The War of the Moonstone: an Epic Fantasy (31 page)

Dalic shook his head. “No. I’m too
old. I will retire to our country estate and live out my days there, watching
your children hunt rabbits in my garden.” He smiled kindly at Giorn and added,
“As I have in the past.” Returning his attention to Serit, he said, “I must
refuse your offer. May
you
rule a
hundred years!”

There was more cheering, but Giorn
did not join in.
What’s the old man
doing?
The possibility that Dalic would decline to take his old seat of
power had never occurred to him. Giorn needed someone he knew and could trust
on the throne of Wenris.
Surely he knows
that. The fool!

When he was able, at a lull between
toastings, Giorn went to where Dalic was sitting, drinking his wine and
smiling, if somewhat sadly.

“I know you must be wroth with me,”
he started.

Giorn was, but he did not say so. Instead,
he waited.

“It’s just, being here, after all
we’ve gone through, I feel my age more than ever.” Yfrin took a sip and
grimaced. “I’m an old man, Giorn, and I fear this war has only made me age
faster.” He touched his head absently. “When we were being bathed and cleaned,
I caught sight of myself. All white, my hair.
All
white. I would swear there was a touch of the old yellow in it
before all this started, but now . . .” He shook his head ruefully. “Let Serit
have it! He’s a good man—I should know, I raised him—he’ll do you proud.” He
leaned in closer. “And he
will
do you
proud. He’ll help you win your throne back, have no fear. He’s loyal to the
Wesrains, just as I taught him to be. The bow-and-dagger, remember.”

Still, Giorn was uneasy as the
feast ended and he was shown to his chambers in the guest quarters of the royal
wing. Uncle Dalic was a few doors down, in Serit’s old chambers, while Serit
occupied Dalic’s old rooms at the end of the hall. Giorn slept fitfully,
tossing and turning. Nightmares haunted him. He wasn’t sure if it were the
wine, the war, or something else, but something just seemed
wrong
.

She came to him in the dead of
night, it must have been three in the morning. He had finally been beginning to
doze, if restlessly, and didn’t hear her approach. Then he felt a feminine form
recline on the bed with him, and he smiled and wrapped her slender body in his
arms.

“Niara . . .” He kissed her,
finding her lips soft and warm.

“Giorn.”

“Niara . . .” He frowned. It wasn’t
Niara’s voice.

His eyes fluttered open and he
stared, blinking, up at the woman that lay over him. He had only the moonlight
shining through the window to see by, and that was blocked by the heavy drapes.
Only a trace of ghost-light filtered in, providing just enough illumination to
see that this wasn’t Niara. She smelled of flowers and incense.

She did not draw away from him as
most women would have after a stranger kissed them. “Giorn,” she said again. She
had a soft, young, pleasing voice.

“Who—?”

For an instant he thought of Saria—she’d
come to him much like this—but no, this was another, he was certain of it. He
shoved her away, climbed to his feet, having forgotten his bad leg in his alarm,
then reached for his cane.

She slipped from the bed, graceful
as a shadow. He raised his cane menacingly, balancing himself awkwardly on his
good leg.

“Explain yourself!”

The dark, oval shape that was her
face parted slightly, and he saw the flash of teeth. For a moment, that trace
of fear rose in him again, and his cane nearly came down on her head, but then,
as his eyes adjusted to the dimness, he realized that she was smiling—and most
sweetly.

“I’m Histra,” she said. “A friend,
fear not.” She swept a delicate arm about the room. “This is the chambers of a
concubine of an ancient duke, did you know that?”

“No.” He didn’t lower his cane.

She laughed lightly. “Well, it is. By
rights it should be
my
chambers, not
yours.”

He frowned. “You’re Serit’s
mistress?” He was aware that the duke was married; his wife had been at the
feast.

“You’re rather blunt, I think.”

Reluctantly, he lowered his cane. “What
do you here? Did you mistake my quarters for Serit’s? Or are you planning on
making the switch from duke’s woman to baron’s?”

“Not just blunt, but rude.”

He massaged his forehead with the
hand not gripping the cane. “It’s late, I’m tired, a bit worse for drink, and a
strange woman has entered my chambers without announcing her reasons, and this
after I have endured many attempts on my life throughout recent months.”

She softened. She stole forward and
gripped his forearm, giving it a light squeeze. “I’m sorry, Lord Wesrain. I
didn’t mean to startle you.”

“Then what, precisely, did you mean
to do?”

She nodded her head to a black space
in the wall, a narrow gap that had to be the way she’d entered by.

“Come with me,” she said. “I came
through the tunnel the old duke built to visit his concubine.”

