Chronicles of the Black Company

  I snorted at myself. I recalled being asked for a hug. She was as scared as anybody.

  She saw but did not ask—tip enough that she was focused inward.

  The meal was a miracle considering what the cooks had to work with. But it was nothing grand. We exchanged no words during its course. I finished first, rested my elbows on the table, retreated into thought. She followed suit. She had eaten very little. After a few minutes she went to her bedroom. She returned with three black arrows. Each had silver inlays in TelleKurre script. I had seen their like before. Soulcatcher gave Raven one the time we ambushed Limper and Whisper.

  She said, “Use the bow I gave you. And stay close.”

  The arrows appeared identical. “Who?”

  “My husband. They can’t kill him. They lack his true name. But they’ll slow him down.”

  “You don’t think the rest of the plan will work?”

  “Anything is possible. But all eventualities should be considered.” Her eyes met mine. There was something there. … We looked away. She said, “You’d better go. Sleep well. I want you alert tomorrow.”

  I laughed. “How?”

  “It’s been arranged. For all but the duty section.”

  “Oh.” Sorcery. One of the Taken would put everyone to sleep. I rose. I dithered for a few seconds, putting logs on the fire. I thanked her for the meal. Finally I managed to say what was on my mind. “I want to wish you luck. But I can’t put my whole heart into it.”

  Her smile was wan. “I know.” She followed me to the door.

  Before I went out I yielded to the final impulse, turned—found her right there, hoping. I hugged her for half a minute.

  Damn her for being human. But I needed that, too.

  The Last Day

  We were permitted to sleep in, then given an hour to breakfast, make peace with our gods, or whatever we had to do before entering battle. The Great Barrow was supposed to hold till noon. There was no rush.

  I wondered what the thing in the earth was doing.

  Battle muster came about eight. There were no absences. The Limper drifted around on his little carpet, his path seeming to intersect that of Whisper more often than was necessary. They had their heads together about something. Bomanz skulked around the edges of things, trying to remain invisible. I did not blame him. In his shoes I might have made a run for Oar. … In his shoes? Were mine more comfortable?

  The man was a victim of his sense of honor. He believed he had a debt to repay.

  A drumbeat announced time to take positions. I followed the Lady, noting that the remaining civilians were headed down the road to Oar with what possessions they could carry. It was going to be a crazy road. The troops the Lady had summoned were reported our side of Oar, coming in their thousands. They would arrive too late. Nobody thought to tell them to hold up.

  Attentions had narrowed. The outside world no longer existed. I watched the civilians and for a moment wondered what difficulties faced us if we had to flee. But my concern did not persist. I could not worry past the Dominator.

  Windwhales took station over the river. Mantas searched for updrafts. Taken carpets rose. But today my feet remained on the ground. The Lady intended meeting her husband toe to toe.

  Thanks a bunch, friend. There was Croaker in her shadow with his puny bow and arrows.

  Guards all in position, entrenched, behind low palisades, ditches, and artillery. Pennons all in place, to guide Darling’s carefully surveyed ride. Tension mounting.

  What more was there to do?

  “Stay behind me,” the Lady reminded. “Keep your arrows ready.”

  “Yeah. Good luck. If we win, I’ll buy you dinner at the Gardens in Opal,” I don’t know what possessed me to say that. Frenzied attempt at self-distraction? It was a chilly morning, but I was sweating.

  She seemed startled. Then she smiled. “If we win, I’ll hold you to that.” The smile was feeble. She had no cause to believe she would survive another hour.

  She started walking toward the Great Barrow. Faithful pup, I dogged her.

  The last spark of light would not die. She would not save herself through surrender.

  Bomanz gave us a head start, then followed. Likewise, the Limper.

  Neither’s action was in the master plan.

  The Lady did not react. Perforce, I let it go, too.

  Taken carpets began to spiral down. The windwhales seemed a little bouncy, the mantas a little frenetic in their search for favorable air.

  Edge of the Barrowland. My amulet did not tingle. All the old fetishes outside the Barrowland’s heart had been removed. The dead now lay in peace.

