Knight Eternal (A Novel of Epic Fantasy) (Harbinger of Doom Volume 3) (3 page)

“
A trick?” said Harsnip, a
glimmer of a smile coming to his face. “Yeah, that’s all it is.
Just a trick. Not magic.”

“
To what end?” said
Graham.

Baret scrunched up his face. “How would I
know what’s his mind, the stinking bag of bones? That’s for bigger
men than the likes of us.”

“
Bigger men,” said
Harsnip, staring over his shoulder at the messenger. “Foul magic, I
think. Not a trick at all.”

“
What’s that, boy?” said
Baret.

“
Me grand-mum told me to
steer clear of magic, she did. She told me the old stories were
more truth than fancy. Steer right clear of anything magic, or
it’ll be the death of you, Harsnip, she said. And she done told me
not to join up with the guard too. Any magic already hereabouts
will be at the Dor, she said, and any magic what comes around will
head straight there, like a moth to a flame. She was right about
that, it seems. She said the Dor would be the death of me, old
grand-mum said. Said it just last week, right over Thorsday’s
dinner, she did.”

“
Steady, lad,” said Baret,
placing a firm hand on the young man’s shoulder. “Just a messenger
it is, bones or not. Nothing much to fear, not yet,
anyways.”

“
What if—”

“
I’ll look out for you
lad, if it comes to it.

“
Thanks. I’m counting on
that.”

“
Just remember your
training.”

“
Aye,” said Harsnip. “I
will.”

A group of men exited the keep’s central
tower and walked toward the gate. Jude Eotrus, a dark-maned hulk of
crooked nose and squared jaw led the way. With him, his youngest
brother, Malcolm, long and lean; Sir Marzdan; and several other
knights and soldiers.

The messenger still stood by the gate,
unmoved.

Jude held the ring before the messenger,
then stepped back, wrinkling his nose and coughing from the
messenger’s stench. Marzdan stood protectively beside Jude, hand on
sword hilt. The messenger, taller than most men, and as broad, more
or less, came up only to Jude’s jaw, and was barely half his
breadth.

“
What do you know about
this ring?” said Jude from a safer distance, his breath
steaming.

“
It be the signet ring of
House Eotrus, taken from thy father’s hand the night he fell in the
Vermion Forest, not one month ago.”

“
Who are you and how came
you by it?”

“
I be little more than
dust. The ring was entrusted to me so that you would know that the
message I bear be true.” The creature pulled a piece of dusty
parchment from beneath its robes and handed it to Jude.

Jude unfolded the parchment. It read:

Aradon Eotrus lives and
will remain so if and only if you deliver twenty thousand silver
stars unto our messenger tomorrow evening at Riker’s Crossroads.
Thence we will exchange the silver for the old Lord. No tricks or
dead he’ll truly be.

Jude’s eyes grew wide. “It
says that father is alive and this creature’s master has
him.”

“
What?” Malcolm’s face
flashed brick red and drew into a snarl; his fists opening and
closing at his sides.

“
Are you the messenger
that will make this exchange?” asked Jude.

“
Perhaps, perhaps not; who
can say?”

“
How dare you hold my
father for ransom, you stinking dog.” Malcolm pulled his sword, and
before Jude could grab his arm, thrust the blade through the
messenger’s chest.

The messenger stumbled back and clutched at
the sword with both skeletal hands.

Malcolm yanked the blade free.

No blood sprang from the
creature’s wound. No cry erupted from its throat; its torn cloak
the only evidence that the blow had been struck.

Only gray dust marred the
sheen of Malcolm’s sword, but in no more than a moment, the fine
steel blade turned to ash from tip to guard. Malcolm threw the hilt
down as it too burned to ash before his eyes.

The messenger threw back
its head, its cowl still cloaking its face, and laughed. Louder and
louder it laughed—so loud that the men cringed and crushed their
hands against their ears. It was a horrid, cackling sound of such
unnatural tenor and fearful intonation as could not be voiced by
the throat of man, though, mercifully, it lasted but a few
moments.

