Ice Forged (The Ascendant Kingdoms Saga) (49 page)

Kestel gasped as Penhallow took Connor’s arm and pressed it against his mouth. Connor stiffened but did not cry out, his eyes focused on the distance as if he were not truly present. After a moment, Penhallow raised his head. Blaine had expected to see blood on the vampire’s mouth, but Penhallow’s lips were clean, as was Connor’s arm. All that remained were two small punctures, and even from where he sat, Blaine could see that the bite was already healing.

“Interesting,” Penhallow said, releasing Connor’s arm. Connor shook himself, as if coming out of his thoughts, and stepped away.

“Now that I know more about your purpose, I am even more interested in supporting your cause,” Penhallow said, leaning forward a bit to meet Blaine’s gaze. “I would like to be your patron, and will offer you my protection.”

“At what price?” Kestel’s voice was sharp. Penhallow looked at her and chuckled.

“You’ve lost none of your fire, Kestel,” Penhallow replied.

“I know your reputation,” Kestel replied. “It held that you were a loyal friend and an implacable enemy.”

Penhallow gave an eloquent shrug. “That is true.”

“So what’s in it for you?” she challenged.

“A very businesslike attitude for a courtesan… and an assassin,” Penhallow replied.

“Business always comes first,” Kestel answered.

Penhallow stretched. Had he needed to breathe, Blaine
guessed the other would have taken a long breath. As it was, his stretch seemed designed to delay comment, or perhaps it was just a vestige of a mortal mannerism. “I don’t like what Donderath—and the Continent—have become since the Great Fire.”

“I thought predators preferred the wild,” Kestel replied.

Penhallow chuckled. “Predators prefer order. The natural order of things has been upset. The wildness that results—in the magic, in the people—is good for no one. I have seen the collapse of many kingdoms in my time. There is profit for no one but the scavengers.”

A groan from Piran drew their attention. Piran’s eyes opened, and a look of panic crossed his face as he awoke in unfamiliar surroundings.

“You’re safe, Piran,” Kestel said, crossing to him.

Piran managed to sit up. His shoulder was now completely healed. “Where are we?” He glanced around the room and stopped when he saw Lanyon Penhallow. “Who’s he?”

“Lord Penhallow gave us shelter and provided a healer for your wound,” Kestel said in an even voice that did not betray her thoughts about the matter.

“Penhallow, the vampire?”

“An inelegant term, but sufficient,” Penhallow said with a slight incline of his head in acknowledgment.

“I thought you said we were safe?”

“To the extent that anywhere is safe, you are safe here,” Penhallow replied, ignoring the tone of Piran’s question.

“If your magic, this
kruvgaldur
, still works, why should you care about the rest of the magic?” Dawe asked.

Penhallow made a gesture to take in the scope of the comfortable room. It resembled the parlor of a well-appointed manor much more than it did an underground bunker of a
noble in exile. “With magic, it is possible to rebuild within a generation. Without magic…” Another shrug. “What has been lost may never be reclaimed.”

Blaine leaned forward. “You say that you’ve seen kingdoms collapse before this. Do you know how they regained their magic?”

“Yes—and no. I’m not a mage myself. But I have been told by mages that magic rises from different sources. Perhaps it is the gods’ way to assure that magic everywhere is not destroyed.” Penhallow paused. “What you have learned from the maps and the book that Grimur gave you is your best hope. Whether or not you have all the pieces that are required remains to be seen.”

“That’s not very reassuring,” Blaine replied.

Penhallow frowned, and sat up straight, suddenly alert, all conviviality gone from his manner. “Something is not right,” he murmured. He moved to the door in a blur, all pretense of mortality gone. Blaine caught a glimpse of Geir’s face at the door, but could not hear their muffled conversation.

Abruptly, Penhallow turned back to them. “You must go.”

“I thought you said we were safe here?” Piran challenged.

“From mortals, yes. It isn’t mortals who attack us.” He nodded toward the sack full of weapons Verran had taken from the chest in the tunnel. “Take your weapons. Geir will get you out. He’ll stay with you, help you navigate. This is not the land you left behind. You’ll need him.”

“Don’t we get a say in that?” Blaine remarked as Kestel and Dawe helped Piran to his feet. Piran waved off their assistance, standing on his own though he was more pale than usual. Verran handed him a sword to replace the one Piran lost to the barghest.

