The Waking of Orthlund

Chapter 2

Chapter 2Crouching in a shaded alcove, Dilrap shook and shook as if the only way his body knew to quell his whirling mind was to destroy itself. Dismissed from the Throne Room by the King with a soft blessing and a loudly proclaimed curse to give him some little protection, Dilrap had watched the ensuing scene through the intricate carved tracery that formed a panel in one of the side doors. Watched the entrance of the strangely transformed Dan-Tor impaled on a black arrow. Watched Rgoric move to slay him, only to fall victim himself to Dan-Tor’s Mathidrin, perishing as he cut a hideous path through them towards their evil Lord.

Rigid with horror, his hands pressed against the sharp edges of the carved wood, Dilrap had watched the Kingship of Fyorlund rise grim and determined from its years of sullen decay only to fall in a welter of primitive blood-lust. With it fell his own hopes and dreams. Now he was alone. Appallingly alone.

Fear and self-pity took alternate command of his mind, though rage seemed to dominate both. Rage at his father for bearing such a poor scion to carry the Secretary’s burden, rage at Dan-Tor and his years of silent, evil scheming, rage at the King for his futile death, at the Lords for their neglect, at the Queen for deserting him, and at this last, rage at himself for the injustice of such base thoughts.

Cowering small in the alcove, it seemed to Dilrap that he was entering a darkness that could only deepen, and that it would be beyond his soul to bear. And yet, even in this terrible extremity, bright threads flickered and he reached out for them in the hope that they might grow and bind together to form a desperate lifeline.

For he had heard too the King’s strange last words. That Dan-Tor would die at the very height of his power; die at the hands of an ancient and insignificant assassin. And that the ancient line of Kings was still unbroken, for the Queen now carried his heir.

Heartening words. But what of the King’s final eerie utterance into the dreadful waiting silence that filled the hall as he had crawled agonizingly towards the fountainhead of all his ills? ‘Nothing shall end the reign of your Master.’ A desperate, doom-laden avowal. And yet it was not uttered as such — ‘It is not what it seems’ — and the King had laughed softly with his last breath, as at some private jest.

What could it mean? And who could be Dan-Tor’s master? Then the name that the King had uttered returned to him.

Oklar.

A name from myth and legend. Oklar, the earth corrupter, greatest of the Uhriel, the servants of Sumeral, the Great Corrupter.

A chill possessed Dilrap that set his previous terrors at naught. It couldn’t be. Such creatures could not exist. It was contrary to reason. They were ogres for children, old tales embellished through the ages. But the chill persisted. Hadn’t he seen Fyorlund deteriorate in his own lifetime? Hadn’t he seen the great tower fortress of Narsindalvak and its Watch abandoned, and the ranks of the Lords’ High Guards softened into foppery. And now its King was slain, its Queen was fled, and its Lords were arming for a conflict that could only set brother against brother. And who could account for the force that had just shaken the palace, perhaps even the City, to its very roots? But, rising above all this, came the vision of Dan-Tor being carried into the Throne Room; changed, but unchanged. Dilrap knew it was no human creature that now occupied that familiar lank form.

Resting his flushed and tear-stained face on the cold stone of the alcove, Dilrap struggled with his grief, and the enormity of his revelation. Powers were awakening that were beyond human understanding. His sense of loneliness and isolation deepened but, strangely, he felt comforted. He remembered the Queen’s words: ‘Even your father couldn’t have stood against the wiles of Dan-Tor.’ The memory made him smile bitterly. How could she have known the measure of the creature that they were opposing?

And yet they had opposed him, and done so successfully. Dilrap had fouled and encumbered his path with his seeming helpfulness. The Queen had restored her long-sick King. They were achievements in which to take no small pride, even if now they would doom him.

Scarcely had the thought occurred to him than the curtain of the alcove was pushed roughly aside and two white-faced Mathidrin troopers confronted him.