“
Well struck. Well
struck,” said the messenger. It shrugged off its cloak, revealing
glowing, silver chains that criss-crossed about its body. From
skull to foot it was little more than bleached bones affixed
together by some strange gray tissue. It had two large eyes of
blood-red pupil and sickly yellow sclera, and hands that ended in
boney claws.

The messenger flexed its
arms and legs, and strained against the chains. “Thy blow has freed
me from my binding.” Another flex and several links shattered. The
chain fell to the ground in a heap. “I can now pursue my own
course.”

The creature vaulted at Jude, claws
flailing.

Lightning quick, Marzdan
grabbed Jude and pulled him clear—no small feat considering Jude’s
bulk.

The messenger veered and raked its claws
across young Harsnip’s chest; the boy’s face froze in shock and
horror. The blow met no resistance, as if the claws were
insubstantial like those of some ghost out of a fireside tale.

Harsnip loosed a bloodcurdling scream. His
face grew ashen; his skin wrinkled and shriveled. His hair grew
instantly white and fell about his shoulders. For a moment, before
he fell, his eyes locked accusingly on Baret’s. Then Harsnip
collapsed into a heap of dust, rotted clothes, and rusted
armor.

The soldiers yelled, and
hacked at the messenger, but their blades passed through it, doing
it no harm. Each blade that touched the thing burned to ash, and
those men too slow to throw down the hilts burned to ashes with
them. The creature struck again and again and more men went down
and shriveled to ash. Its touch was death, no matter the victim’s
courage, strength, or skill.

Whistles blew and calls of alarm sounded
about the keep. Jude led the men in a fast retreat to the central
tower; the creature pursued at its own shambling pace. Soon, the
booming claxon of the bell tower warned all the Dor of danger and
roused the garrison to arms.

“
Bar the door, and stand
well back,” shouted Jude after the last of the soldiers dashed
through the portal.

The men crowded about the tower’s entry hall
and on the winding stair to the upper chambers. They heard screams
and war cries from without as guards from other parts of the keep
descended upon the messenger and died for it.

“
What is that thing?” said
Malcolm. “How do we fight it?”

“
We wouldn’t have to fight
it if you weren’t an idiot,” said Jude. “Some monster out of
Nifleheim. It’s beyond our ken. I know not how to bring it
down.”

The messenger stepped
through the door, though the door did not open. It passed through
the solid oak, banded and reinforced in honest steel and iron, as
if it were but empty air. Startled, the men jumped back. Many went
down in a heap as they stumbled over those behind. Several crossbow
bolts flew, passed through the creature, and embedded themselves in
the door before they too burned to ash.

“
To the chapel,” shouted
Jude, “Run.”

Those on the stair turned heel and raced up
the winding steps shouting the alarm as they went. Up and up they
raced to the third floor, which housed the keep’s place of worship.
What men were still with Jude dashed in, closed, and barred the big
double doors.

“
What do we do?” yelled
Malcolm.

“
Holy water,” said
Marzdan.

The soldiers stood in a semi-circular line
some ten feet from the barred door. Each held a basin of holy
water, or one of the chapel’s holy symbols or relics.

“
We’ve no priests to bless
the weapons,” said Malcolm.

“
Don’t worry, young
master,” said Captain Marzdan. “They’ll work. They have
to.”

Long seconds passed. A scream or two from
without and below heralded the messenger’s approach. Then it passed
through the barred door, again as if it wasn’t there. The room
instantly grew frigid, the light from the sconces wavered and
dimmed, and the air filled with the creature’s fetid stench.

“
Begone, creature,”
shouted Jude. “You can’t enter this holy place. Begone.”

“
You be no priest,” said
the messenger. “You hath no power over me.”

The men flung their holy water, dousing the
spot where the messenger stood, though the water passed through it
and the messenger paid it no heed. It moved forward, toward
Jude.

Malcolm held a staff upon which was mounted
an ancient, holy relic of Odin, father of the gods. He thrust it
forward and pressed the end to the creature’s forehead. This time,
the weapon met resistance; the relic seared the messenger’s skull
and held fast.