  Moist earth sucked at my boots. I had trouble maintaining my balance, keeping an arrow across my bow, I had one black shaft set to string, the other two gripped in the hand that held the bow.

  The Lady halted a few feet from the pit whence we had dragged Bomanz. She became oblivious to the world, almost as if she were communing with the thing underground. I glanced back. Bomanz had halted a little to the north, about fifty feet from me. He had his hands in his pockets and wore a look that dared me to protest his presence. The Limper had set down about where the moat was when a moat surrounded the Barrowland. He did not want to fall when the null swept over him.

  I glanced at the sun. About nine. Three hours margin if we wanted to use it.

  My heart was setting records for carrying on. My hands shook so much it seemed the bones ought to rattle. I doubted I could put an arrow into an elephant from five feet.

  How come I got lucky and got picked to be her buttboy?

  I reviewed my life. What had I done to deserve this? So many choices I might have made differently. … “What?”

  “Ready?” she asked.

  “Never.” I pasted on a sickly grin.

  She tried to smile back, but she was more scared than I was. She knew what she faced. She believed she had only moments to live.

  She had guts, that woman, going on when there was nothing she could win but, perhaps, some small redemption in the eyes of the world.

  Names flashed through my mind. Sylith. Credence. Which? In a moment a choice might be critical.

  I am not a religious man. But I sped a silent prayer to the gods of my youth asking that it not be me required to complete the ritual of her naming.

  She faced the town and raised an arm. Trumpets winded. As though anyone were not paying attention.

  Her arm dropped.

  Hoofbeats. Darling in her white, with Elmo, Silent, and the Lieutenant all three dogging her, galloped the lane defined by the pennons. The null was to come sudden, then freeze. The Dominator was to be allowed to break out, but not with his power intact.

  I felt the null. It hit me hard, so unaccustomed to it was I. The Lady staggered too. A mewl of fear fled her lips. She did not want to be disarmed. Not now. But it was the only way.

  The ground shuddered once, gently, then geysered upward. I retreated a step. Shivering, I watched the fountain of muck disperse … and was amazed to see not a man but the dragon. …

  The damned dragon! I hadn’t thought about that.

  It reared fifty feet high, flames boiling around its head. It roared. What now? In the null the Lady could not shield us.

  The Dominator fled my mind entirely.

  I drew a shaft to its head, aimed for the beast’s open mouth.

  A shout restrained me. I turned. Bomanz pranced and shrieked, calling insults in TelleKurre. The dragon eyeballed him. And recalled that they had unfinished business.

  It struck like a snake. Flames surged ahead of it.

  Fire masked Bomanz but did not harm him. He had taken his stand beyond the null.

  The Lady moved a few steps to her right, to look past the dragon, whose forelegs were now free and scrabbling to drag the rest of its immense body loose. I could see nothing of our quarry. But the flying Taken were into their attack runs. Heavy fire-carrying spears were in flight already. They roared down, burst.

  A thu
nderous voice announced, “Headed for the river.”

  The Lady hurried forward. Darling resumed moving, carrying the null toward the water. Ghosts cursed and pranced around me. I was too distracted to respond.

  Mantas dropped in swift, dark pairs, dancing between bolts of lightning loosed by windwhales. The air went crackly, smelled dry and strange.

  Suddenly Tracker was with us, muttering about having to save the tree.

  I heard a rising bray of horns. I dodged a flailing dragon leg, ducked a hammering wing, looked back.

  Scores of ill-clad human skeletons poured from the forest in the wake of a limping Toadkiller Dog. “I knew we hadn’t seen the last of that bastard.” I tried to get the Lady’s attention. “The forest tribes. They’re attacking the Guard.” The Dominator had had at least one ace in the hole.

  The Lady paid me no heed.

  What the tribesmen and Guard did were of no consequence to us at the moment. We had prey on the run and dared concern ourselves with nothing else.

  “In the water!” that voice thundered from above. Darling moved some more. The Lady and I scrambled over earth still rippling with the dragon’s efforts to break free. It ignored us. Bomanz had its entire attention.

