Frostborn: The Gorgon Spirit (5 page)

“We don’t know why the Traveler is here,” said Ridmark, “and as for the Mhorites…”

“Gray Knight.”

The voice was a furious, hissing rasp. Ridmark whirled, fearing that one of the trolls had healed from Morigna’s mist. The trolls’ carcasses remained motionless, but one of the fallen orcs got to his knees, his leather cuirass wet with blood, the right side of his face gleaming with gore. 

He held a dagger clutched in his right hand. 

“I know you, Gray Knight,” rasped the Mhorite, black eyes glittering with the scarlet light of orcish battle rage. “I saw you. When you dueled the great Voice of Mhor below the walls of Vulmhosk. You should have fallen there. You shall fall.”

“The Voice of Mhor?” said Ridmark, a dark suspicion falling into his mind.

“I think,” said Morigna, “that he means Mournacht.” 

That was an alarming thought. Mournacht was an orcish shaman, a priest of Mhor, a wielder of powerful dark magic. He was also a formidable warrior, and used his dark magic to enhance to combat prowess to deadly effect. Ridmark had dueled him twice, once at Vulmhosk, and again at Tarrabus Carhaine’s domus in Coldinium, and both times Ridmark had barely escaped. 

“The female speaks truly,” snarled the Mhorite, staggering forward. “The Voice of Mhor is here. He has gathered tribes of Kothluusk to his side, and he has marched forth with the might of the followers of great Mhor behind him. He has come to claim the great power for himself, and to bring the world beneath the heel of Mhor.”

“The power?” said Calliande with alarm.

“The great power awakening beneath the mountains,” said the Mhorite warrior. “The Voice of Mhor shall claim it and pour out Andomhaim upon Mhor’s altar as a blood offering.” He laughed. “He shall be pleased, most pleased, to find you again, Gray Knight. He owes you a debt of pain and suffering.” 

“Does he, now?” said Ridmark. “Tell him that he is welcome to try and collect, if he wishes.”

The Mhorite started to answer. 

Suddenly both Heartwarden and Truthseeker blazed with white fire, and a jolt of pain went through Ridmark’s head from his broken bond with Heartwarden. 

“Beware!” shouted Arandar. “A…”

A blur shot behind the Mhorite orc and drove the Kothluuskan warrior to the ground. The orc just had time to scream, and then a hunched, misshapen form appeared over him as the blur melted away. The creature pinning the Mhorite looked like a twisted cross between a wolf and an ape, its body corded with muscle, greasy, lank black fur hanging from its body. Its eyes burned like dying coals, and its fanged mouth yawned wide. 

It was an urvaalg, one of the war beasts of the ancient dark elves, a creature immune to steel and vulnerable only to magic. 

Before Ridmark could react, the urvaalg’s jaws crushed the Mhorite’s skull with a single vicious snap. 

“They’re around us!” said Gavin, and a half-dozen more blurs appeared, resolving into the shape of urvaalgs. The scent of the spilled blood must have drawn them. The urvaalgs charged in a ring, claws bared, fanged maws yawning wide. Almost anyone would have fallen to such a vicious onslaught. 

But Ridmark had two Swordbearers with him, and the soulblades had been forged to fight creatures of dark magic. 

Gavin and Arandar moved in a blur, their soulblades leaving a trail of white fire in the air behind them. The Swordbearers crashed into the charging urvaalgs, leaving two of the creatures dead in their wake. Calliande shouted and cast a spell, and a blast of white fire slammed into another urvaalg, throwing the beast to the ground. The creature screamed as the white fire of the Well’s magic chewed into its flesh. The urvaalg crouching atop the dead Mhorite snarled and sprang forward. 

Ridmark met its attack with a two-handed blow of his staff.

His old staff would have been useless. That staff had burned in the destruction of the Torn Hills as the aftermath of the Warden’s furious spells erupted around them. Instead, Ardrhythain had given Ridmark his old staff. The archmage of Cathair Solas had carried the staff for so long and worked so many spells with it that the staff had taken on some magic of its own. Symbols of white fire flared up the staff’s length as Ridmark struck, and the weapon smashed against the urvaalg’s yawning jaws. Fangs shattered and bones cracked, and the urvaalg stumbled with a furious yowl. Before the creature recovered, Ridmark swung again, his staff hammering against the side of the urvaalg’s skull.