Giorn raised his eyebrows.

Histra smiled again, this time
softly. “The duke knew his wife would kill him if she found out about the
concubine, so he kept it from her. They slept in adjoining rooms, he and his
wife, but she would know if he left through the front door, so he had this
passage built.”

“Did it work?”

“Oh, she caught him in the end. She
first slew his mistress, then she dressed up in the girl’s clothes, waited in
her bed, and when her husband came to her in the night, thinking it was his
lover, she let him have his way with her and afterward, with him still inside
her, she slit his throat and drank his blood.”

He shivered. “Hell of a thing.”

“It was. And that’s how the guards
found them later, with her straddling him, drinking his blood, his
death-hardened member still inside her. The most interesting thing about the
tale is that afterward, since they had no issue, the guards didn’t dare
apprehend her or even report the crime. Chaos would have broken out. There would
have been civil war. So she continued ruling the dukedom till her death twenty
years later. After her husband’s death, they say, she acquired a taste for
human blood, and—”

“Enough. Why should I come with
you? Did Serit summon you to bring me to him? If this passage goes to his
chambers, then, by all means, let us go, if it will get you to stop talking and
allow me to get some rest.”

“Thank you.” She gestured toward
the doorway.

“Oh no,” he said. “After you.”

She slipped like a slim pale ghost
into the darkness.

Giorn took the moment to shove his
hunting knife into the waistband of his nightpants. Whatever trap this was, he
would meet it armed.

He found the passageway dark and
cold. He could smell the girl’s scent even more acutely in the tight space. Flowers,
incense, and . . . something else. Something coppery.

Chapter
19

“Here,” the girl said, pausing to trigger a panel, which
opened for her.

A
secret passage within a secret passage.
Giorn’s mind spun as he stared into
the blackness. Histra took a lantern that hung on the wall, lit it and stepped
into the narrow tunnel. On the first step, Giorn nearly fell.

Cursing, he righted himself and
squinted about. It was a small, tight stairwell, spiraling down into darkness. The
stairs proved steep and small, and he would have to make his way carefully with
his bad leg. Glaring at Histra’s back—she could have warned him—he followed her
down, several times nearly slipping on slime mold.

“What’s this? I thought we were
going to Serit’s quarters.”

“Oh, no. That wouldn’t do. He has
several servants that sleep in the antechambers. They would overhear our
discussion.”

“And what are we to discuss?”

“You shall see, my lord.” With one
hand holding the hem of her dress, the other the lantern, she led on through
the darkness. The small orange-red blob of light shifted and swayed, making the
shadows leap like drunken things.

“Why is this stairway here?” he
asked. “You said the old duke built the passage we just left to visit his
concubine. So why the stairs?”

“Oh, he built the passage, all
right. As for the stairs—well, after his wife slew them—and, I should add, ate
them afterwards—well, remember, I told you that she developed a taste for human
blood?”

Carefully, Giorn took another step
down. He slipped on a patch of slime and had to grab a rough stone along the
wall for support. With a ragged breath, he said, “Yes. And?”

“Think about who she was. She’d
killed two people, totally given in to her darker passions, then, consumed with
her hate for those that had wronged her, she ate them. At the same time, she
was ruler of a prosperous duchy. A dark-willed duchess, yes.”

She seemed to like this tale a
little too much. “Please just get to the point.”

“Oh, I am, my lord. For, you see,
it wasn’t long until Gilgaroth reached out to her.”

“
Gilgaroth
?”

“The Breaker felt her darkness, her
hate, her bloodlust, her power, and He reached out to her. Touched her in
dreams. Spoke to her, whispered promises in the night. And she heeded Him.”

“What are you saying?” Gooseflesh rose
on his skin.

“She turned to the worship of the
Wolf.”

“Impossible!” He needed both hands
now, one on his cane and one to brace himself on the sometimes rough, sometimes
slick walls. Otherwise he would have reached for his hunting knife.

“Oh, no, not impossible. She turned
to Him. She journeyed down into the deepest catacombs below this castle, where
the servants were too superstitious to venture, and built an altar to Him.”

Giorn shivered. “A Black Altar,
here
. . . ?”

“There she brought prisoners to be
sacrificed to Him. Just as now, there were no public executions in Fiarth, and
so the sentences were carried out in private. She took over the duty herself. There
were many rumors about her in those days, and her actions caused many scandals,
but no one could prove anything, and all were too afraid to try. So it continued.
For a score of years it went on like that, until at last she went to her dark
master for good and all, and her nephew assumed the throne of the dukedom.”

