THE SAGA OF BOY: BOOK ONE
Chapter 9: Funeral Fire
"Was I really that naive? Look at us! Traipsing off to Gods knew where, more concerned about a wizard than the danger we were facing. How in the hells did we live as long as we did!?"
"Pure luck, as much as I hate to admit it, does sometimes play as big a role as the Gods do in such circumstances. One wrong move at any one of a hundred points and you would be nothing more than one more unfulfilled destiny consumed by worms. I don't think any mortal, perhaps any God has an idea of how many worlds have been lost, or saved by a chance misstep too near the abyss."
"But look at us, we were so...young, almost helpless then."
"Old enough to attempt murder, young enough to fail at it."
"That...Do we have to bring that up? It wasn't a proud moment for me."
"What good would it do to weigh your proud moments if not against those you'd rather forget? Peace... there is time yet. For there to be murder, there must first be hate."
The main keep was still open to the elements, with the echo of dripping water reflecting from some place deep in the corridors. The slightest breeze sent up a whistling moan while weaving through open hallways and window frames, as if stirring the restless spirits of the dead in its passing. Ramses nodded in some satisfaction, impervious to the shivers that crept up the spines of the others.
"We can at least leave the horses here, the walls look sturdy enough. We should try to find the source of that dripping, it may be drinkable water."
His companions looked dubiously from the bare tops of the ancient walls to the small piles of broken stone that had crumbled from them throughout the years. There seemed to be an unspoken agreement that they'd rather have rain than rock falling on their heads in the night, and they settled their horses and equipment near the center of the old hall. A few stunted, twisted trees had sprouted in the windblown dirt, and sent roots seeking moisture through tiny cracks in the mortar. Nathanial tested their hold, and found they would serve better than he'd thought for a tether line.
As he worked to settle the horses, Nathanial's eyes were drawn more and more to Leto's curious behavior. With an almost forgotten wisp of grass in his teeth and a distant expression in his eyes, he crept carefully around to each doorway leading from the room and simply stood for several minutes. When Ramses cleared his throat enquiringly behind him Leto raised an abrupt finger in a demand for silence. The Paladin looked somewhat affronted, but also curious. After a tense moment Leto nodded his head in satisfaction and strode back to the center of the room. With a final turn towards each doorway he paused and flicked the blade of grass towards the northernmost portal.
"I believe the water is that way, at least as far as I can tell."
Nathanial strained his ears and held his breath to listen. He could hear a minute difference in the volume of the drip from the northern doorway, so slight that he was impressed that Leto could catch it at all. His own hearing was, as far as he could tell, unusually keen. If Leto wasn't simply guessing, his must be as good or better.
"He's right, it's that way, but it's a long way off," Nathanial reported.
Ramses nodded and began walking in that direction after tying a pair of empty waterskins to his belt. Nathanial sighed and activated another alchemical light, averting his eyes this time from the flash. He retrieved a length of rope from his saddle, a package of rations and his own empty waterskins before following the others through the doorway.
A shiver went up Nathanial's spine and raised the hairs on the back of his neck at the eerie silence that hung almost physically in the air. He had taken no more than a dozen steps into the room when he felt a sudden, hysterical urge to laugh and dispel the rising tension. He couldn't comprehend the gut feeling of danger when there was no possible source, especially when a quick glance at the others showed only curiosity or disgust over the contents of the room. The battle between instinct and rationality inside him caused him to break out in a light sweat as his heart began pounding hard enough to feel in his eardrums. He saw Whisper give him a pitying glance out of the corner of her eye and knew she thought he was afraid. How could he explain to her the lurching urge to flee, screaming from this place, when from all appearances the room had lain quiet for centuries? He couldn't, and while every step into that room became an effort of willpower, he knew in his mind that he could never run from this room and still be able to look the others in the eye if they ever met again.
In the trembling glow from the alchemist light they could see dozens of broken skeletons littering the floor. Ancient remains of clothing and rusted weapons were scattered amongst them as if all had been tossed haphazardly into the room for disposal. Nathanial drew in his breath and nearly gagged at the metallic rotting odor that filled the air. Even Ramses was taken aback when his foot barely struck an ancient skull, which promptly crumbled to a thick wet ash. Perhaps some of the nervousness that consumed Nathanial had been felt by the Paladin, for he drew his sword as a precaution and leaned down over the crumbled skeleton to examine it. He reached out to carefully pull loose a scrap of cloth still bearing part of an insignia, but the ancient fabric separated into fibrous dust at his touch.