This time the creature went down and stayed down. 

Ridmark spun, seeking another foe, and saw a second urvaalg preparing to spring.

There was no way he could reach it before the beast jumped, and it was too close for him to avoid the lunge. Ridmark got both hands around his staff and braced himself, hoping he could strike the urvaalg in midair with enough force to divert its motion.

But the urvaalg did not move, its body trembling with tension.

Ridmark had an instant of confusion, and then his instincts screamed for him to move. He raced forward, whipping the staff around, and brought it down with all his strength. The urvaalg started to get to its feet, but by then it was too late. The black staff of Ardrhythain slammed into the urvaalg’s skull with the snap of bone, and the creature collapsed to the bloody ground. 

He whirled, seeking new foes, but the battle had ended. Arandar cut down the final urvaalg, Heartwarden blazing with white fire. Ridmark remembered what it had felt like to have Heartwarden burning in his fist, the sword’s power flowing up his arm and filling him with strength. He also remembered what it had been like to have his connection to the sword severed, agony flooding through him. He still had a sharp headache whenever he looked at the sword or drew too close to it.

None of that mattered right now.

“Is anyone wounded?” said Ridmark. 

“I don’t think so,” said Calliande, looking around.

“Seven urvaalgs and not a scratch,” said Caius. “Truly, God was with us.”

“God,” said Jager, offering a grand bow to Gavin, “and two men with soulblades. You know, Sir Arandar, as annoying as you are, you are quite a useful fellow to have around.” 

“Such high praise,” said Arandar, his tone half-amused, half-annoyed. 

Gavin said nothing, staring hard at Morigna. She glared right back at him. Ridmark wondered what that was about, and decided that he could worry about it later. 

“The spilled blood must have drawn the urvaalgs,” said Kharlacht. “They are likely one of the few creatures in Vhaluusk that can defeat a troll in combat.”

“It is not a mystery why the urvaalgs were here,” said Caius. “I am more concerned about the Mhorites.”

Jager shrugged. “It is not such a mystery. I daresay we rather annoyed Mournacht during our last meeting, and I’m certain the Gray Knight in particular vexed him a great deal. Well, Morigna and her rats, too.” Calliande shuddered a little at that. She hated rats. 

“But to gather a host and march upon Vhaluusk?” said Arandar. “Vhaluusk is a long way from Kothluusk, and to march so far for vengeance…”

“He’s not here for vengeance,” said Calliande. “You heard that Mhorite orc. Mournacht is here to claim the power below the mountains. He’s here to take the Keeper’s staff for himself.”

“How could he possibly know that?” said Jager. “No one knew where the damned thing is, not even you, and you’re the one who hid it!”

“The Warden knew,” said Caius. 

“Aye, and we almost got ourselves killed asking him,” said Jager. “I cannot see Mournacht taking the same risks, or the Warden sharing the secret out of charity.” 

“Shadowbearer,” said Kharlacht.

They all looked at him. Save for Calliande, Kharlacht was the only other member of their group who had met their ultimate enemy. 

“From what we have seen, Shadowbearer prefers to work through emissaries and proxies,” said Kharlacht. “He used Qazarl and my kin to claim the soulstone and Calliande, and when that failed, he used the Enlightened of Incariel and the Red Family. We defeated them both, so now Shadowbearer has chosen a different proxy.”

“How could he know to send Mournacht here?” said Calliande. “How would the Traveler know to come here?”

Mara shrugged. “Perhaps he watched us from afar.” She considered that for a moment. “Or maybe we awakened the staff of the Keeper.”

“Awakened?” said Calliande. “What do you mean?”

“I wonder,” said Mara, “if when you learned of the staff’s location, it…woke up. Started calling to you, the way the auras of the dark elven lords call to me.”

“I can’t hear or sense anything like that,” said Calliande. 

“I fear it is possible,” said Mara, “that you have forgotten how to do so.” 

“But the Traveler and Mournacht,” said Ridmark, “might know how to hear the staff.”

“Others, too,” said Jager. “If my clever wife is correct, and she usually is, that means anyone who can hear the staff’s call will hasten to claim it. Like pouring out a bag of coins in the forum on a festival day.”

“Then our task is all the simpler,” said Ridmark.

“How?” said Calliande.

