Michael A. Stackpole (37 page)

Kothvir moved.

At first 1 thought it was a trick of the dying light, but his chest began to swell and contract. His breathing came so shallow at first that I refused to believe I had seen it. As his lungs grew used to breathing again, I began to hear him breathe. My ears confirmed what my eyes had told me: Kothvir had returned to the living.

His hands convulsed, and his claws extended. 1 winced as I saw them, and Roarke squirmed uncomfortably in his chair. Muscles tightened on the creature’s thighs, and his toes curled in. His shoulders dipped right and left as he loosened his back. His thick chest muscles heaved as he dragged his hands into his lap, then his arms flexed and bent at the elbow. .

The power line withered as, finally, Kothvir brought his head up. His shaggy mane had been shaved away from the sides of his head in the manner of warriors. Red highlights played off the sharp angularity of his cheekbones and the strong line of his jaw. His nostrils flared with each breath, and his mouth remained open just enough to let some light flash from his teeth.

He opened his golden eyes, then blinked away the droplet of Roarke’s blood. He stared forward at me and Roarke, but seemed to look right through us. He turned his head toward his left, and, when he saw Vrasha, his jaw began to work slowly as if he were speaking. He stopped, then tried again in a dry, harsh croak.

“You have done this?”

Vrasha nodded solemnly and raised the sceptre in his right hand. “As it was ordained to be done.”

“You are?” Kothvir peered hard at him, ignorant of the other
Bfiarasfiadi
warriors slowly stirring.

“Vrasha, Father.”

“Vrasha.” Kothvir’s eyes closed, and he sniffed the air. “You were the puling runt suckling born of a witch. I took your mother because it pleased me to displease her. I wanted to drown you at birth.”

As much as I hated Vrasha Packkiller, my heart ached for him. 1 could never imagine speaking to a son of mine like that, nor did I think I would have lived through hearing those words spoken to me by my father. I looked at Vrasha to catch any outward reaction to Kothvir’s comment, but he managed to hide his pain.

The
Bharashadi
sorcerer brought his head up. “1 believed you had spared me for greatness.”

“1 spared you because your mother would have found it more convenient for you to be dead.” Kothvir glanced over at the other
Bharashadi
standing on the dais. “You are?”

“The caretaker for your throne, Father. I am Rindik.”

Kothvir smiled. “So you slew your eldest half brother to take my place.”

“Actually, my lord, my mother poisoned your primary wife and her brood before you were a fortnight dead. I have, since that time, been very careful and have defended our realm against T
svortu
incursions.”

“And you sanctioned Vrasha here in his attempt to resurrect us?” Kothvir’s eyes narrowed.

Rindik did not even flinch. “I encouraged him. The timing was not what I might have desired, but the outcome was.”

“Yes, the outcome.” Kothvir turned back toward Roarke and me. “It has been a very long time since I have seen you. Even while I sat here, wrapped in death, 1 did not forget you. What you stole from me caused enough pain that I could not release it even after death. You killed not only me, but my dream of uniting Chaos and destroying the Empire. That is a crime for which you and all your kin should pay.”

Roarke bared his teeth. “If that’s a crime, recidivism would be a virtue.” He struggled against the magickal bonds holding him in place. “Let your pet release me, and 1 will do it again.”

Kothvir stood unsteadily, then pressed his left hand to the side of his chest where his wounds had been. “Even after this time I feel the pain. It is cold now, but it nests there to remind me. The years have changed you, but it makes no difference. I will finish now what I started years ago.”

With his left hand he reached back for the sword attached to his throne. “I made this
vindictxvara
in the heart of a volcano, beneath a full moon, and quenched it in the river that runs through the most desolate parts of Chaos. There has never been a blade like this before. At its mere touch, you will burst into flame.”

Roarke laughed all the more loudly. “Death has slowed you down. Not even a fair fight? Go ahead, slaughter me, your reputation will not benefit by it.”

