The SteelMaster of Indwallin, Book 2 of The Gods Within (34 page)

“Only you, massster. Only you, and of courssse . . .” The snake turned its head and looked at Morgin. “And of courssse Lord Mortal there.”

Valso started and his eyes snapped toward Morgin. He looked back at the snake, then back at Morgin, then screamed, “Nooooo.”

He rushed up to Morgin and started kicking him, screaming and cursing as he rained vicious blows on him. Morgin wasn’t sure if he should take some satisfaction in Bayellgae’s revelation, though he resolved to remember the look on Valso’s face as he lost consciousness.

Chapter 19: The Dane King

Morddon moved silently from one shadow to the next, paused to listen carefully to the sounds about him. Dawn had come almost reluctantly, as if the land wished to keep the devastation of the battlefield hidden in the shadows of the night. The still air was filled with the cries of those who were unfortunate enough to die slowly of their wounds.

He thought he knew where Aethon had gone down, but the landscape looked different littered by so many corpses. Nevertheless he searched, and he continued to search without rest, for somehow he knew Aethon still lived, and he didn’t care enough to wonder how he knew. He found him just as the sun rose fully above the mountain peaks. The young king lay unconscious, his tunic soaked with blood, so Morddon picked him up like a child, and with the help of Morgin’s shadows carried him off the Glen to where Mortiss hid in a small clump of forest. The two of them were not an excessive burden for the horse.

Morddon rode with Aethon seated in front of him, his arms gripping Mortiss’ reins around the unconscious king to support him. But near mid-morning Aethon cried out and regained consciousness. Morddon cupped a hand over his mouth and whispered in his ear, “Be silent, my king.”

“Morddon?” Aethon pleaded. “Is that you?”

“Aye,” Morddon answered.

“Ah, my white faced friend. The sword . . . my sword, it was not flawed. It didn’t fail, and yet, here I am, defeated.”

“I think your victory must wait for another age, my king.”

Aethon drifted off into an uneasy sleep, his breathing ragged and shallow. When he again awoke he pleaded, “Can we stop and rest? It hurts so terribly.”

Morddon stopped near a small stream, gently put Aethon down in the shade of a tall elm tree. Aethon burned with fever, so Morddon soaked his blouse in the cold stream and swabbed the young king’s forehead. He was much too ill to travel further so Morddon let him rest, and through that day he drifted in and out of consciousness while Morddon sat next to him and tried to calm him. But late that afternoon Aethon awoke and grasped Morddon’s arm. “It wasn’t me he sought,” he said, struggling to get the words out. “Never me.”

“Don’t speak,” Morddon told him. “Try to rest.”

“I was nothing to the Dark God. He swept me aside like a feather in a strong wind, and he coveted only Lord Mortal. Always Lord Mortal.”

Aethon shuddered and gasped. “I pity poor Lord Mortal, for Beayaegoath ripped him from my soul, and even now torments him beyond life itself. I wonder if he ever found the Unnamed King . . . ever found his name.”

Aethon calmed, and the shaking stopped, and slowly his body relaxed and his eyes glazed over with death. And there beneath the elm tree all life seemed to stand still for that instant, as if the soul of the land felt the loss of its king.

Morddon used his fingers to close the dead king’s eyes, then he covered him with the blanket from his pack and bivouacked for the night. In the morning, while gathering stones for a cairn, he happened to glance up and saw a small, black speck high in the sky. He knew that shape well, so he stepped out into the open and waved his arms.

The speck circled and grew in proportion as it descended, until a few minutes later TarnThane landed nearby. “Well, SteelMaster,” the griffin lord said. “We are come to this.”

“He’s dead,” Morddon said.

The griffin nodded. “I know. We all felt his passing. We’re preparing a crypt now, a place appropriate for the last of the Shahotma. Will you bring him?”

Morddon started to object, to say he must return to Kathbeyanne, but the griffin shook his head violently. “Your place is by his side, whiteface.”

Morddon turned his head slowly from side to side, stretching the tension out of his neck muscles. “I guess Magwa can wait a few more days, halfbird.”

Morddon wrapped Aethon’s body in his own blanket, and carefully sat him on Mortiss’ saddle. He then mounted behind him and wrapped his arms around him as if he were still alive and needed protecting. And it occurred to Morgin that, perhaps in death, he did need protection.