“No,” Penhallow replied. “Not if you want to survive. Leave now.”

With that, Penhallow disappeared into the corridor. Geir slipped past him into the room. “Come on,” he said, striding past them toward one of the other closed doors.

Blaine caught him by the arm. Geir permitted his hold, but turned with an impatient expression. “Who’s out there?” Blaine demanded.

“Vampires. Pentreath Reese’s get. Reese doesn’t hold much with helping mortals. I suggest we leave before introductions are required.” Geir shook off Blaine’s hand casually, but with enough restrained force that Blaine got the message.

In the distance, Blaine could hear crashing and banging, and a jumble of shouts. He’d seen what one vampire could do. He had no desire to be caught between two warring vampire camps. Blaine looked back at the others, who were watching for his response. The crashes were getting closer. “We’ve got no choice. Follow him.”

Just as they reached the opposite wall, the door to the salon splintered down the center. It smashed to the floor, torn from its hinges. A blur of motion followed, as if storm winds had found their way into the underground. Blaine caught glimpses of men fighting, moving faster than his gaze could follow.

Blaine gripped his sword, ready to defend himself. Connor took a place next to him, his sword drawn. Piran stood ready for the attack, but Blaine doubted Piran could hold his own for long. Verran was on his knees in front of a door on the far side of the room, and Blaine guessed that he was picking the lock. Dawe fired a steady stream of quarrels at the onslaught of attackers, while Kestel lobbed whatever she could find toward the newcomers to slow their advance. After a moment, Verran rose with a triumphant grin and joined Kestel, keeping up a constant barrage of hurled projectiles.

Geir and Penhallow were at the front of the fray. Geir fought
with a broadsword in one hand and a short sword in the other, against an attacker that was equally well armed. The two parried and feinted, sizing each other up. Geir struck first, swinging hard with the broadsword. His opponent blocked the swing, slashing with the scythe-shaped dagger in his left hand and nearly scoring on Geir’s arm.

Geir twisted away, using his momentum to strike another bone-jarring blow, and while his opponent was able to parry, it drove him back a step, enough for Geir to get inside his guard with the short sword and slice open a long gash on the other’s left arm. With a curse, Geir’s opponent sprang at Geir, driving forward with his sword. Geir evaded the strike, but the point of the blade tore into his side, and dark blood colored his tunic. Geir countered with a series of pounding blows, each one driving his attacker back, staying just out of range of the scythe blade in the man’s left hand.

Not far from Geir, Penhallow kept two attackers at bay. He moved with a fighter’s grace, parrying a killing thrust by one opponent as he fended off a two-handed slash by the other that would have cut a mortal in two. While Geir’s face showed intent concentration, Penhallow had the look of a predator in his element: focused, remorseless, yet alive with the thrill of battle. Geir moved with cold precision and elegant reflexes. Penhallow seemed to dance, punctuating his attack with kicks and turns, a lethal combination of warrior training and reckless abandon.

More of the
talishte
had joined the fight, pressing Blaine and the others closer to the far wall of the chamber. “Do we run for it?” Dawe asked. Thus far, Geir and Penhallow had been able to keep the attackers away from Blaine and his friends, but as more of the undead swarmed into the room, that seemed unlikely to remain the case.

“I’d rather fight here, where we can see and move, than be overtaken in some damned tunnel,” Blaine replied.

Most of the
talishte
battled in pairs or triads, and from the look of it, Penhallow’s forces were holding their own, though in this room, the numerical advantage went to the attackers. Just as Blaine spoke, two of the
talishte
split off from the two-man attacks they had been mounting against single vampires and came at Blaine and Connor in a blurred rush of motion.

Dawe’s crossbow thudded as he loaded as quickly as the device would allow. Kestel hurled a silver candlestick at one of the vampires, striking him on the temple with enough force to fell a normal man. Verran had begun to raid the bag of weapons they had taken from the ruins of the inn, and sent a dagger wheeling through the air at the second vampire, pegging the man in the left shoulder so that the blade sank halfway into the joint.

Their attackers slowed but did not stop. Blaine heard scuffing next to him and looked up to see Piran beside him. Piran looked drawn and pale, but he held his sword with both hands and his lips were curled in a snarl.