Kothvir turned on him, the blade yet undrawn. “Why do you prattle on so, wizard? I remember your knife—a splinter to the tree driven into me that day. This blade will kill you well enough, but now I use it on the one it was forged to slay.”

With a hissing ring, Kothvir drew the
vindictxvara
and thrust it toward the roof. Red light ran like blood over the razor-edged steel. My jaw dropped open in complete surprise because there, staring back at me from amid the black tracery decorating the silvered blade, I saw my own face.

29

J ¥ow could that blade be meant for me
? At the time

f f he had created the weapon I was nothing more than an infant. He had no way of knowing what 1 would look like when I reached adulthood. He could not have anticipated my trip to Chaos. It was impossible that he could have manufactured that
vindictxvara
intending to use it on me.

Yet even as part of me wanted to take refuge in the thought that the time Kothvir had spent in the Necroleum had rotted his brain, scenes from the nightmare and many others boiled back up into my brain. I had seen this Chademon before, I had opposed him, and I had defeated him. Never before by force of arms, but by tactically outsmarting him. I had known forever that to directly engage him would mean my death. Even throwing that spear at him in our last battle had brought me far closer to him than I had ever been before.

Kothvir took a step forward, and his tail twitched. “The
Chronicles of Farscry
reported my death at your hands, and so it has been. Now 1 will return to you the favor you showed me.” With both hands wrapped around its hilt, he raised the sword over his head and closed to striking range.

I shook myself to clear my confusion. He was speaking to me as if I were my father. A confederate in his lunacy, I was letting nightmares bleed over into memories. How could he think me my father when Cardew was a hero, and I was too terrified to do anything to resist?

As the blade slashed down, a blurred bolt of silver swept across my sight and bowled Kothvir from his feet. Utterly unbalanced, the
Bharashadi
warrior scrambled to stay upright. In his struggle with the steel-pelted dog tearing at him, his feet kicked the Staff of Emeterio across the dais. Horror blossomed on Vrasha’s face as the staff rolled toward Roarke and hit the legs of our chairs. In an instant the enchantment woven with the Fistfire Sceptre to hold us evaporated.

I leaped to my feet and dove toward a pile of loot to grab a weapon to use against Kothvir. Off to my left Kothvir roared in pain and stood. He held Cruach out at arm’s length by the throat. A flap of the Chademon’s pelt hung down from Kothvir’s right shoulder, and Cruach’s mouth ran with Chademon blood. The hound barked and bit at Kothvir’s wrist, but the
Bharashadi
tightened his grip and choked off Cruach’s voice.

Glancing over to make sure I was watching, Kothvir pressed the tip of the
vindictxvara
to Cruach’s belly, then thrust the blade all the way through the dog. Cruach twisted in his grip and squeaked out a mournful howl. He looked at me, his opal eyes full of pain, but I could do nothing to save him.

Kothvir twisted the blade, then ripped it free of the hound’s body. Finished with Cruach, the Chademon cast him aside as if he were a soiled rag. Cruach disappeared from sight on the far side of the dais, though his whimpers reached my ears easily enough.

Slashing his
vindictxvara
through the air, the
Bfiarasfiadi
splashed a line of Cruach’s warm blood across my chest. “Now I will do for you what I have done for your damned hound. Then I will destroy your beloved Empire!”

My
hound.
Unbidden and outside my control, memories of Nob—much younger and much stronger—presenting me the pick of a litter filled my mind. “For you, Master Cardew, a hound to be alert and be hunting the Chademons who hunt you.” Cruach, the hound that had kept me safe during my expeditions to Chaos. The hound that had taken to me when Roarke said he was very particular about people. The hound who ran to me, not Roarke, when we returned from Castel Payne.

My hound. And the Emerald Horse,
my
horse. I scattered great handfuls of gold coins as my life and my father’s life fused into an epic that could not have been all of one piece, yet I knew that was exactly what had happened. Madness began to nibble my sight down into a dark tunnel.

The words I
am my son,
I
am my father
echoed through my head without end.

“Locke, move!”

