The Queen's Assassin

  He turned this information over in his mind. The voices whispered that this was true. The Quan had certainly never met a human so strong. The fact that he was still alive proved this. “To tell the truth, Rik, you are already far and away the strongest mortal sorcerer I have ever met, and you will only become stronger if you are given time.”

  He kept silent, and as he hoped she kept speaking to fill the silence. “I don’t know whether it’s because of your Shadowblood heritage or some other factor but you are different from all the other mortal mages I have encountered.”

  “You think I can kill Malkior?”

  “No, Rik, but I think that between us we can. I have a score to settle with him. Queen Amarielle was my friend and I was supposed to protect her. He killed her. He has killed an awful lot of people, and will kill many more if he is allowed to. The time has come for him to be stopped.”

  “In this we are in agreement, but how will we find him?”

  “He will come to us, Rik. If for no other reason than he has to take you back to the Quan to prove that he was not responsible for your escape.”

  “I would die before I let that happen.”

  “If the situation should arise that will probably be your best choice. We have other problems as well.”

  “That’s good - we did not have enough already.”

  “Lord Jaderac and Tamara are up to something, she as much as told you so. Given the fact that they are here in Halim, I suspect this is where their plan will come to fruition. I imagine it is not intended to benefit the Talorean army in any way.”

  “What are you going to do about that?”

  “I already have agents at work in the city. They are digging up leads. I have the Sardean embassy watched day and night, although that will not stop Tamara from coming and going. She may be able to take Jaderac with her.”

  “What could they be up to?”

  “We know Jaderac is a sorcerer, and he specialises in necromancy. He must be planning something in that line. I have warned military intelligence about that. I have assigned your friends Weasel and the Barbarian to make contact with the local underworld to see if they can find any leads that way. I have worked a few divination spells and learned a few things that way.”

  “What have you learned?”

  “That there has been a quite extraordinary build-up of necromantic energies in the city since we have been away.”

  “Someone is planning on raising the dead?”

  “I don’t know. And I can’t pinpoint the source but there is a definite cloud of energies at the darker end of the magical spectrum in the city’s aura right now. It is getting stronger every day. It’s most likely the by-product of someone working ritual magic somewhere.”

  “Can’t you pin it down?”

  “I might be able to, but by then it might be too late. The coronation is only a few days away now.”

  “You think they intend to prevent it?”

  “It would be the logical thing for them to do.”

  “Then how are you going to get to the bottom of this?”

  “The old fashioned way. By spending a lot of money and talking to a lot of people. You and your friends are going to do that anyway. I will keep working away at my divinations.”

  “You are sure about this?” Rik asked. The vodka burned as it went down his throat. Uri wiped his mouth and his huge handlebar moustache with the sleeve of his left arm then he looked at Rik’s empty glass and poured him another one. He poured one for himself.

  “To keep it company,” he said. At this time of day it was quiet in the Nag’s Head. There were very few people around. None of them could get into this alcove anyway. The Barbarian and some of Uri’s toughest boys were out there to prevent that.

  “You sure about this?” Rik repeated. Partially it was the alcohol that made him do so. Partially it was the fact that Uri seemed more interested in the vodka than he was in telling Rik what he knew. Uri snapped the glass back to his mouth, downing it in a single gulp. Rik did the same, drawing on the spells to neutralise poison, to counter the effect of the booze and any drugs that Uri might have put in it. He did not exactly trust the Gang Lord.

  “Of course, I am sure. As sure as anybody can be about these things. My boys have been selling bodies to some so-called alchemist. They thought it was the usual stuff, you know, for dissection and showing to medical students. They thought they might be able to use that to put a little bite on the guy, but when they tried it, he just laughed at them, and told them that if they tried anything they would die very slowly and painfully. They told him he had been smoking too much black lotus, which he had been too, since his pupils were the size of plates and his skin was a sallow yellow. He got mad and showed them a walking corpse, and told them they would become just like that if they told anybody. He had friends in high places, he said. Well that’s what Standa and Rudi said anyway. Nobody believed them. They were famous liars.”