“It is a race,” said Ridmark. “We simply find Dragonfall and your staff before the Traveler, Mournacht, and anyone else who tries to claim it.”

“That’s it?” said Jager, and he laughed. “Simplicity itself!”

“The best plans are always simple, are they not?” said Ridmark. “If this is a race, then let us win it.”

They left the valley and the dead Mhorites, trolls, and urvaalgs, climbing higher into the foothills.

###

A few hours later Gavin saw Morigna walking alone at the rear of the column, her eyes half-closed as her ravens circled overhead, watching for trolls and Mhorites and God knew what else. 

He made up his mind, took a deep breath, and walked to her.

Her eyes, hard and black and deep, stared at him. Again he wondered what Ridmark saw in her. She was brave and clever, true. She was also pretty, and when he had seen her unclad at Coriolus’s altar near Moraime, he was honest enough with himself to admit that it had been hard to look away. Yet there was a cold arrogance within her that seemed dangerous.

“Well, Sir Swordbearer,” said Morigna in her usual mocking tone. “Come to keep me company, hmm? Perhaps to reminisce about your childhood in Aranaeus, oblivious as everyone around you worshipped spiders?”

“I know what you did,” said Gavin. 

“Oh, just what is that?” said Morigna. “I ate breakfast, I helped save your lives from some trolls…”

“You used dark magic,” said Gavin, his voice quiet enough that no else could hear it, “to control that urvaalg in the battle.” 

Morigna’s eyes narrowed into black slits. “So sure of that, are you? Are you a Magistrius now, to…”

“I felt it,” said Gavin. “During the battle. It was the same spell you used during our fight against the Warden’s creatures. I only felt it because I was standing a few feet away from you. I think you made it weaker so that Sir Arandar and Lady Calliande would not sense it.” 

Morigna stared at him. He could almost guess the thoughts behind those dark eyes. She was contemplating lying to him. Or perhaps attacking him. 

“So you think to bully me, boy?” said Morigna. Apparently she had decided to threaten him. “You think that sword gives you the right to command me? Sir Gavin the Wise, then?”

“Why?” said Gavin. “You told the Gray Knight you would not use the dark magic again.”

“I did it to save Ridmark’s life,” hissed Morigna. “That urvaalg would have taken him unawares, and neither of you mighty Swordbearers were close enough to aid him. I will not lose someone else to those damned urvaalgs.” 

Gavin hesitated. He knew that dark magic was dangerous. He had seen what happened to those who turned to dark powers, Paul Tallmane foremost among them. Morigna was playing with fire, was creating a weapon that would one day turn upon her. Yet he could not find the words to articulate his thoughts. 

“You should be careful,” said Gavin at last. “You are playing with dangerous things.”

She sneered. “I have been playing with dangerous things since long before you were born.”

“You are five or six years older than me at most,” said Gavin. “If you were playing with dangerous things then, you must have been a most foolish five-year-old.”

She almost smiled at that. “So, my brave Swordbearer. What shall you do with the vile witch in your midst? Denounce me to Sir Arandar and the Magistria?”

“No,” said Gavin. “I’m not going to tell anyone. You should think on something, though.”

“Do enlighten me,” said Morigna. 

“You used a spell to control an urvaalg,” said Gavin. “The Old Man used an urvaalg to kill your Sir Nathan. What kind of spell do you think the Old Man used to command the urvaalg? The same one you’re using, perhaps?” 

Her face went blank, but her dark eyes flashed with rage, and for a moment Gavin thought she might strike him. Then she scowled and looked away, but he saw a flicker of chagrin on her face. Perhaps she had listened to him. Perhaps she was putting on a show for his benefit. 

But he would watch her closely nonetheless. 

Chapter 3: Khorduk

The next day they reached Khorduk in the middle of the afternoon.

“That,” said Gavin with surprise, “looks a lot like Thainkul Dural.”

Ridmark nodded, watching the village. 

They were high in the foothills now, almost to the mountains proper. The peaks rose up overhead like fists of gray stone and white ice, their snow-topped caps glinting in the sun sinking towards the western horizon. Somewhere beyond those peaks, he knew, lay the Vale of Stone Death and the gates to the ruined dwarven city of Khald Azalar.

With luck, they would find aid within the walls of Khorduk.