The creature snarled and spasmed. It lashed
out and grabbed the staff, howling in rage. Where its claws grasped
the oak, the staff smoked and blackened and turned to ash. As a lit
fuse, the destruction of the staff continued down its shaft. Eyes
wide, Malcolm froze.

“
Drop the staff,” yelled
Jude, his breath steaming.

Captain Marzdan dived into Malcolm and
pushed him aside. Malcolm fell clear but Marzdan landed atop the
decaying staff.

The captain’s face froze
in terror and he screamed—a lingering wail of agony and anger that
no man there could forget for the rest of his days. Marzdan’s hair
went white, his skin paled and shriveled. In moments, the brave
soldier was no more than an ashen heap with the shape of a
man.

Malcolm writhed in agony and clutched at his
left wrist; his left hand smoldered, flesh hung loose, white bone
tasted the air.

“
Yes,” hissed the
messenger. It thrust back its arms and its head as if in ecstasy,
and then by some power born of hell, the creature grew–taller,
thicker, darker. “Ah, the sweet blood of kings. I must have more.”
Its eyes locked on Jude, boring into his very soul. It shambled
forward, toward Jude, ignoring all else.

Jude backpedaled through the room, sword
held at the defensive. The knights and guardsmen fired crossbow
bolts at the thing and threw weapons at it from all sides, all to
no avail.

“
What do we do?” yelled
one man.

“
How do we bring it down?”
called out Baret.

As he neared the very back
of the chapel, with little space left to run, Jude stopped and held
his ground.

“
What do you want?” he
shouted. “Why do you plague us?” Jude’s eyes darted from the beast
to his wounded brother. Baret and Graham pulled Malcolm up and
dragged him from the room.

“
To sate my thirst, I will
drink thy blood—the blood of kings,” said the fiend, its eyes wild;
foam dripped from its bony maw.

“
To sate my hunger, I will
burn thy body and devour thy soul.”

“
Can’t we give you some
mead and a chicken or two, perhaps a goat, and call our business
done?”

“
No,” said the
messenger.

“
Some fresh venison then?
Good gnomish ale to wash it down? We’ve a keg from ’58, brewed in
Portland Vale.”

The messenger lunged forward.

Jude stepped back and tripped over a chest
that sat beside the chapel’s lectern. The messenger’s claws raked
through the empty air where Jude had just stood. Jude landed on his
rump, the stout, ironbound oaken chest before him, and knew at once
what to do. He flung the lid open and sure and swift from within
pulled a strange glowing dagger of silver hue.

The messenger recoiled and
sniffed the air. It locked its eyes on the glowing dagger and
growled. It flexed its claws and they began to change, to grow. In
moments, they passed six inches in length; darkened, black as
pitch; and sharpened to a razor’s edge.

In one motion, Jude leaped to his feet and
flung the ensorcelled dagger with all his power. It struck the
messenger mid-chest, exploded through its sternum, and lodged
there. The creature emitted a devilish wail to whither the soul and
slay the spirit: a howl of such volume and pitch that near every
man in the room dropped to his knees. It clutched at the dagger
with both its taloned, skeletal hands, stumbled back a few steps,
and collapsed to one knee.

“
Curse you, Eotrus,” spat
the beast. “And all thy line forevermore.”

Its eyes rolled back in its head. It fell
backward, struck the marble floor, and exploded in a cloud of dust.
The glowing dagger remained, embedded in a heap of foul black
ash.

II

MAGES AND MONSTERS

“
Don’t play by any rules,
just survive,

That is all that
matters
.”

—
Lord Angle
Theta

Ornate figurines overran
the tabletop. They were cast in the likenesses of soldiers,
knights, elves, dwarves, wizards, lugron, and all manner of
monsters, various and sundry—all beautifully painted and mounted on
moveable hardwood bases inscribed with arcane symbols and numbers
that represented their attributes. Two compact carrying cases of
leather and hardwood, homes for the game tokens, sat open at the
end of the table. Their outsides scarred and battered from long
travels, the cases were heavily padded within to protect their
precious cargo.