  “So why should you believe them now?”

  “No one has seen them in days. They were supposed to show up with their share of the take a couple of night’s back but they never did.”

  “Maybe they legged it with your money.”

  Uri looked at him and guffawed. He poured more vodka. “They would not dare. And they would not leave their families behind either. Standa’s wife Lucie says he was pretty strange the last night she saw him. Eyes were blank. Seemed to be in a trance. He just walked out, never came back. Kept muttering something about graves.”

  “If you want to talk about blank eyes take a look into the Barbarian’s sometimes.”

  Uri had another drink. He did not offer Rik one. It did not seem to have too much effect on him, except that he was becoming more aggressive. “Look, pretty boy, I don’t care if you believe me or not. It’s just my friend Weasel there brought word that you and the Taloreans were looking out for just this sort of story so I mentioned it to him.”

  The voices whispered to Rik that he should kill this arrogant fool, and drink his life. He forced them down. “Maybe you made this up because you heard there was money to be made for such tales.”

  “Yes, and maybe I have nothing better to do with my time than sit here and tell these stories to you. However I have other ways of making money. This was a favour for a friend. One I can see is not much appreciated.”

  “Calm down,” said Rik. He did not need any trouble with the local gangs. “You know where this bodysnatcher had his premises?”

  Uri nodded. “My boys have had it staked out since I sent you the invitation.”

  “Then here’s the deal. We’ll check this out, and if there’s anything in it, you’ll be owed. Money, favours, whatever you need. We don’t forget the people who help us.”

  Uri looked as if he was considering asking for money up front, and remembering that he had claimed he was doing this as a favour. Eventually, he nodded. “Tell your masters to check out the basement of the old ruined tenement on Angel of Hope Street. The whole area was wrecked when you boys came to town but there’s still a few beggars around there.”

  “Why don’t you arrange for somebody to show us the way?”

  Uri nodded. “I can do that.”

  Chapter Twenty-Eight

  Sardec lay on his back and looked up at the bright moonbeams slipping in through the chinks in the curtain. Sleep would not come. Rena stirred beside him. He lay still, not wanting to wake her. Soft footsteps sounded on the stair and he sat upright. Someone knocked on the door. Sardec rose, slipped the lock and looked out. Sergeant Hef stood there.

  “What is it?” Sardec asked.

  “Weasel and the Barbarian just came in, sir. Lady Asea is below. Looks like they found a lead on the necromancers everybody is looking for. Her Ladyship would like you to lead the lads out and investigate.”

  "Can't it wait till morning, Sergeant?" Sardec knew that it could not, but he felt he needed to vent his exasperation.

  "I don't think so, sir," said the Sergeant. "They say it’s
important."

  "All right then, lead on," said Sardec.

  “What is it?” Rena asked from the bed.

  “Duty calls,” said Sardec

  Sardec trudged through the snow, wondering what was going on. The raggedly dressed men with Asea had led his unit to the remains of a collapsed building. There were some signs of burning but it looked like it had fallen when hit by something big. This whole street had suffered during the siege; a large section of the city was abandoned now by all but scavengers and beggars and worse things. There was a strange smell in the air, a hint of something he had encountered before, something disturbing and strange that reminded him of the graveyard encounter with the ghouls. The moment his nostrils twitched he reached for his pistol. Sardec dreaded the presence of ghouls.

  “This is the place,” said the more villainous of the two men. He was a Kharadrean human of the lowest type. This war had certainly given them some strange allies. He checked his pistol and made sure all the men had truesilver bullets loaded. He had been told to expect sorcery. The stump of his missing hand itched where the gutta-percha padding met flesh, a constant reminder of how dangerous evil magic could be. He looked at Asea who stood there with her half-breed lover. She was garbed for war, in her strange living leather armour and silver facemask. Sardec lifted a lantern.