“Amazing. And this . . . this altar
. . . is it still here? Surely it was destroyed. If you know the tale, then
that must mean . . .”

“Oh, it was found, years later. But
not destroyed. All feared that her spirit was still near, still haunting the
lower portions of the catacombs, and that it still served the Dark One. Castle
servants even to this day refuse to sleep on the ground level. Those that did
in older times reported that their breath was stolen in the night, and they
woke up weary and gray. Some didn’t live long. This went on for a long while
until the duke at the time ordered that the servants’ rooms be moved to the
second floor. Since then, there have been no problems. Apparently the duchess,
if it really is her spirit feeding off the living, cannot venture far from the
Altar.” She let that sink in. “But that’s why this tunnel is here. She
commissioned it to be built so that she could visit the Black Altar in secret. I
don’t know what happened to the masons—nothing good, I would imagine.”

She stopped at a blank, black wall.
She pressed a certain stone, then shoved at the wall, which swung away, and
stepped out into a broader corridor.

“Here we are,” she said, smiling. “The
catacombs.”

He did not smile back.

She led on. Giorn was more than
beginning to think he should never have come. He had thought he was just going
a few rooms down, to the duke’s chambers. Surely nothing overly bad could
happen there, in the royal wing. But here, in the catacombs . . .

“Where are we going?” But inside he
already knew.

“Why, the Altar, of course.”

He stopped. “I’m not going any further.”
Without another word, he pulled out his hunting knife.

Histra turned, her green eyes
falling on the weapon. “Dear Omkar! You would assault a young woman alone in a
dark corridor at night? Truly you are not your father’s son!” Despite her
words, her eyes showed no fear.

“I don’t know what you are or why
you brought me here, but I won’t be party to your games. Now—you stay here. Come
after me and I’ll be forced to hurt you.
I
am going back up—and through the proper way.”

She lifted the lantern to her face,
pursed her perfect lips, and blew out the tiny flame, drowning everything in
darkness.

“I don’t think so, Baron.”

Someone grabbed his shoulder. Instinctively, he spun to
slash at his attacker, but a second grabbed his knife hand and wrenched the
weapon from his grasp. A metallic clatter sprang from the void.

Two pairs of hands seized him. Something
punched him across the face, and he tasted blood in his mouth. His ears rang. Another
punched him in the gut. He doubled up, groaning. Tasted bile in the back of his
throat. The arms, which seemed unnaturally strong, did not release him.

“Now,” Histra’s voice came, “will
you come willingly, or will you fight?”

Giorn lunged sideways, clamped his
jaws around one of the arms that gripped him, and bit down, hard. To his shock,
the flesh he tasted was cold and fetid.
Dead
flesh. Horrified, he spat.

Another fist smacked his face. His
head spun. Somewhere, Histra laughed.

His attackers dragged him forward. Though
weakened, he fought them, but they were like iron as they hauled him through
the dark hall. Crypts reared on all sides.

Dread filled him. Dimly he
remembered the altar beneath Wegredon, the great shadow surging forward and
snapping up the elf-girl with monstrous jaws; he remembered the spurt of fire.
The fires of the Second Hell.
If they
slew Giorn on a Black Altar, would his soul be cast into that same inferno?

He struggled with greater fervor,
but to no avail. They wound down a stairway, then another. They were deep below
the earth now, below the castle. The air grew colder, and moisture dripped on
him from above.

At last he saw light ahead—red and
low and lurid, spreading like thickening blood from some point just out of
sight. His captors dragged him on, and presently he came within sight of what
must be the Altar. The old duchess had used the lowest crypt in the castle, the
deepest one, and there, beyond the statue of the ancient duke who was entombed
beneath his image of bronze (an image of a stern, bearded man, face tilted downward
in a contemplative pose, sword clasped before him in both hands, point in the
ground), was the long, low black slab, scored by many thrustings of the knife
and surely, though it was too dark to see, stained with the bloods of many.

Looming over it on the other side
was the high black wolf head on its dais, the massive bust of Gilgaroth just a
shadow in the dimness. The brazier’s light made the eyes dance, just slightly,
as though the thing were alive. Giorn stared at it with mounting dismay.
Gilgaroth, here
.

Duke Serit Yfrin waited nearby. He wore
a long black robe and held a curved dagger. The red light of the small brazier
flickered, coating everything in tones of fresh blood.

“How?” Giorn said. “How could you
worship
Him
?” Uncle Dalic would be
horrified.

Serit’s bland, youthful face did
not look smug or arrogant, or even particularly proud. He looked sad, actually,
and grave, as though what he did disturbed him. He did not answer.

“Was it the ghost of the old
duchess?” Giorn pressed. “Did she come to you and . . . ?”