"Curious," he murmured, "how did they retain their shape for this long? Surely wild animals would have disturbed them, or the wind..."
He looked up, puzzled, and his thoughts were nearly echoed by Leto.
"What wind?"
Nathanial felt somewhat better at having one of the sources of tension identified. There was no air moving in the room, not even from the open doorway they had entered from. Their breath seemed even to stop inches from their open mouths. Nathanial fumbled for his Morningstar and moved the alchemist light to his right hand. It was shaking so badly that the light jumped around them in an eerie impression of a dancing white fire. Whisper strode over to Nathanial in disgust.
"Give me that!" she ordered, "and stop giving yourself the willees! You're practically jumping at shadows."
Leshar was affecting a pose of boredom, though Nathanial had seen his eyes flicker into the corners of the room in search of danger when he thought he was unobserved.
"Yes Boy, whatever is wrong? One would think you'd never seen a dead body before."
Nathanial stared at him in shock, feeling the blood drain from his face. His rising caution screamed to him, "He knows! He knows! By the Gods how does he know!? It was by every drop of strength in his mind that he wrenched control from his instinct to flee. "He can't possibly know, it is your paranoia talking, he's fishing for weaknesses in you."
"fey-child, murderer, devil spawn..." The paranoia whispered back to him. "Stupid! He met you in a bar littered with corpses," retorted the voice of reason in his mind. At this assertation of the obvious, the paranoia retreated to a controllable distance. He relaxed ever so slightly and swept the room with a more objective eye. It was only a slight movement beyond Leshar that drew his eyes in time to shout a warning.
"Ramses! Behind you!"
A rusted longsword had levitated quietly from the stone floor as they were talking, and positioned itself to strike the Paladin as he knelt beside the skeleton. Ramses turned swiftly on one knee and blocked the attack with his own sword.
The party looked around the room in dazed surprise as more weapons floated up from the floor. They encircled the party as if wielded by invisible men, and when they attacked they moved with an uncanny speed and vicious force. Ramses soon became hard pressed to fight off the disembodied longsword, but Nathanial's eyes were on a rusted, pitted shortsword advancing in his direction. He crossed the alchemist light and the sword in front of him to block the first blow, but as he responded by swinging just behind the sword to strike its unseen wielder, his Morningstar met only air. The unexpected lack of impact sent his blow wide and he reeled, losing his footing on the shifting layer of metal and bones on the floor. As he stumbled and fell onto his hands and knees, his Morningstar flew from his sweaty grip and landed nearly ten feet away. The alchemist light bounced heavily on the ground and rolled away to connect with a skeleton. He saw the skull crumble, covering the light with a layer of ash and plunging the room into near-darkness. He heard cries of dismay from his friends as they battled.
"Damn, Damn, Damn, Damn," he cursed under his breath as he tried to scramble towards his weapon. He felt a heavy blow across his shoulder as his armor deflected the cut. The sword felt as if it was wielded by a giant and Nathanial's arms buckled beneath the weight. Calling upon the tricks he'd learned in his youth, he did not lock his arms to resist the sudden weight. Instead he rolled, using the force of the blow as momentum. When he came up awkwardly from the roll into a badly balanced half-crouch, he spied his Morningstar within an arm's length. He reached out for his weapon with obvious relief, but it skittered out from under his hand as if kicked. He overbalanced in his attempt to catch it, and sprawled on the floor once more. Scrambling desperately to his feet, he watched in horror and confusion as his own Morningstar began to rise from the ground in front of him.
He circled to keep both weapons in sight, risking an occasional glance at the floor for anything he could use in defense. His eyes had adjusted quickly to the loss of light. His mind leapt from option to option, sure of some way to survive, despite being weaponless and outnumbered. His eyes flickered briefly towards the ground and arrested on the remains of an iron halberd near his feet. With one eye on the floating weapons surrounding him he took a deep breath and dove for the halberd, knowing as he did so that he'd misjudged his chances. There was a terrible blow as the sword buried a quarter of its blade in his midsection with a single, deadly thrust. He was doubled over by the force of the impact, and felt his own flesh tear as the jagged, rusted steel imbedded itself inside him. He tried to ignore the numbing sensation that quickly spread from the wound to his extremities, and concentrated every effort on closing his fingers around the halberd. He succeeded in getting it, but raised his eyes only in time to see his own Morningstar swinging towards his face. He flung one arm up as if to try and deflect it, but his last impression before it struck him was of pressure in his mind and a flash of white light.