  “Wait here,” Sardec said, just to let everyone know he was in charge, and then gestured for the Foragers to enter the ruins. There was still a ceiling overhead although tumbled at a crazy angle. The bright moon shone through the gaps, illuminating an interior partially covered by snow. Shafts of silver light speared the ground in a dozen places. Wreckage lay everywhere - broken furniture, torn clothes. At the back of the room was an open trapdoor of the kind that would normally have run down into a coal cellar. As he approached it, the smell got worse; there was a hint of rot, and chemical bleach, as if someone had set up a tannery inside an old abattoir.

  He looked at the men. They were pale and nervous and looked to him for leadership. He picked up the lantern with his hook and made for the stairwell. The Sergeant and the Barbarian and Weasel fell into step behind him.

  Blood, he thought, as he descended into the gloom. Blood and chemicals. The stairs took him down into a large cellar. Something squelched beneath his foot as he reached the bottom. The stink of rot followed a bellow's wheeze. His footing was soft and slippery and he realised why soon enough. He was standing on a dead body. More dead bodies lay round about. They were oddly pale. He got off the corpse, looked around and saw that the flesh was white, the eyeballs grey. There were faded bruise marks in the arms and neck.

  "No blood," said Weasel. His voice was sombre. "Something drained them of blood."

  "What's that?" Sardec asked pointing to the large metal tub, bigger than a wine-vat, that dominated the centre of the cellar. It seemed like they had encountered nothing but dark sorcery this whole year, ever since they had ventured into the valley of Deep Achenar and fought with the followers of the Spider God and the thing they had worshipped. Sardec shivered. He had lost his hand during that encounter, and almost his life. It had made him wary. He wished he still had his truesilver blade, but that had been turned to slag during the final battle in the abandoned city.

  He looked around the walls. More corpses hung from hooks, some split like pigs at a butcher's shop, others still intact but pale, so pale. His skin crawled. He fought the urge to run from the place. If he had been alone, he might have, but it would not do to let the men see he was afraid, so he strode forwards towards the vat, conscious even as he did so of the fear that gnawed at his stomach, as if a massive rat were in there trying to bite its way through to his heart.

  He heard something and paused, shocked. One of the corpses had shifted on its hook. For a moment, he feared that it had come alive, and was about to attack him. Memories of the Nerghul, the strange sorcerous assassin Lord Jaderac had sent to kill the Lady Asea back in Morven, gibbered at the back of his mind. That thing had almost killed him despite the presence of a squad of troops and the most powerful sorceress in the western world.

  Sardec moved closer, set the lantern down nearby and looked into the vat. It was filled with a reddish black congealed fluid. Blood, he thought, with chemicals added to it to keep it liquid. There seemed to be something deep below, a vaguely humanoid outline that moved disturbingly, as if currents in the fluid were shifting its limbs. Heat rose from the vat and it bubbled obscenely, sending odd little farts of chemical exhalation into the air.

  Sardec bent down and looked below the vat. It stood on metal legs. There was a mechanism that looked like a boiler; pipes connected it to the bottom of the tub. The chemical smell was more intense.

  Something touched his forehead, wetting the brim of his tricorne hat before dribbling down onto his head and hands. A chill ran down his spine. He looked up and saw that the fluid had slopped over the edge of the vat. Something large and spidery crawled into view. It took him a moment to realise it was a hand.

  Sardec sprang upright and brought his hook down in a vicious arc so that it pierced the back of the hand. Reddish fluid oozed forth from it to flow back into the vat. A head emerged from the liquid, to be followed by a broad pair of naked shoulders and a massive burly torso. He slashed at it with his hook and drew more blood. The thing made no noise and reached for him. He sprang backwards and away.

  "What the hell?" the Barbarian shouted. Sardec looked around. The intact corpses on the hooks had started to move, flailing their limbs as they attempted to dislodge themselves from their hanging places and get to grip with the intruders in their domain. One by one, like obscene fruits dropping from an overloaded tree, they hit the cellar floor and began to advance towards the startled soldiers.