* * * *

Sylvriss spun round, and rising rapidly to her feet, drew a large hunting knife from her belt. ‘I must have been too long in the Palace,’ she said menacingly. ‘If a Lord can usurp the King, and thugs the High Guard, then I suppose bandits could return to the highways. Well, you’ve no soft maiden here, outlander.’ And she called out to her horse which reared up and flayed out wildly with its forelegs, narrowly missing Isloman’s head.

Gavor squawked and hopped a considerable distance away, while Isloman’s mouth fell open at the sight of this suddenly wild woman with her glittering knife and an indisputable will shining in her eyes. The horse jostled him violently.

‘Lady,’ he said, staggering under the impact, ‘what are you doing?’

‘What are you doing?’ Sylvriss retorted. ‘Lay down your sword before one of us kills you.’

Isloman hesitated, bewildered. Sylvriss’s horse moved towards him, forelegs dancing, but Isloman watched it uncomprehendingly. Abruptly, Serian neighed, and Sylvriss’s horse stopped. The Queen shouted to it again, but it did not move.

Sylvriss faltered at this unexpected intervention by the great horse. Who were these people? At her hesitation, Isloman seemed to come to himself and, bending down, he laid the sword gently on the ground.

‘I’m sorry,’ he said. ‘I didn’t mean to frighten you.’

Sylvriss bridled. ‘I’m not afraid,’ she lied. ‘That damned bird startled me, landing so close.’

Gavor put his head on one side but did not speak. Then he walked over to Hawklan and peered at him intently. Sylvriss caught the movement in the corner of her eye and, without taking her gaze from Isloman, swung a foot in Gavor’s direction.

‘Shoo!’ she shouted.

Isloman stretched out a hand and stepped forward. ‘It’s all right...’ he began, but the Queen levelled her knife at his groin.

‘Really,’ came a fruity voice from behind her. Startled she turned. But there was no one there, just the lifeless black figure — and that damned bird again, standing by the body and staring at her.

Without thinking, she moved towards it angrily. Gavor spread his wings and flapped away. ‘Really,’ he repeated. ‘Do something, Isloman. These Fyordyn women seem to do nothing but kill people when they get hold of a knife.’

Sylvriss stopped, eyes wide. Then, turning, she found Isloman standing next to her, but with his hands raised in surrender.

‘Please don’t be afraid,’ he repeated. ‘I’m sorry I startled you with the sword, but I think it might help Hawklan.’

Sylvriss glanced from Isloman to the motionless figure and then at Gavor.

‘The bird spoke,’ she said, ignoring Isloman’s explanation.

Isloman nodded. ‘Yes, that’s Gavor,’ he said, then, ‘Please call your horse off, so that I can pick up the sword.’ Sylvriss looked at him. He looked powerful enough to have wrestled the horse to the ground had need arisen, but his power was lost in his anxiety and concern. She sheathed her knife.

‘Your horse has called mine off already, Orthlundyn,’ she said. Then, sadly, ‘Attend to your friend if you wish, but I fear he’s dead.’

As Isloman recovered the sword and moved to Hawklan’s side, Sylvriss walked slowly to her horse. Patting its cheek, she said. ‘Why did you disobey me, old friend?’ The horse lowered its head, and Serian bent forward and nudged her gently. Turning to him, Sylvriss saw that fear still flickered in his eyes, but it was being well mastered. So many questions. She stroked his neck. ‘I don’t understand,’ she said, ‘but thank you, line leader.’

She looked at Isloman, now kneeling by Hawklan and trying to place his hand around the handle of the sword. He kept wincing, as though the sword were burning him.

She patted the horse again and walked back over to Isloman. ‘What’s the matter?’ she asked, kneeling beside him.

There were tears in Isloman’s eyes, and his hands were shaking. ‘I can’t hold the sword,’ he said. ‘I can’t touch the handle. It’s too... charged... too...’ His voice faded. Then, thrusting the sword towards her, he said, ‘Will you try? Please.’