  A windwhale dropped. Its tentacles probed the river. It caught something, dropped ballast water.

  A human figure writhed in the whale’s grasp, screaming. My spirits rose. We had done it. …

  The whale lifted too high. For a moment it raised the Dominator out of the null.

  Deadly mistake.

  Thunder. Lightning. Terror on hot hooves. Half the town and a swath to the edge of the null shattered, scattered, burned, and blackened.

  The whale exploded.

  The Dominator fell. As he plunged toward both water and null, he bellowed, “Sylith! I name your name!”

  I loosed an arrow.

  Deadeye. One of the best wing shots I have ever made. It got him in the side. He shrieked and clawed at the shaft. Then he hit water. Manta lightning made the river boil. Another whale dropped and shoved tentacles beneath the surface. For a long moment I was terrified the Dominator would stay under and escape.

  But up he came, again in a monster’s grasp. This whale, too, went too high. And paid the price, though the Dominator’s magic was much enfeebled, probably by my arrow. He got off one wild speil which went astray and started fires in the Guards compound. The Guards and tribesmen were closely engaged nearby. The spell slew scores from both forces.

  I did not get another arrow off. I was frozen. I had been assured that the naming of a name, once suitable rituals had been observed, could not be stilled by the null. But the Lady had not faltered. She stood a step short of the edge of land, staring at the thing that had been her husband. The naming of the name Sylith had not disturbed her at all.

  Not Sylith! Twice the Dominator had named her wrong. … Only one left to try. But my grin was hollow. ƒ would have named her Sylith.

  A third windwhale caught the Dominator. This one made no mistake. It carried him to shore, toward Darling and her escort. He struggled furiously. Gods! The vitality of that man!

  Behind us, men screamed. Arms clashed. The Guards had not been as surprised as I. They were holding their ground. The airborne Taken hastened to support them, flinging a storm of deadly sorceries. Toadkiller Dog was the center of their attention.

  Elmo, the Lieutenant, and Silent jumped the Dominator the moment the windwhale dropped him. That was like jumping a tiger. He threw Elmo thirty feet. I beard the crack as he broke the Lieutenant’s spine. Silent danced away. I put another arrow into him. He staggered, but did not go down. Dazed, he started toward the Lady and me.

  Tracker met him halfway. He set the son of the tree aside, grabbed hold of his man, started a wrestling match of epic scale. He and the Dominator shrieked like souls in torment.

  I wanted to rush down and tend to Elmo and the Lieutenant, but the Lady gestured for me to stay. Her gaze roved everywhere. She expected something more.

  A great shriek shook the earth. A ball of oily fire rolled skyward. The dragon flopped like an injured worm, screaming. Bomanz had disappeared.

  To be seen was the Limper. Somehow he had dragged himself to within a dozen feet of me without my noticing. My fear was so great I nearly voided my bowels. His mask was gone. The devasted wasteland of his bare face glowered with malice. In a moment, he was thinking, he would even all scores with me. My legs turned to jelly.

  He pointed a small crossbow, grinned. Then his aim drifted aside. I saw that his quarrel was close cousin to the arrow across my bow.

  That electrified me, finally. I drew to the head.

  He squealed, “Credence, the rite is complete. I name your name!” And then he let fly.

  I loosed at the same instant. I could get the shaft off no faster, damn me. My arrow slammed into his black heart, knocked him over. But too late. Too late.

  The Lady cried out.

  Terror turned into unreasoning rage. I flung myself at the Limper, abandoning my bow for my sword. He did not turn to face my assault. He just held himself up on one elbow and gaped at the Lady.

  I really went crazy. I guess we all can, in the right circumstances. But I had been a soldier for ages. I’d long ago learned you don’t do that sort of thing and stay alive long.

  The Limper was inside the null. Which meant he was barely clinging to life, barely able to sustain himself, wholly unable to defend himself. I made him pay for all the years of fear.

  My first stroke half severed his neck. I kept hacking till I finished the job. Then I scattered a few limbs about, blunting my steel and madness on ancient bone. Sanity began to return. I whirled to see what had become of the Lady.