  Sardec snatched the lantern up in his hook. "Back!" he shouted, "Out of the cellar." He knew it was imperative that they not be trapped down here. Once they were on the surface they could call on the rest of the Foragers for help. If they failed to get away, these night-stalking things would emerge and take the troops by surprise. He was not going to allow that.

  He raised his pistol and fired it at the head of the thing in the vat. The bullet caught it squarely between the eyes. The whole back of its head exploded. Brain jelly splattered one of the animated corpses hanging behind it. The undead creature vanished beneath the surface of the vat like a drowning swimmer. A long-barrelled rifle spoke thunderously as Weasel shot down another walking dead man. The Barbarian raced into the room, blade held in each hand, filled with desperate fury and desire to get to grips with his undead foes.

  "Back!" Sardec roared. "Get back I tell you! We don't want to get trapped down here!"

  The Barbarian had already reached one of the foes. He slashed it with his left blade and buried the right in its throat. The creature kept on coming, despite the terrible wounds.

  "Get back, you great northern idiot!" shouted Sergeant Hef, raising his own rifle, and taking a shot. He was not as accurate as Weasel in the poor light and it thunked into one of the hanging sides of human beef, sending it swinging on its hook. Weasel was already at the top of the stairs, reloading, and getting ready to cover his companions as they retreated. Whatever else Sardec thought of him, he gave the former poacher credit for presence of mind.

  He strode over to the Barbarian, yelling at him to retreat. He prepared to slash at any walking dead man with his hook. He was here until the Barbarian got out. Under these circumstances he was not going to leave any of his men behind. "You can't kill them, northlander. They are already dead."

  The sense of this seemed to cut through the Barbarian's fear-induced fury. He gave a wide scared grin and began to back away towards the stairs. His eyes seemed too wide, his skin too pale, as if something of the evil magic in this place had already started to affect him. Sardec prayed this was not the case.

  He let the Barbarian slip past him, not quite sure why, save that he felt it was his duty. The big northerner was undoubtedly much more capable of taking on one of these
things than he was. Weasel's rifle roared again and another one of the dead men went staggering back to fall back into the bubbling vat. Sardec watched its blood-caked feet jerk spastically for a moment before it vanished below the surface. An image of some sort of horrid mating taking place down there filled his mind. Disgusted he pushed it aside as he backed towards the stairs.

  "Get out," he yelled at Weasel. "Go rouse the others. We need every man we can get."

  Another thought struck him. It might be best to try and blow these evil things apart. "Get grenades ready as well."

  He risked a glance over his shoulder and saw that Weasel understood and was already departing. Sergeant Hef was right behind. The Barbarian had already begun to scamper up the stairs. Sardec hoped he did not trip. Now would not be a good time to be caught in a tangle on the steps. He gave his attention back to the oncoming undead. Their eyes glowed with a reddish light and their bodies seemed to exhale putrid air with every step. It was as if simple motion forced rotten gases from their corrupted lungs out of their mouths and the gaping holes in their pale naked bodies. Some of them had very long nails, almost claws. He had absolutely no doubts that those talons could tear his flesh or gouge out his eyes. He had no intention of remaining down here to test this empirically if he could help it.

  The corpses moved noticeably faster now, like sleepers reaching full wakefulness after a doze. One or two of them lumbered forward. Their balance was not good, and they weaved like drunken men, crashing into one another, finding only unstable footing on the corpses strewing the floor. Sardec put one foot back on the stairs and began to move up them. He slipped his pistol into his sash and transferred the lantern to his good hand. He began to swing it backwards and forwards in front of him, hoping that it would keep the creatures at bay. The light fluttered but remained bright.

  What had they found here, he wondered? Had this been the residence of a necromancer, performing his unholy arts hidden from his neighbours? Or was it the temple of some murderous cult who re-animated their victims for their own unholy purposes? Sardec knew there were many secret Brotherhoods throughout the land, and some of them dabbled in very dark arts indeed. He thought of the Prophet Zarahel and his followers who had almost succeeded in unleashing the Spider God Uran Ultar. Had they stumbled over a cult like that here?