Sylvriss looked helplessly down at the plain black scabbard that held the sword, and then back at Isloman’s pleading gaze. She did not take it. ‘Your friend’s dead, Isloman,’ she said. ‘I could find no pulse.’

Isloman shook his head. ‘No,’ he said. ‘He can’t be. Try again.’

Sylvriss laid her hand on Hawklan’s throat and closed her eyes to shut out all distractions. Very faintly, like the distant stirring within herself, she felt the flutter of Hawklan’s heart.

‘Yes,’ she whispered, as if the sound of her too-loud voice might extinguish the tiny flame. ‘You’re right. But what can I do? I’m no healer. I’ve no idea what’s wrong with him.’

‘I don’t know,’ Isloman replied. ‘But give him the sword. It’s... important... it’s saved me in the past, and it’s saved us all today. Give it to him.’

Reluctantly, Sylvriss held out her hands to receive the weapon. Isloman placed it gently on to the outstretched palms. As the hilt of the sword touched her, Sylvriss felt the wind-blown Fyorlund countryside disappear in a great soaring song. A myriad voices singing a myriad tales of triumph and despair. There she was, riding by her father’s side across the open Riddin countryside, flirting and teasing the besotted Rgoric in summer orchards, withdrawing into herself over the long bitter years as Dan-Tor poisoned her husband, prowling the Westerclave, slaying the Mathidrin Sirshiant in the streets of Vakloss, at once exhilarated and degraded by the deed. And other tales were there. Everything was there. Everything. Even the life song of her unborn child.

With a cry she let the sword fall. ‘What is this?’ she asked hoarsely. ‘Who are you? And who is this to own such a thing?’ She looked down at the motionless Hawklan.

‘Help him, please,’ said Isloman again, taking her arms in his powerful hands. ‘I’m sure the sword will help him.’

‘No,’ she said. ‘He’s... too near the end to hear... that.’ She clasped her hands together to stop them trembling as she looked at the sword.

Then she leaned forward and took hold of Hawklan’s hand. It was cold and lifeless; a terrible contrast to the great celebration that had just possessed her. Almost without realizing what she was doing, she pressed it gently against her stomach. ‘He needs a softer song to draw him back from wherever he is,’ she heard herself saying.

The wind buffeted the motionless group, ruffling Gavor’s feathers, and blowing Sylvriss’s hair across her face, but it could not disturb the deep stillness that descended on them all as they watched and waited.

Then Sylvriss laid down Hawklan’s hand and placed her fingers on his throat. ‘His heartbeat’s a little stronger,’ she said after a moment, almost disbelievingly. ‘Still faint, but definitely stronger.’

Isloman checked for himself. ‘It is, it is,’ he whispered. ‘And his face is less pale.’ However, despite his obvious relief at this improvement in his friend’s frail condition, the momentum of his journey seemed to return to him and without further comment he lifted Hawklan up quickly and began carrying him to his horse.

‘What are you doing?’ cried Sylvriss in alarm. ‘He’s very weak. I don’t think he should ride any more.’

‘He’s ridden this far and lived,’ Isloman said, almost callously, although his tone contrasted markedly with the gentleness with which he laid Hawklan across Serian’s neck. ‘We have to get away quickly.’

Sylvriss seized his arm and dragged him round to face her.

‘He might die yet, Isloman,’ she said angrily. ‘What are you running from that’s worth such a risk?’

Isloman looked down at her, his eyes full of concern and gratitude, but still impatient and fearful. He cast around for an explanation. It was there, in the west.

‘We’re running from that, Muster lady,’ he said, gently taking her hand from his arm, and turning her round to look at the place they had just so desperately ridden from. ‘We’re running from that. And the man... the creature that caused it.’