When he awoke, he was looking at a blue sky. Leshar was leaning over him with an empty potion vial and wearing an expression of mocking triumph. Nathanial groaned and struggled to sit up, rubbing the remains of a bruise on his temple. For a moment he could not pinpoint why his head felt so cold, then he suddenly missed the presence of his hat. His eyes snapped upwards and saw it twirling slowly on one of Leshar's fingers.
"Sooo, Boy. All this time, and you turn out to be a mage. Funny how you never used your magic to help your companions isn't it. I wonder if they even know..."
"I don't know what you're talking about." Nathanial answered with a bad stab at casualness. He snatched the hat from Leshar and jammed it down over his ears, furious that Leshar now had something with which to control him.
"Why Boy, I'm talking about that lightning bolt you shot off before you dropped. Not a very impressive one of course, but it showed much more magical aptitude than you've shown before. Is it a racial trait of some kind?"
His voice slowed to a honey-sweetness, but Nathanial could hear the venom beneath the words. He could tell Leshar was enjoying this game of torture. Beneath the smug smile he wore what Nathanial called the "freak" look. He had seen the look on the face of everyone who'd ever witnessed the strange events that happened around him. That look awoke the paranoia within him to whisper "fey-child, murderer, devil spawn.." and triggered a hot, helpless rage inside Nathanial. He knew Leshar would tell the others, and why should they react any differently? He knew how hard it would be to prove himself to those who thought he was a demon freak. Brand had been the only one who had let him.
"Soo," continued Leshar with a look of feral satisfaction on his face, "Did you get those ears from your mother or father? Or was it both? I must admit, I've never seen anything quite so...different. Are you part fey?"
"fey-child, murderer, devil spawn..." the mantra continued in his mind, causing a coil of shame, fear and hatred to grow in his stomach. He clenched his fists and jaw, using every effort of will not to swing on Leshar. He knew that Leshar would twist it against him somehow if he did. It was becoming almost unbearable to resist when he was saved by Sir.
"WootyewdewinBuouy? Ha'ntyewgotenoffsleepyet? Lazeesonfabeech."
Sir tossed Nathanial's Morningstar to him, without caring if he was ready to catch it or not. Nathanial managed to catch it, but not very gracefully. Sir snorted from the doorway.
"DehyegoBuouy. Kipa'oldofeetdistyme."
Nathanial shook his head in bewilderment, his ears still ringing slightly.
"Say that again, Sir? I didn't catch it."
Sir rolled his eyes and spoke more slowly.
"Din-let-go-av-yer-cloob-when-yer-fightin...yadeefgit."
Nathanial's face reddened and he hastened to stand up and straighten his armor.
"It isn't like I did it on purpose Sir, it was an accident."
"Then perhaps, Nathanial," purred Leshar, "You'd better pay more attention to what you're doing. Accidents can happen when you're careless."
Nathanial turned to Leshar with flashing eyes. The wizard's last sentence had a certain intonation that suggested a threat.
"Ahshettup," interrupted Sir with obvious scorn, "wotdeyeknowabootit, yepanzeearsefiggit?"
Leshar's face darkened with rage. His hand went to his spell component pouch and gripped it before he asserted control. Nathanial felt a twinge of disappointment; He was fairly certain that Sir could tear Leshar in two pieces if he was driven to do so.
"Do not underestimate me, Merriweather," Leshar said with a false note of polite calm, "there is an excellent chance of you regretting it."
"Bah!" Sir responded in a bark of laughter. He managed to put enough scorn and ridicule into the one syllable to silence Leshar. "C'monBuouy."
Nathanial dogged Sir's steps from the room, hiding a secret grin.
They joined the others in the room of skeletons, and Nathanial noticed that they actually seemed relieved that he was alive. It was a double-edged happiness to him after Leshar's implied threat to reveal his secret, but he forced himself to simply enjoy their friendship while it lasted. They spoke only in whispers, and proceeded towards the opening of the next room with great caution and raised weapons. Ramses was in the lead, but stopped abruptly when the sound of a male voice, heavy with the brogue of Thardunn, reached their ears from the next room.