Serit shook his head as Histra went
to stand beside him. In the light of the brazier, Giorn was able to get a good
look at her for the first time. She was slender and pretty, and younger than he
had thought. She had curly blond-brown hair that fell to the middle of her back,
and small, bow-shaped lips.

Serit bent his head and kissed her
briefly, adding a whispered, “Thank you, dear. I hope he wasn’t much trouble.”

“Not much.” She indicated Giorn’s
handlers, and her gesture drew his attention to them, whom he could just now
see.

Shocked, he struggled and beat at
them, but to no avail. They were human, but dead—dead and rotting and clad in
armor. There was no expression in their faces, no humanity to them at all. Even
the Borchstog-things Giorn had fought below Wegredon had evinced more life than
these creatures. What were they?

“How?” Giorn asked again.

Serit looked at him pityingly. “Raugst.”

“What of him?”

“Don’t you see? Soon Felgrad will
be overrun, and Vrulug’s armies will devour it like locusts. They’ll slay all
the men and rape all the women, and they will keep the issue of those rapings
for their slaves.”

“So why in the world would you
worship the Thing
they
do? Would you
be as evil as
them
?”

“No. Of course not. That’s why I
had to do it.” His face was earnest, his eyes imploring. Histra wrapped her
arms about one of his for support. “Felgrad will fall. The Age of Grandeur will
begin, and the time of our civilization will end. There is nothing we can do to
stop it. But Raugst sent out his agents, and they spoke with several of the
barons and dukes of Felgrad in private. This was months ago. He gave them each
a Black Book, the bible of Oslog, and told them to follow its rites. If we turn
to the service of the One, Vrulug will spare us and our provinces. Not all
agreed to follow him—Raugst chose his targets well, but there were still
dissenters, and they paid for it—but enough of us did. We’ll save our people no
matter what.
Now
do you see?”

“You’re a fool,” Giorn said.

“I am saving my people.”

“You’re
damning
them. You’re weakening Fiarth by taking away a powerful
dukedom, making it all the likelier that Vrulug will win.
That’s
why Raugst came to you, don’t you see? He doesn’t care if
you live or die, if your women are ravished or not, he only wants to destroy
Fiarth, then Felgrad as a whole. And you’re only making it easier for him!” Giorn
spat blood in Serit’s direction. “Your father would be ashamed.”

Serit’s eyes narrowed. “My father
is a foolish old man. Rabbits! He wants to watch rabbits, when I am trying to
save our people!”

“Delivering them to Gilgaroth is
not saving them!”

They glared at each other for a
long moment, and smoke from the brazier drifted across the chamber. Giorn
smiled. He imagined it was a bloody smile. “It must have given you a tense
moment when you offered the dukedom back to him,” he said.

Serit nodded. “It was a calculated
risk. I didn’t think he would take it. If he had . . .”

“He’d have met with some accident
sooner or later, wouldn’t he?”

“Regrettable, but he will not stand
in the way of my saving Wenris. Do you understand that? I’d hoped to make you
see before I do what must be done. Your sacrifice
does
have a reason, Lord Wesrain. I wanted to give you the chance
to die with honor, as a martyr to Fiarth. My father raised me to love the
Wesrains, and I do. The bow-and-dagger, forever. What say you?”

Giorn wanted to laugh in Serit’s
face. He wanted to spit more blood and mock the fool. A better plan occurred to
him.

He let a long moment go by as he
pretended to think on it. Then, finally, he made his face go blank as though in
resignation and slumped his body.

“Yes,” he said in a dispirited
voice. Then, more firmly, raising his eyes to meet Serit’s: “Yes. Yes, I will
do it. My people have served Fiarth for a thousand years, and if this is the
only way I have left to serve her, then I will do so gladly.”

Serit looked surprised, then proud.
Tears actually built up behind his eyes, but he did not let them out. He
actually believed it! And it was not due to stupidity, Giorn saw, but the
absolute conviction in Serit’s mind that he did the right thing and that others
would recognize that. Which, of course, made him all the more a fool to Giorn.

“Stand forward and lay upon the
Altar,” Serit instructed.

Histra slipped toward the black
slab, meaning to grab some item from it before Giorn lay down, but the
following events stopped her.

Giorn tried to step forward. The
dead hands that restrained him did not let go. He tried to shrug them off. They
did not leave.

“What’s this?” Serit asked. Histra
glanced up.

One of the dead ones said, very
clearly and shockingly, its mouth opening and closing with no expression
showing on its withered face:
“Beware of
this one, nephew.”
Its voice was that of an oak grinding in a storm.