There, dominating the distance, was Vakloss, chief city of Fyorlund, standing high on its isolated hill, and crowned by the towers of the King’s palace. Its familiar skyline was unchanged, but Sylvriss was aware of some ominous difference, though for a moment she could not make out what it was. Two scars, seemingly rooted at the palace diverged across the city, as though a powerful flood had struck a massive rock and split irrecoverably into two lesser streams. At isolated points, smoke was being swept up and dissipated by the wind.

‘What...’

‘Mount up.’ Isloman’s command cut across Sylvriss’s question, and forestalling any further discussion, he swung up on to Serian. Immediately, the horse began walking along the road.

Scowling, at first with annoyance and then with pain, Sylvriss mounted her own horse and rode after the retreating stallion, which had now broken into a trot. Catching a gust in the wind, Gavor opened his wings and rose straight into the air to follow them both.

‘What’s happened in the City?’ Sylvriss finished her question as she reached Isloman.

Isloman shook his great head, trying to order his thoughts. ‘I can scarcely remember,’ he replied. ‘I remember getting involved with a crowd and arriving at the palace somehow, then Hawklan was talking to this Dan-Tor, and...’ He screwed up his face in concentration, then laid his hand uncertainly on the bow hanging from Serian’s saddle. ‘Then Hawklan shot him... for some reason...’

Sylvriss’s eyes widened. ‘Shot him,’ she gasped. ‘Shot Dan-Tor!’

Isloman nodded uncertainly.

Hopes began to form in Sylvriss’s mind. Was she fleeing now from something that no longer existed? Were these two men simply fleeing an anticipated retribution?

‘Is he dead?’ she asked anxiously.

Isloman turned to her, his face fearful again. ‘How can a thing like that die?’ he asked. Then, almost to himself, ‘It’s so confused. Hawklan’s never used a bow in his life. And he’d never strike anyone...’ Memories returned to give him the lie. Memories of Hawklan wielding the sword like a great warrior to hack down Mandrocs as the two of them had fled from Aelang’s patrol in Orthlund, Hawklan defeating Mathidrin in the smoke-strangled streets of Vakloss. ‘Well, not without provocation,’ he added hesitantly.

Sylvriss leaned across to him and laid her hand on his arm. ‘What did you mean — a thing like that?’ she said.

Isloman started slightly. ‘Hawklan’s arrow struck him, I’m sure,’ he said. ‘He twisted away, but it hit him. Sent him staggering. I’m certain it did, and yet...’ His voice faded away as he struggled again with the confused images that were vying for his attention.

Sylvriss waited.

‘I remember Dan-Tor standing there, changed somehow, standing there radiating a terrible power, malevolent, like...’

He shuddered. The words did not exist. ‘He... it... lifted its hand and pointed at us, then everything around us was heaving and rumbling... even the ground.’

Imperceptibly, Serian’s trot became a loping gallop.

Unthinkingly, Isloman’s hands clutched nervously at Hawklan’s limp body draped in front of him, like a child trying to wake a parent for reassurance that his recent vivid torment had been just an evil dream. But there was no response.

Sylvriss took his arm again. ‘What happened?’ she said softly.

Isloman shook his head. ‘It’s gone, it’s gone,’ he said. ‘I remember Hawklan holding out the sword, keeping back some awful... I remember cowering behind him as he sank to his knees. Then everything’s confusion, screaming and pain. Everyone’s screaming. Every thing’s screaming. Even the stones. Pity help me, even the stones.’

Isloman’s head went back in a spasm of despair. Sylvriss flinched away from his pain.

‘Then I was on Serian. Galloping through panicking crowds. Galloping through heaving streets...’ Isloman’s eyes widened, and Serian’s gallop increased. ‘They were cracking open in front of us. Like great yawning mouths. And buildings were falling. Debris clattering around us everywhere, and great clouds of dust blowing.’ He drew a hand across his mouth. ‘And all the time, it was behind us, pursuing us. A great howl like a monstrous, demented animal... So much hatred... So much evil.’