The village was a peculiar mixture of dwarven and pagan orcish architecture. A stockade of sharpened logs and piled stones encircled the village, and most of the houses within were round with thatched roofs, much like the dead village Ridmark and Morigna had seen yesterday. Yet the gate’s twin watch towers were built of massive blocks of perfectly worked stone, and stood twice as tall as the stockade itself. The blocky shape of dwarven glyphs marked the towers’ sides, along with the stylized, angular bas-beliefs the dwarven kindred preferred for artwork. Within the heart of the village rose another blocky dwarven tower, twice as high as the watch towers. Khorduk was a strong place and would be difficult to take by storm. To judge from the crossbow-armed guards standing atop the wall, it hadn’t fallen to the trolls. If the Traveler and Mournacht had both brought armies to enter Khald Azalar, they would find it wiser to go around Khorduk. 

“Aye, Sir Gavin,” said Caius, gazing at the towers. “It was once one of the outer watch towers of Khald Azalar, with a signal fire to warn the others. Likely it fell when the Frostborn stormed Khald Azalar itself.”

“If it is a watch tower,” said Morigna, “then would it not open to the Deeps? Perhaps we can enter Khald Azalar through a tunnel and avoid our foes entirely.”

Caius shook his head. “A sound thought, but the outer watch towers would not link to the Deeps. The approaches to Khald Azalar within the Deeps have their own strong points.” 

“You seem most familiar with Khald Azalar, Brother Caius,” said Arandar with surprise.

“I visited it once,” said Caius, his deep voice distant. “Long ago, before it fell to the Frostborn, when the Three Kingdoms of the dwarves were still the Four Kingdoms. Certainly long before any of you children were born.” 

“You shall make a useful guide, then,” said Arandar.

“Not as much as I would wish,” said Caius. “It was long ago, and I only visited the top levels of Khald Azalar. I had no idea the Keeper would conceal her staff there…or even who the Keeper really was.” He smiled. “Had I but been a little older, I could have met Calliande in person centuries ago and saved us much trouble.” 

Calliande smiled back. “How dare you have been born too late, Brother Caius.” 

“We can hire a guide with more recent knowledge here,” said Kharlacht.

“This village looks like a den of iniquity,” said Arandar. 

“It is,” said Kharlacht, “but the orcs here worship neither the blood gods nor the Dominus Christus, but only profit. They will not kill us in the name of Mhor.”

“No,” said Jager. “Though they might kill us in the name of all the armor of dark elven steel that we are wearing. Such relics are valuable.”

“That is a possibility,” said Kharlacht. “But only if we look like easy prey.” 

“Well,” said Ridmark. “Let us find out if we are appetizing or not.” 

He strode towards the gates of Khorduk, the others following. The Vhaluuskan orcs upon the stockade straightened up, lifting their crossbows. They didn’t precisely aim at him, but Ridmark knew they could bring the crossbows to bear easily enough. He stopped a dozen paces from the gate and lifted his hands.

For a moment the orcs stared at him.

“If you’re looking to sell those women,” said one of the guards, a tough, grizzled orcish man with skin like battered green leather, “you might find a buyer.”

“You could not afford me,” said Morigna with a smirk. 

“We’re treasure hunters,” said Ridmark. “We want to take some relics from the ruins of Khald Azalar.” That part, at least, was true. 

“You picked a foolish time to come, stranger,” said the orcish guard. “The trolls are stirred up, and there are devils loose in the Vale of Stone Death. It seems as if every warlord with a petty army is marching on the Vale for some reason.” He cackled, a bit of spittle dangling from his yellowed tusks. “Perhaps they all hope to die in the Vale.”

“Nevertheless,” said Ridmark. “I wish to speak with a man named Qhurzal.” Kharlacht had given him the name. “I want to propose a joint venture. My followers and I shall make no trouble within your walls.” 

“Very well,” said the guard. “Though if you make trouble, we’ll sell that fine armor of yours.” 

The gates to Khorduk swung open.

###

Gavin had never been in a tavern of pagan orcs. 

He had talked to pagan orcs before, of course. Occasionally small groups had launched raids upon the outlying farms of Aranaeus, but more often they came to trade. The pagan orcs prayed to demons and false gods, but they still needed to eat and drink and buy and sell. The Vhaluuskan orcs were grim and taciturn, hard-dealing but fair. Rather like Kharlacht, now that Gavin thought about it, though Kharlacht had been baptized and brought into the church. 