“You should have stayed in Velant,” one of the attacking
talishte
sneered as he slashed toward Blaine. Blaine managed to parry—just barely—but the force of the undead fighter’s blow made his arm ache to the shoulder. The attacker grinned, sure of an easy kill, and brought his blade sideways for the next blow. Again, Blaine narrowly evaded the deadly tip, but it ripped into his jacket and sliced through his shirt, drawing blood from a shallow gash.

The other attacker had gone for Connor. The first swing was low, nearly catching Connor in the thigh. Connor parried and lurched out of the way as the next blow was a thrust meant to fix him between the ribs. The blade slashed through his shirt,
and blood flowed from a cut on his side. The vampire laughed, and Connor’s expression hardened. He ran toward the vampire instead of attempting to flee as his opponent expected, gratified when his sword scored a deep gash on the vampire’s forearm before the other knocked it loose with a force that sent Connor reeling. One of Dawe’s quarrels thudded against the wall, missing its target by a hair’s breadth.

Blaine was tiring fast, but his attacker clearly was not. From the gleam in his opponent’s eyes, Blaine guessed that wearing him out was part of the strategy. Each of the vampire’s blows took Blaine’s full strength to deflect, yet the attacker’s speed made it difficult for Blaine to wound the vampire, and he had no idea what would be required to kill it.

Piran ran at Blaine’s attacker, making up for waning strength with bluster and a bellowed war cry that could be heard even above the din of battle. The vampire wheeled, catching the brunt of Piran’s thrust on his blade, but he was a few seconds too late to deflect the blow completely, and the point of Piran’s sword dug deep into the vampire’s belly, a move that should have dropped a normal attacker in a steaming mess of blood and entrails.

Annoyance glinted in the man’s eyes as he focused his attack on Piran, and Blaine struck from the side, holding his sword shoulder height, its grip in both hands, running at the vampire like a horseless jouster. Piran feinted as if striking for the man’s chest, then at the last instant took his sword down, slashing hard across the vampire’s thighs as Blaine’s attack forced the vampire to raise his weapon in response.

Piran’s sword bit deep across the vampire’s flesh. The pain of it forced the vampire to flinch, just enough for Blaine’s wild thrust to slide along the vampire’s parry, slip free of the defending blade, and stab, point first, into the vampire’s neck. Carried
by his own momentum, Blaine’s sword skewered deeper, severing the throat and slicing through the neck muscles until the head lolled back, held only by the spine, which gleamed white against the blood. The vampire staggered, falling to its knees, blood washing down its thighs from the gashes that cut to the bone. Piran sprang forward and grasped the dangling head, then gave a vicious twist that snapped the spine and broke the head away from the body.

Only then, as the vampire fell forward and lay still, did Blaine have the chance to glimpse Connor’s battle. Blood flowed from multiple gashes on Connor’s shoulder, chest, and forearms. By sheer luck, Connor had managed to land a few nicks on his opponent, but it was clear that Connor was rapidly tiring. Before Blaine or Piran could move, they heard a wild shriek and saw the glint of silver in the torchlight. Kestel gripped the base of a heavy silver candelabra in both hands and came at Connor’s attacker swinging with her full might. Bone crunched as the blow landed on the vampire’s ribs and spine. Before the vampire could turn to face this new threat, Connor rallied. Lurching forward, he rammed his sword through the vampire’s chest, catching him full in the heart. Kestel brought down the candelabra again as the vampire fell forward, smashing the bloodied silver down on the vampire’s skull with a sickening crunch.

The room smelled of blood and decay. Kestel screamed as the vampire whose skull she had just crushed began to rot more quickly than a corpse left in the sun. Within seconds, its once-ashen skin had purpled and blackened, then began to peel back, exposing decomposing tissue beneath it. A few seconds later, the skin was gone, and the rotted muscles and organs became gelatinous, then sloughed off, leaving only bone. A heartbeat more, and the bone crumbled into dust.

Blaine heaved for breath and looked out over the battle. More of Penhallow’s loyalists had joined the fight, enough that the attackers were joined one-on-one, eliminating their advantage. The floor was littered with decomposing corpses, but Blaine had no idea whom the body count favored. Penhallow was in the center of it, holding his own, though his once-fine doublet was torn and bloodied, and he moved as if at least some of the blood was his. As Blaine watched, Penhallow cut down his attacker, only to have another take his place.