"Sooo, I steal these bits o'metal, from these folks, and y'ell show me ta way out then?"
"That's right. I'm afraid we're trapped in here until we find them. They're keys that open the exit from this dungeon."
The second voice was female, and slightly breathless.
"Awl roight, then. Where're these folk hidin' at."
"They'll come through here, they have to in order to get out. We must wait in hiding and be ready. They should reach us within a day or so."
Ramses made a motion with his hand for everyone to stay quiet, and crept forward. He made it nearly to the door before he accidentally kicked a piece of metal hiding beneath the dust of skeletons. A scraping noise echoed through the room and Ramses froze. If their attackers were still waiting in the other room they could not have missed the noise.
"What was that?" the female voice whispered sharply. Ramses motioned for all to be ready and called out.
"Show yourselves."
There was a brief moment of silence, and a woman stepped into the doorway. She wore a dress in shades of red and orange that called to mind the markings of a venomous spider. Beside her was a Halfling in well-maintained blackened leather armor. He made no sound as he moved with her into the room. The woman seemed unafraid of their situation and spoke to Ramses.
"You're early; I wasn't expecting you for another day."
"So we heard."
Her smile faltered somewhat and she scanned the party dismissively.
"So you are the ones who destroyed my pets in Whitefall. Monk still has an unusual and tragic preference for underdogs I see. Do you carry the keys?"
"Who are you?" demanded Whisper haughtily, "and what business is it of yours what I carry?"
Nathanial blurted out his first suspicion before he could help himself.
"Khezrial."
The woman gave him a glittering malicious smile that stirred an old forgotten memory.
"No, child. But it was an intelligent guess. I am here to retrieve items stolen from her. You carry those items, I believe."
"Why Nathanial," chimed in Leshar, in a voice so sweet it could cut glass, "if you've stolen something, you must of course return it."
"Now is not the time for this, Leshar." Nathanial whispered from the corner of his mouth. Then "Hold it!" as he spied the Halfling making his way to the back of the company. The Halfling froze, looking irritated.
"Roight then, I kin see you all have some sort'o history with each other, that's lovely. But I'd like to get out of this place. So if you could just point me at the exit I'll be on me'way, and take me'chances on the locks."
"There are no locks," said Ramses in confusion, "you go through that door, turn the corner, and you're out."
The Halfling's face went through a metamorphosis, beginning at skepticism and ending in rage.
"Ye lyin' HOOR!" he shouted at the woman, "ye told me we were trapped!"
She waved him away as if he were a buzzing fly.
"Dearest Paladin," she said to Ramses, "I can see we will not be reaching an amicable arrangement as far as those keys are concerned..." She paused and waited for his ready nod. "Then I shall be forced to take more drastic measures. I do hate to waste my pets, but you have left me little choice. Farewell then, I'm quite sure we will meet again."
"Madam I cannot allow you to leave," Ramses said in an official tone. "I hereby place you under arrest for the confessed destruction of the town of Whitefall, as well as the murder and injury done to the citizens therein. I ask you to come along to the magistrate peacefully."
She looked at him in utter surprise, and then threw her head back in laughter. Ramses stood with sword drawn, unfazed by her lack of fear. Eventually her laughter slowed somewhat, and she wiped a tear from her cheek.
"Oh darling Paladin, what a delightful proposal! How adorable that you think you can stop me! Well then, I'll have to summon a match worthy of your ego, won't I? But thank you for the laugh, it has been some time."
She spoke a few words in a guttural language and disappeared from their sight. Ramses quickly moved forward in search of her, but his hand met only air as it passed through where she'd been standing.
"Don't bother, Ramses," Leshar spoke up, "She teleported."
Ramses looked disgruntled as he searched the room. The Halfling continued to curse under his breath. Nathanial caught repetitions of the words "two-faced hoor" throughout his tirade, and felt sympathetic.
A low crackling noise began where the woman had disappeared, and the party looked to that spot hopefully. More crackling began near the entrance to the room, and spread around the walls. The hair stood up on the back of Nathanial's neck and he gripped his Morningstar, ready for some sort of attack. When the crackling ended, what seemed to be large, man-sized boulders appeared in six places around the room, blocking both exits. Looking confused at the anticlimactic result of whatever spell had been cast, Ramses approached a boulder cautiously. He reached out with his sword to touch it, and Leto cleared his throat.