Though Gavin supposed that all the fanatical Vhaluuskans, all the ones like Mournacht and his followers, had marched to their deaths at Dun Licinia. 

The tavern was unlike any Gavin had ever seen. Of course, he hadn’t seen all that many taverns in his life, which struck him as absurdly funny. For all the wonders and the horrors that he had seen since leaving Aranaeus, there was so much of the world he had not seen, so much of life he did not understand.

Still, it was a strange tavern. It was a large round room walled in stone, a larger version of the orcish houses, the thatched roof held in place by old wooden beams. A firepit blazed in the center of the room, smoke rising through an oculus in the center of the roof. Skulls lined the walls of the tavern, troll skulls, skulls of kobolds and murrags from the Deeps, and even a few urvaalg skulls, the bones glistening and black. Benches and tables circled the firepit. Orcish women moved back and forth among the tables, carrying trays of food and drink. They looked as tall and fierce and muscular as most of the orcish men, and either they were in a foul mood or a scowl was their customary expression. Orcish men and a few orcish women sat at the tables, eating and drinking. Most had the rough look of mercenaries or bandits, and all of them cast quiet glances at Gavin and the others like wolves contemplating the prospect of prey. 

Ridmark, Kharlacht, Jager, Caius, Calliande, and Morigna sat at one of the tables, while Gavin, Arandar, and Mara stood guard. Gavin felt better having Arandar to back him up. He also felt better having Mara nearby, which made him feel a rueful sort of amusement. He had never thought such a diminutive woman could make himself feel safer, but she did. 

Though given that both Mournacht and the Traveler were loose in the foothills, he supposed any sense of safety was an illusion. 

A deep, gurgling laugh rang through the tavern. 

The orcish man they had come to see sat at the head of the table, between Ridmark and Caius. Like Kharlacht, he was nearly seven feet tall. Unlike Kharlacht, he had run to fat, his tusks rising before thick jowls, his broad gut straining against his leather jerkin. Yet he looked as if he knew how to use the weapons hanging at his belt. He also wore a peculiar variety of symbols – a wooden cross, a red skull of Mhor, symbols of the other blood gods, blocky glyphs that Gavin thought belonged to the dwarven gods of stone and silence, and other symbols he did not recognize. The big orc’s symbol-laden chest positively clanked every time he lifted his cup of beer. 

“You bear, master Qhurzal,” said Caius, “a most curious array of symbols.”

“Well,” rumbled the big orc, “one man says his god is supreme, and another says that his rules over the heavens. Who is to say which man is correct? Gods are powerful things, and I have no wish to earn their enmity. So I burn a handful of incense to the Dominus Christus, sit in silence for an hour in honor of the gods of stone and silence, and sprinkle a pinch of blood on Mhor’s altar on days of the blood moons. I pay my respects to all the gods, for a man must have many friends.”

Arandar gave a faint shake of his head. “Polytheist,” he said in a soft voice. 

Gavin blinked. “A what?” 

“Polytheist,” said Arandar.

Gavin thought back to his lessons with Father Martel in Aranaeus. “You mean…a figure of more than three sides?”

Now Arandar looked confused. “What?”

“I think you mean a polygon,” said Mara. “A polytheist is someone who worships more than one god at once.” 

Morigna gave them an irritated glance and made a shushing gesture, but fortunately Qhurzal seemed not to notice. 

“A pious attitude,” said Caius, “though the Dominus Christus and his Father are supreme above all other gods.”

“And that,” said Qhurzal, “is why I burn incense, to avert their wrath. But, come! I am curious how a dwarf of Khald Tormen became a priest of the god of Andomhaim…but Kharlacht tells me you came all this way to talk business, yes?” 

“We did,” said Ridmark.

“I enjoy war as much as any orc,” said Qhurzal, rubbing his thick hands together. “But business is more profitable by far. So! What brings such a peculiar band of travelers,” he glanced over them all, “to the gates of Khorduk?” 

“We wish to enter Khald Azalar and retrieve a particular item,” said Ridmark.

Qhurzal considered that for a moment.

“Kharlacht my boy,” he said, “I thought you seemed a sensible lad, at least until you fell in with that lunatic Qazarl and his pack of Mhalekite madmen.”