TarnThane led the way, always circling high in the distance ahead, guiding Morddon north toward Attunhigh. The path TarnThane chose kept them high in the mountains, always skirting the edge of some deep crevasse or sheer rock face. Morddon could not have found the way on his own, even with his vast knowledge of forest and mountain lore. But with the griffin overhead surveying the ground from the advantage of soaring heights, always picking just the right trail, Morddon found his way easily. He camped that night near an icy mountain stream, and the next morning they rose above the tree line to a barren landscape of rocks and lichen and small patches of snow.

On the third day of travel, as Mortiss carefully picked her way up a twisting trail of steep switchbacks, the path suddenly opened out onto a flat shelf of rock, a wide expanse where Ellowyn and the other legion commanders awaited them in a solemn, silent throng. With them stood the royalty of the House of the Thane and what remained of the Benesh’ere command. Morddon nudged Mortiss forward slowly and stopped just short of them.

He dismounted carefully, and gently lowered Aethon out of the black mare’s saddle. The dead king weighed next to nothing, as if he’d already begun turning to ash. Morddon laid Aethon down at Ellowyn’s feet, then watched as the archangels stripped him and carefully washed him, then dressed him in the ceremonial armor of the Shahotma, the greatest of kings.

When Ellowyn finished she looked to Morddon. “You should take him to his final rest. He would want that.” She nodded toward the mountain behind her and the granite that rose steeply from the shelf where they stood. Only then, with Morgin’s ability to see through shadows, only then did Morddon see that one particular black slash of granite was actually a shadow filling the small mouth of an open cave.

Morddon picked up Aethon; he weighed more now that he’d been dressed in the heavy ceremonial armor, yet still he seemed diminished. Morddon had to duck, and shuffle sideways to fit through the low, narrow mouth of the cave. But it opened into an inner cavern dimly lit by flickering sconces, and Morgin immediately recognized the burial chamber of the Skeleton King, a room cluttered with swords and shields and armor polished to a brilliant sheen and studded with jewels. Thick and richly embroidered tapestries covered the walls, and in the center, surrounded by such unimaginable riches, sat the throne of the Shahotma King.

Morddon carefully sat the dead king upon his throne, then arranged his arms and legs as if he were holding high court. But to Morgin’s eye the scene remained incomplete. Morddon straightened, and looking at Aethon’s lifeless form he said, “There’s something missing.”

Behind him Ellowyn said, “His sword. The AethonSword.”

Morddon turned to face her, found her standing with a sheathed broadsword resting in her outstretched hands. Morgin recognized the jeweled hilt from his dreams as Morddon reached out and took the sword, then carefully pulled the blade from the sheath. It shown with the brilliance of the finest steel, the blade intricately worked with runes decorating its entire length. “The godslayer,” Morddon said. “Why did Aethon not fight the Dark God with this blade? It must contain great power, and yet he left it behind.”

Morddon, who was not a magician or wielder of sorcerous powers, could not sense what Morgin sensed: that the blade contained no power and was just a blade. He hid that knowledge from Morddon, the only thing he’d ever truly hidden from his Benesh’ere host.

“Why?” Morddon asked again.

He hadn’t meant it as a real question, not one to be answered, but Ellowyn did so anyway. “He said the blade you forged, the flawless blade, would have more power against the Goath’s evil.”

Morgin shared Morddon’s thoughts; had he doomed Aethon by giving him the blade he’d forged? Had they turned fate aside by not using the proper blade? But it was too late for such thoughts.

He turned back to the throne and his dead king, and he arranged Aethon so he sat with one arm resting casually on an armrest, the other on the hilt of the great sword, its tip resting in the dust of the floor, its upper weight balanced by no more than the casual grip of Aethon’s hand. He carefully set the scene so that every detail matched the tomb of Morgin’s dreams.

He was the last to exit the tomb, and he stopped just outside the narrow slash of its entrance. The angels quickly filled it with rocks the size of a man’s head, and then Morgin cast a shadow he hoped would misguide any stranger who chanced this way.