  She was down on one knee, the weight of her body resting upon the other. She was trying to draw Limper’s bolt. I charged over, pulled her hand away. “No. Let me. Later.” This time I was less startled that the naming had not worked. This time convinced me that nothing could disarm her.

  She should have been gone, damn it!

  I gave myself up to a long fit of the shakes.

  The Taken pounding on the forest people were having an effect. Some of the savages had begun fleeing. Toadkiller Dog was enveloped by painful sorceries. “Hang on,” I told the Lady. “We’re over the hump. We’re going to do it.” I don’t know that I believed that, but it was what she needed to hear.

  Tracker and the Dominator continued to roll around, grunting and cursing. Silent pranced around them with a broadbladed spear. When chance presented itself, he cut our great enemy. Nothing could survive that forever. Darling watched, stayed close, stayed out of the Dominator’s way.

  I scooted back to the wreck of the Limper and dug out the shaft I’d put into his chest. He glared at me. There was life in his brain still. I booted his head into the trench left by the dragon’s rising.

  That beast had ceased thrashing. Still no sign of Bomanz. Never any sign of Bomanz. He found the fate he feared, second try. He slew the monster from within.

  Do not think Bomanz peripheral because he kept his head down. I believe the Dominator expected the dragon to preoccupy Darling and the Lady those few moments he needed to get shut of the null. Bomanz took that away. With the same determination and distinction as the Lady facing her inescapable fate.

  I returned to the Lady. My hands had attained their battlefield steadiness. I wished for my kit. My knife would have to do. I laid her back, started digging. That quarrel would chew on her till I got it out. For all the pain, she managed a grateful smile.

  A dozen men surrounded Tracker and the Dominator now, every one stabbing. Some did not seem particular as to whom they hit.

  The sands were about gone for the old evil.

  I packed and bound the Lady’s wound with material from her own clothing. “We’ll change this as soon as we can,”

  The tribesmen were whipped. Toadkiller Dog was dragging himself toward the high country. That old mutt had as much staying power as his boss. Guards
freed of the fighting hurried our way. They carried wood for the old doom’s funeral pyre.

  End of the Game

  Then I spotted Raven.

  “The damned fool.”

  He was leaning on Case, hobbling. He carried a bare sword. His face was set.

  Trouble for sure. His step was not quite as feeble as he pretended.

  It took no genius to guess what he had in mind. In his simple way of seeing things, he was going to make everything right with Darling by finishing off her big enemy.

  The shakes came back, but this time not from fear. If somebody did not do something, I was going to be right in the middle. Right where I would have to make a choice, to act, and nothing I did would make anyone happy.

  I tried distracting myself by testing the Lady’s dressing.

  Shadows fell upon us. I looked up into Silent’s cold eyes, into Darling’s more compassionate face. Silent cast a subtle glance Raven’s way. He was in the middle, too.

  The Lady clawed at my arm. “Lift me,” she said.

  I did. She was as weak as water. I had to support her.

  “Not yet,” she told Darling, as though Darling could hear. “He is not yet finished.”

  They had gotten a leg and an arm off the Dominator. Those they threw into the woodpile. Tracker hung on so they could carve on the Dominator’s neck. Goblin and One-Eye stood by, waiting for the head, ready to run like hell. Some Guards planted the son of the tree. Windwhales and mantas hovered overhead. Others, with the Taken, were harassing Toadkiller Dog and the savages through the forest.

  Raven was getting closer. And I was no closer to knowing where I stood.

  That son-of-a-bitching Dominator was tough. He killed a dozen men before they finished carving him up. Even then he was not dead. Like Limper’s, his head lived on.

  Time for Goblin and One-Eye. Goblin grabbed the still-living head, sat down, held it tightly between his knees. One-Eye hammered a six-inch silver spike through its forehead, into its brain. The Dominator’s lips kept forming curses.

  The nail would capture his blighted soul. The head would go into the fire. When that burned out, the spike would be recovered and driven into the trunk of the son of the tree. Meaning one dark spirit would be bound for a million years.