“He was kin,” rumbled Kharlacht.

“The bonds of blood are sacred, this is so,” said Qhurzal. “But if you want to follow this madman into Khald Azalar, then you are indeed a fool. Oh, I know who you are, Gray Knight. Tales of you have come this far north. But even you cannot go into Khald Azalar right now and live.” 

“Why not?” said Ridmark. 

“Because,” said Qhurzal, “strange things are going on in the Vale of Stone Death.”

“What manner of strange things?” said Ridmark.

Qhurzal took another drink of beer, the fingers of his free hand drumming against the planks of the table.

“The ruins,” he said, “are waking up.” 

“Waking up?” said Ridmark. “They’re stone and steel. How can rock and metal awaken?” 

“More precisely,” said Qhurzal, “their ancient guardians are awakening. How to begin?” He thought for a moment. “There is a pass through the mountains near here. It goes into a vale in the heart of the mountains. On the far end of that vale is one of the main gates to Khald Azalar, specifically the Gate of the West. We call the vale the Vale of Stone Death. Do you know why?”

“No,” said Ridmark. “I suspect the story is not a pleasant one.” 

Qhurzal smiled, showing yellowed teeth in the gray tangle of his beard. “It’s not. There is…something in the Vale, some manner of creature that can turn its victims to stone.”

Caius sighed. “The ancient defenses. I feared we might encounter something like this.”

Qhurzal grunted. “You know what it is, dwarf?”

“When the Nine Kingdoms of the dwarves were founded many millennia ago,” said Caius, “my kindred were at war with the dark elves. The dark elves wielded mighty magic and terrible weapons, and we feared defeat in that war. We had no wish for our engines and magic to fall into the hands of our enemies, so our stonescribes prepared defenses of…surpassing potency, let us say, only to be activated if our kingdoms fell.” 

“What kind of defenses?” said Ridmark.

“Something that can turn living men into dead stone, apparently,” said Caius. 

“A basilisk?” said Ridmark.

Qhurzal grunted again, impressed. “You’ve seen a basilisk, Gray Knight? How are you still alive?”

“Not a basilisk, but its eye,” said Ridmark. “Years ago, in a dark elven ruin. Even that almost killed me.”

“I doubt it was a creature of flesh and blood,” said Caius. “Likely it was some kind of spirit creature, summoned and bound through the lore of the stonescribes. When Khald Azalar’s fall became inevitable, its king would have released the final defenses.”

“The Frostborn army that attacked Khald Azalar was utterly destroyed,” said Calliande, her voice tight. “Khald Azalar itself fell and its people were wiped out, but the Frostborn army perished as well.”

“It was,” said Qhurzal with less concern. Gavin supposed it was ancient history to him, but for Calliande it had been part of her life, even if she could not remember it. “So the Vale of Stone Death is littered with dwarven ruins, to say nothing of Khald Azalar itself. From time to time some of the tribes of Vhaluusk or an enterprising rogue organizes an expedition into the Vale and Khald Azalar in search of treasure. Some of them come back rich. Most do not come back at all. Yet there are gold and jewels to be found in the ruins, and items of dwarven steel fetch a fine price anywhere.”

“What makes the Vale so dangerous, Master Qhurzal?” said Jager. “This…guardian creature?”

“That,” said Qhurzal, “and the ways to the Deeps are open from Khald Azalar. So anything that wishes to visit the surface can do so. Kobolds, dvargir, deep orcs, deep trolls…and deep trolls make the mountain trolls look like frolicsome kittens. To say nothing of the guardian, this creature that turns its victims to stone. The creature seems to sleep on occasion, sometimes for years at a time, but when it awakens it goes on rampages. So few of those who enter the Vale of Stone Death ever return.”

“You did, though,” said Ridmark. 

“Aye.” Qhurzal finished his beer and then called for one of the serving women to bring him another. “Three times.”

“How have you survived?” said Calliande. 

The big orc grinned at Calliande. “By being clever, madam. And stealthy. The biggest mistake raiders make when they go to the Vale is…well, making too much of a fuss. They hire teams of mercenaries to guard themselves, trains of pack horses and mules to carry out all their treasures. That draws the notice of the guardian and the creatures of the Deeps. I went by myself, alone and stealthily. I also made sure to go when bigger expeditions were making for Khald Azalar.”