"Ah...wouldn't do that Ramses, something doesn't seem right."
Ramses looked over at Leto, who paled at the sight of the boulder beginning to move. Ramses glanced back at it and did a double-take as it unfolded itself into an enormous humanoid with hide resembling the granite rock they'd all taken it for. All the boulders reacted similarly, and Ramses backed into the center of the room with the others.
"Watdefook!" exclaimed Sir, gripping his axe. He swung on the nearest creature, but his axe only embedded itself a few inches into the tough hide. When he yanked it free again, they could see the blade was notched.
"Everyone try to work your way to the exit," Ramses directed in a low voice, "they don't seem to move very quickly. First one out, get the horses. Saddle them if there's time, but if not then just take one and run."
"Bah!" exclaimed Sir with scorn, "roon? Haintgoonaroon, yewtakemefoorahpanzee?"
"And I'm not going to let you face them alone, Ramses," chimed in Whisper, "that's suicide."
"An I wanta piece of that lyin' hoor's pets ah do."
They looked down to see who'd spoken, having nearly forgotten the Halfling. He stood amongst them with a pair of gleaming daggers, eyeballing the shuffling creatures with grim satisfaction.
Ramses had no chance to respond as the creatures rushed them in a single movement. Leshar proved more nimble than he looked, and ducked under the swing of one creatures to sprint towards the door. Once there, he looked over the room in satisfaction and mumbled a spell beneath his breath.
The walls and floor of the room erupted in a sticky mass of spiderwebs several feet deep, trapping the feet of several creatures. Nathanial leapt clear and rolled towards the door as he swung on the nearest monster. His Morningstar connected, but the impact nearly jarred the weapon from his hand. A tingling numbness spread from his wrist to his shoulder, but the creature did not even seem to have been damaged. Panicked, he ducked beneath its swing and surveyed the fight. What caught his eye was that the fighters with the smallest weapons seemed to be doing more damage to the creatures. Sir's Axe and Whisper's falchion were chipping away pieces of stone, but the Halfling's daggers were cutting deep, drawing a black tar that may have been blood. Leto managed to trip his, then drove a punch so fiercely into the creature's head that it caused an explosion of stone and black tar. An idea occurred to Nathanial, and he scrambled for the exit, rolling between the feet of the creature blocking it.
He hurried to his horse and pulled out the crossbow he'd kept from the bar in MarketTown, as well as the half-quiver of bolts. He hurried to the doorway and took careful aim. His first bolt sunk deep into the neck of the creature fighting Ramses and it let out a mighty roar of pain.
Minutes later he was down to his final bolt. They were still struggling, but three of the creatures were down and the others injured. Sir was about to strike what could have been the killing blow on his opponent when the creature smashed its fist into the side of Sir's head, dropping him heavily to the web-covered floor.
"NO!" Nathanial cried out and shot the creature with his crossbow. The creature stumbled, but continued to struggle against the webbing to reach Sir. Nathanial heard a chuckle behind him and turned on Leshar menacingly.
"Do something already! You're a mage aren't you?"
Leshar cracked his knuckles.
"Why Boy, are you suggesting I haven't been helping?"
"Nevermind that, I don't want to play word games with you. If you can't help Sir, then I'll have to try."
Nathanial dropped his empty crossbow and picked up his Morningstar once again. He charged into the room to try and reach Sir's side, but ducked instinctively as he felt a rush of scorching air pass just over his head. He looked up to assess the new threat and saw an enormous ball of fire flying at the creature attacking Sir. His mind put together the danger of fire near the web still filling the room a heartbeat before the fire struck its target.
"NO!" he screamed in rage as the web caught. The fire raced through the room in seconds. Nathanial staggered back as the heat and smoke struck him as a solid wall, forcing him to retreat. The fire consumed the web so quickly that it was soon extinguished, leaving friend and foe alike choking on the ash.
The creatures they'd been fighting all dropped in the blast of the fire, but Nathanial rushed first to Sir's side. Ramses saw him kneel beside the body and stumbled, coughing in their direction. The Paladin checked anxiously for a pulse on the scorched body, but found none. He sat back on his heels and shook his head at Nathanial.
"I'm sorry Boy, he's dead."