Abruptly Sylvriss realized that they were riding almost at full gallop. Isloman’s relived terror had wakened Serian’s own. Her Muster instincts set aside the confusion that Isloman’s telling had produced in her and leaning over, she spoke softly to the black horse; gentle words of reward for tasks well done and rest well earned. Gradually, Serian slowed until he was trotting steadily again.

Isloman seemed unaware of the incident and sat motionless in his saddle, staring blankly ahead, apparently with nothing further to say. Sylvriss was content to ride in silence for some time, while she tested the reality of his bizarre tale. Dan-Tor attacked! And by Orthlundyn. Orthlundyn riding a Muster horse. The City raked by some terrible force released seemingly by Dan-Tor. A Dan-Tor transformed into... What?

She had felt the fringes of whatever had happened in the City and had been terrified. There was no doubting that reality. To be near its heart could indeed have overwhelmed even as fine a horse as Serian and such a man as Isloman seemed to be. As for his stricken friend, Hawklan — a man whose presence could be felt even though he was at the very edge of death — who was he and what had he borne as carrier of that awesome sword, at the very centre of the horror?

For a moment, she felt as though her mind was going to break free from all restraint and plummet shrieking into an abyss. She had grown used to living in a world of treachery and deceit, a world of political manipulation and intrigue, of power-seeking ambition. It was repellent and oppressive, but it was human. Now what was she fleeing from? A man — a thing, as Isloman called him — who could shake and destroy the very roots of a city?

A chilling thought crystallized abruptly. She seized Isloman’s arm. ‘Isloman. My husband. What’s happened to my husband?’

Isloman turned and looked at her, his eyes focussing slowly as Sylvriss repeated the question.

‘I don’t know,’ he said gently. ‘I don’t know your husband, Muster lady. I don’t know you. I don’t even know your name, for all I’m in your debt.’

Sylvriss closed her eyes irritably at the tiny worm of vanity that intruded into her concern. Of course, this man was an outlander, how could he be expected to recognize her?

‘I’m sorry Isloman,’ she said. ‘I’m Sylvriss, daughter of Urthryn, Ffyrst of Riddin, and Queen to King Rgoric.’

Isloman stared at her thoughtfully. ‘Your voice marks you out as Riddinvolk and your riding and your horse would mark you out as Muster trained even if you weren’t wearing their field uniform. But why would Rgoric’s Queen be fleeing the City? he asked.

Sylvriss’s eyes blazed. ‘How do Orthlundyn come to be riding a Muster horse?’ she shouted, suddenly angry. ‘And take pride that they’ve tried to kill a Fyordyn Lord?’ But before Isloman could speak, her tone changed. ‘For pity’s sake Isloman. What of Rgoric? He must have been with Dan-Tor when you arrived.’

‘I don’t know,’ Isloman replied. ‘The only other people with Dan-Tor were Mathidrin — it’s difficult, but I don’t remember anyone else.’ He searched for more comforting words. ‘The palace seemed undamaged when we looked back, didn’t it? Dan-Tor’s harm flowed out away from it. Your husband will probably be all right.’

Sylvriss recalled the terrible chill that had possessed her soon after she had brought Serian to a halt. She shuddered. No, she thought, she must not give way to doubts. Isloman’s words were all he could possibly offer. And he was probably right. Perhaps even now Rgoric was on this same road with Eldric and Jaldaric at his side. She could serve him best by doing his bidding; by riding to Eldric’s mountain stronghold and raising his High Guards.

‘Where are you going, Isloman?’ she asked.

‘The horse chose the road,’ he replied. ‘As it’s eastward I’ll go to Lord Eldric’s stronghold. There’s nowhere else in this land I can go. And there are people there who need to know what’s happened.’

‘Good,’ Sylvriss said simply. ‘That’s where I go.’ High above, Gavor rode the boisterous air with a relentless purpose, his eyes fixed on the tiny figures below and their precious burden.