Roarke’s yell freed me from my insanity. I dodged left as Kothvir’s overhand chop sliced down at me. The blade pitched coins and jeweled baubles in every direction, then his backhanded slash at me splintered the chair that had been my prison. The force of the blow sent half the chair cartwheeling through the air. It clipped Rindik in the head, knocking him back off the dais and out of my sight.

I crossed to another of the piles of treasure gathered around the room and closed my right hand around the hilt of a sword. I had hoped for something strong, heavy, and straight, but I got a jeweled sabre. Kothvir leaped down onto floor level with me and let the
vindictxvara
spin in time with his twitching tail. I got a hand and a half on the sabre’s hilt and aped his hunched stance.

“You can make it difficult, Cardew, if you wish, but we both know the outcome of this fight.” He dipped the point of his blade toward the loincloth and the rank insignia. “While i have lain dormant here, you have regressed. You could not have defeated me in single combat before. How can you have any hope now?”

I smiled at him with more confidence on my face than I felt in my heart. “Being in the grave for sixteen years hasn’t made you any smarter, has it? You’re the one bleeding. If F
arscry
says I am to kill you, and you do not want to count the time I’ve already done it, I am willing to oblige you again.”

Beyond him I saw Vrasha and Roarke square off. From his side of the dais, Vrasha thrust the sceptre toward Roarke and sent a flight of four red balls shooting out at him like stones from a sling. With the Staff of Emeterio held in his left hand, Roarke muttered a spell that started a blue light playing along the staff. He slashed it through the balls’ line of flight, letting the energy play out like a flag that engulfed and absorbed them all before vanishing.

Kothvir came in carefully, then beat my blade aside to the right. Sliding forward, he lunged, but I ducked beneath his sword and withdrew to the right, following my blade. He pivoted in my direction, trying for a horizontal slash that would have cut me in half. Holding my sabre in my right hand only, I blocked the cut and pivoted my body out of the way. I was ready for him to disengage, but he surprised me by maintaining contact with my blade.

That move shouldn’t have surprised me. He brought the
vindictxvara
up and over, carrying my blade with it. As with fights with Dalt, since i couldn’t counter his strength, he intended to use it to power me into the position he wanted.

Having learned from fighting with my brother, I leaped away before he could push me back and got my body out of the range of his blade. Dalt would have bull-rushed me, allowing me to sidestep him and hamstring him with a slash.

Kothvir did no such thing. He came in with a high slash that I caught on my blade. Sliding to the right, Kothvir shifted the direction of his attack away from me and pressed it against my blade. I felt the jolt as my sabre landed flat against the top of the dais and knew 1 was in serious trouble. Kothvir’s shoulders tensed, then he brought the
vindictxvara
down with all of his power.

My sword’s blade broke off with a brittle pop, leaving me with three inches of sword attached to a beautiful golden hilt.

“You are finished, Cardew.”

“Don’t mistake me for this sword.” I whipped my right hand forward, throwing the sword-crumb at Kothvir’s leg.

It hit him in the right knee and bounced off, doing no visible damage. Kothvir snarled and brandished his sword at me, splashing droplets of his blood and Cruach’s over the floor. “You’ll have to do better than that, Cardew.”

“I’ll do better once I find the right tool for the job.” I took a running step away from the dais and vaulted onto the first of the cavern terraces. I skidded to a halt in a shower of gold coins, then hauled myself up to the next level as the
vindictxvara
struck sparks from the stone below.

“Run, Cardew, run. You cannot avoid this blade forever!” Kothvir’s tongue flicked out, and he licked some of Cruach’s blood from the blade. “One touch. One nick, and you will die most horribly! I have waited in the grave for too long to be disappointed now!”

On the dais itself Vrasha and Roarke continued their sorcerous duel. With a wave of the staff, a flaming azure hawk materialized in the air. It swooped in at Vrasha, but the Chademon quickly described a square with the sceptre. A red cube formed itself around the bird, then fell to the ground. Both spells vanished in a violet flash, but Roarke spelled a snake to life in front of the Chademon, and it lunged at Vrasha.