiting.

For a moment, Cholik believed it was done and that the lord had died in the bog with the specter of the girl he had murdered so long ago. The chill of the swamp blew through Cholik, and he wrapped his arms around himself. As many times as he had ventured down the Black Road, he had never gotten used to the experience. Each time was unique, each fear different.

Lord Darkulan's hand broke the surface, and Kabraxis's hand was there to catch it. Effortlessly, the demon hauled the lord from the muck and the mire with the dead woman still riding him.

"Live or die," Kabraxis offered calmly. "The choice is yours."

Lord Darkulan hesitated only a moment. "Live. May the Light forgive me, I want to live."

A cruel smile carved Kabraxis's horrendous face. " I forgive you," the demon mocked. He continued pulling the muddy, bloody lord from the swamp. The dead woman still clung to Lord Darkulan's back, biting his mangled ear and scratching his face with the claws of her free hand.

Kabraxis backhanded the dead woman from Lord Darkulan's back. When he finished hauling the man up, Cholik found that they all once more stood on the solid ground of the Black Road twisting through the high mountains. The swamp was nowhere to be seen.

Lord Darkulan gave in to his fear, shaking and shivering before the demon's wrath. "Don't kill me," the lord pleaded.

"I won't kill you," Kabraxis said, pushing the man to his knees before him, humbling him. "I am going to give you your life."

Shuddering, Lord Darkulan stayed still before the demon.

"You are weak." Kabraxis spoke in deep tones. "I will beyour strength." The demon wrapped one of his large hands around Lord Darkulan's head. "You are unguided. I will be your design." The fingers elongated into sharp spikes. "By your own hand and childish desires of flesh, you are unmade. I will make you a man and a leader of men." With a quick snap of his wrist, the demon drove his spiked fingers through Lord Darkulan's skull. Blood leaked down his face, threading through the mud that clung to his features. "Mind, body, and soul, you are mine!»

Lightning flashed through the dark sky above the mountains, followed immediately by the rumbling roar of thunder that shattered all other sounds. The Black Road trembled beneath Cholik's feet, and for a dreadful moment he thought the whole mountain range was going to fall.

Then the lightning and the thunder faded, and Kabraxis withdrew his spiked fingers from Lord Darkulan's skull.

"Rise," the demon ordered, "and begin the new life that I have given you."

Lord Darkulan rose, and as he did the mud and fatigue and blood vanished from him. He stood straight and tall, clear-eyed and calm. "I hear and obey."

"Only one thing yet remains," Kabraxis said. "You must bear my mark that I may keep watch over you."

Without hesitation, Lord Darkulan stripped away his tunic, chainmail shirt, and blouse beneath to bare his chest. "Here," he offered. "Over my heart that I may keep you close to me."

Kabraxis placed his palm over Lord Darkulan's chest. When he removed his hand, the tattoo that was the demon's mark marred the lord's flesh.

"You are in my service," the demon said.

"Till the end of my days," Lord Darkulan said.

"Go then, Lord Darkulan, and know that you have the power to heal your mistress and prevent your wife's hanging. Draw a bit of your blood, mix it in wine, and have her drink it to cure her."

Lord Darkulan agreed and offered his undying loyalty to the demon once more, then followed the Black Roadback out of the stone snake's mouth. At the other end of the Black Road, Cholik once more saw the interior of the great cathedral.

"So now you have him," Cholik said, watching as Lord Darkulan rejoined his guards.

"We have him," Kabraxis agreed.

Surprised that the demon didn't sound more satisfied, Cholik looked at him. "Is something wrong?"

"There is a man I have learned of," the demon said. "Taramis Volken. He's a demon hunter, and he has picked up my trail."

"How?"

"It doesn't matter. After tonight, he will no longer be a concern to me. But after the burned man attempted to kill you today, which I did not see coming, I think you should tighten security around the church." Kabraxis paused. "Lord Darkulan should be more than willing to aid you with that."

"There's no way to tighten security completely in the church," Cholik objected. "We admit too many people, and many of them we can't identify, to screen everyone."

"Do it better," Kabraxis snapped.

"Of course," Cholik said, bowing his head and watching as the demon vanished from sight. Cholik's thoughts rushed, scrambling over one another in his head. Who was this demon hunter Kabraxis feared? In their year and more together, Cholik had never seen the demon concerned about anything. The matter was puzzling and more than a little unsettling, even after Kabraxis's assurances that the matter was taken care of.

And how was it that Kabraxis had taken care of the man who hunted him?