Morddon climbed into Mortiss saddle, and when he looked back one last time, Morgin had the oddest thought.
He could see through his own shadows as no other could. Anyone else standing at this spot would see nothing but rock and mountain, but Morgin would always recognize that cave mouth in an instant.

~~~

The black darkness, the rank smells of piss and shit, his own unwashed body, matted and clumped hair; all of these things were familiar to Morgin, and as he slowly struggled to full consciousness, the aches and pains in his mistreated body reminded him he was in the bowels of Decouix. It took great effort just to pull himself up off the stone floor into a sitting position with his back to a wall, and in the process he discovered a hundred bruises and aches. The Kulls had prepared him for the arrival of his family by beating him continuously through the night. His left hand had swollen badly, though he didn’t think anything was broken there, but his ribs might be a different story. He explored his face carefully with his right hand. One eye had swollen completely shut, was unusable; the other had swollen badly, though he guessed he could see out of it to some limited extent. Bruises and small cuts covered his face. He thought about trying to stand, decided it wasn’t worth the effort, and drifted back into a kind of restless sleep . . .

The cell door slammed open; light blinded him; rough hands lifted him off his feet, then chained him hand and foot. He thought at first they’d come for another beating, but instead they pulled him out of the cell and dragged him through the castle. They took him to a room high in Decouix, and as Morgin peered through the slit of his half-swollen eye, he found Valso waiting for him. The prince smiled and said, “I have something I want you to see.”

He turned and stepped through tall doors onto a balcony. The Kulls dragged Morgin across the room and out onto the balcony with Valso, stood him up against the balcony rail. “Look,” Valso said, and he pointed down into the city.

For the longest time Morgin saw nothing that should pique Valso’s interest so, though time and again he tried to sight down the length of Valso’s arm. But then he noticed a commotion in one of the main streets that led to the castle, a procession of riders, one of them carrying a red Elhiyne banner. The distance was too great to be certain but he thought the banner carrier might be DaNoel, and behind him rode several members of House Elhiyne.

“My father is among them,” Valso said. “He thinks he’s returning to his throne, but actually he’s returning only to shame. And your family thinks with him they will shame all of House Decouix.” Valso looked Morgin up and down carefully. “But you’re going to help me turn the cards on them, aren’t you?”

Morgin refused to answer, so one of the Kulls kneed him in the groin. He cried out and fell to his knees. “Aren’t you, Elhiyne?”

Still Morgin refused to answer, so the Kulls beat him senseless.

He awoke again in the dungeon, but it seemed he’d only been awake for moments when they came for him again. He didn’t try to help them or resist them; his body hurt too much to take action one way or the other. They dragged him again through the castle corridors and finally dumped him on a cold, stone floor in a large room. He heard a large crowd gasp at the sight of him, and he forced open the one eye through which he could see, saw ranks of feet gathered along a wall several paces distant. He’d been dumped in the middle of the Decouix throne room, and all those present feared the consequences of coming too close to him. It hurt too much to hold his head up and keep the eye open, so he closed it and lay his head against the stone floor.

He heard some sort of an argument going on. He tried to ignore it, but then he caught the sound of Rhianne’s voice raised in anger. “. . . and you’ll not stop me.”

He still didn’t have the strength to open his eye, but he heard the soft patter of slippered feet crossing the floor, then the rustle of petticoats nearby. He could smell her; the scent of her contrasted sharply with the smell of the dungeon that clung so heavily to him. He opened his eye, looked into her face. She’d sat down on the floor right in the middle of the throne room, was cradling his head in her lap. “My darling,” she said. “What have they done to you?”

“Young Lady!” Olivia’s voice had not changed in the months since he’d last heard it, would probably never change. The old woman stood over them both as Rhianne looked up at her, but Morgin kept his one eye on Rhianne and ignored his grandmother. “It’s not proper for you to just sit down in the middle of this hall like that.”

Rhianne’s eyes hardened. “I care nothing for what is proper, old woman.”

Olivia growled angrily, “You care nothing for—”

Something abruptly silenced the old woman, and when Morgin looked in Rhianne’s eyes he saw magic flare so intense and angry it was something to match even that of the old witch. Rhianne spoke softly, but there was steel in her voice, “Go away, old woman, and leave us alone for these few moments we have.”

Morgin heard Olivia hesitate, then turn slowly and walk away. Rhianne looked down at Morgin and there were tears on her cheeks; they dripped down on his face. But he lost himself in her eyes as she bent down and kissed him gently on the cheek, then on the lips. And for that one moment he would have endured a thousand beatings.

~~~

DaNoel stood just within the entrance of the great throne room of Decouix, his hand carefully holding one end of a symbolic chain, with the other end wrapped about the throat of Illalla. At the far end of the hall Valso sat on the Decouix throne on a high dais. DaNoel had expected to walk the length of the hall in triumph, Illalla following meekly behind him at the end of his chain. Olivia wanted it to be a grand display of Decouix defeat at the hands of Elhiyne. But just as DaNoel was ready to march forward, Valso had surprised them all by having a semiconscious Morgin dragged into the throne room and dumped unceremoniously in the middle of the floor, half-way between DaNoel and Valso.