He glanced over at Aisha. She shook her head. The horses were becoming very skittish. They liked what was happening no more than Shae did. Tendrils of mist were lapping all around them now, cutting off everything from sight. Kormak moved back towards the group, not wanting to get separated from them, in case of attack.
“Any idea what it is?” he asked Aisha.
“Shae thinks it’s something dead.” It was a sign of how worried the others were that they seemed to pay no attention to the fact she was telling them what the wolf thought. They had other, even more sinister types of sorcery on their mind.
“Something?”
“Lots of somethings, coming closer.”
Clouds of greenishly glowing fireflies shimmered in the mist. As Kormak studied the phosphorescent lights moving around them, he noticed they appeared to be twinned, moving in pairs. It took another heartbeat for the realisation to sink in.
“Eyes,” he said. As if giving voice to the thing made it so, it immediately became evident that he was right. Behind the glowing eyes, small forms became obvious, scurrying through the gloom. The clicking sound grew more intense. Shae moved closer to Aisha then suddenly something emerged from the mist and nipped at his legs.
It was a rat, or rather the mummified corpse of a rat. Moments later another and then another emerged. Some of them were little more than walking skeletons, others still had parchment flesh clinging to them. They crunched under the hooves of the horses, splintered when Shae bit them but that did not stop them coming.
The horses neighed in terror as a gigantic tide of undead vermin seethed out of the gloom and flowed over them, biting, scratching, sawing at flesh with the sharp edges of bone and vertebrae.
Kormak pulled his sword from the scabbard and lashed out around him. His blade reduced the tiny things to heaps of blackened bone but there were thousands of them, and they fought and moved as if guided by a single mind, scampering up cloaks, clambering all over the living. One of them was in Aisha’s hair, its long tail scratching at her cheek as it curved around it.
His sword flickered out, caught the mummified rat on its tip and flicked it away to the ground. Bones crunched under horses hooves. They whinnied and screamed as the unnatural horde swept around them. There were just too many of them to fight. Smashing one or two or even five or ten would not stop them. Their individual bites and scratches seemed negligible but it was only a matter of time before eyes were lost or a panicked horse threw its rider. And who knew what diseases or poisons or wicked magic the bites of such things might contain? He vaulted back up into the saddle.
“Ride!” he shouted, “Get out of the mist!”
In response to his command, the others rode, fleeing along the path as fast as their mounts would carry them. Kormak held back. The pack seemed to be avoiding him, perhaps because of fear of his blade or because of the Elder Signs he wore. The vermin swarmed off in pursuit of the other riders but had difficulty keeping up and returned to surround him.
Thousands of tiny green glowing eyes looked at him. He was pierced by a sense of their malevolence and of a strange intelligence contemplating him. Thousands of tiny jaws opened as if trying to speak and failing.
The vermin swarmed towards him. He spurred his horse into their midst, slashing with his blade, burning scores of them, even as more tried to clamber over him. Instinctively he flailed his arm, casting off a larger than usual mummified rat that was moving up his arm.
A moment later he emerged into wan sunlight on the cold hillside and saw the others looking at him. An evil smelling smoke rose from the corpses of the vermin that still clung to him and they fell to the ground all animation lost. The light died in their eyes.
“What was that?” Brandon asked him as he rode up.
“I don’t know but we need to get as far away from it as possible while the sun is above the horizon.”
The others needed no further encouragement. They rode as if demons were at their heels. The path carried them deeper and deeper into the Cursed Lands.
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
THEY RODE ON through the gathering gloom, glancing over their shoulders at the moving mists, passing tumbled down buildings which still bore the signs of war even after all these centuries. The stonework showed cracks from intense heat, their roofs were open to the sky. A conquering army had passed this way.
The symbols of Kharon were inscribed on the walls of some of the buildings, having survived obvious attempts to deface them. There were more skeletal faces, leering and inhuman, set upon what looked like lunar disks. There were things that looked like the skulls of beings other than human, faces obviously distorted, possessed of fangs.
Kormak did not think that this was because the artists lacked the skill to depict human skulls either. It was clear that they were getting closer to the heart of the ancient kingdom with every step. At least there was no more mist close to them, although pockets of the stuff boiled near the road.
On a hilltop ahead of them was a tall tower, partially tumbled. From its peak glowed a soft light. Kormak pointed and said, “We will camp there for the night.”
“As you say, Guardian,” said Lucas. Aisha nodded, clearly understanding what it was. Shae's ears perked up and his tail wagged for the first time since they had entered the Cursed Lands.
“What is it?” asked Brandon.
“It is a First Empire Watchtower, and it looks like the wardstone still functions. If nothing else, we will have a safe campsite for the night.”
It was easy to tell that the tower had been built by a different people than those who had raised the burned-out villages they had passed. Even though it was made from local stone, the lines were cleaner and less crude. There was an arch over the doorway on which an Elder Sign had been carved along with the winged sun emblem of the Solari, a symbol still echoed through all the Temples of the Holy Sun to this day.
Kormak felt his heart lift when he passed through the entrance. This felt like sacred ground, of the sort that could be found in the Chapter Houses of his Order and the sanctuaries of the great temples and cathedrals.
He entered a bare low-ceilinged room. A flight of ancient steps rose up out of it onto another floor. Someone had left rune signs inscribed with a stone on the floor. Kormak inspected them.
“What are they?” he asked.
“Watcher sign,” said Lucas. “I’ve seen them before. They leave messages for each other this way in places they consider safe or are likely to pass.”
“This does not look too recent,” Kormak said.
Lucas shrugged. “At least we know one of them passed this way, that they come to the Cursed Lands.”
Kormak looked at Aisha. She was looking at the signs closely. “It is a variant of Hardic rune-script,” she said. “That was a language old even when the Solar Empire was at its height.”
“What does it say?”
“Shadows lengthen,” she said. “Keep watch.”
“Is that all?”
“It might be a code phrase. It has a ritual sound to it, a reminder of duty. It might mean all is well.” She spoke slowly, considering her words. Kormak felt as if she could say more if she wanted to, which she clearly did not.
“Or it could be a warning,” said Brandon.
Kormak headed upstairs. There were three stories, all empty and then he reached the roof. On it was a large crystal, the size of a helmet, inscribed with an Elder Sign, glowing very softly. He reached out to touch it and felt very faintly the tingle of magic within it.
“A Solari Watchstone,” he said. He knew this sort of thing. It was a ward against the Shadow and against Old Ones. Evil magic would not work within the radius of its glow. Its light would cause an Old One pain at the least, dissolution at the worst, although he doubted this one was strong enough now. “An Eye of the Sun.”
“It is very old,” Aisha said from behind him. “And almost has ceased to function. If you look closely you can see dark veins within it, where the Shadow on this land has seepe
d in.”
“We should still be safe here,” he said. She nodded.
“It is lovely in its way,” she reached out and touched it very deliberately. He realised she was doing it to show him that she could. Her hand would have burned if she was touched by Shadow.
“There are protections that allow even a shadowchild to handle such things,” Kormak said. Her smile was a little sad.
“I know,” she said. “There are no perfect defences against the Evil That Waits.”
“Against anything,” he said. They stared at each other in silence, neither wanting to be the first to speak.
She looked out into the gathering twilight. Pockets of mist had started to form in hollows near them, but from this height they still had a clear view over leagues of terrain.
“The Legionaries of the Sun once stood here,” she said softly. “When they came to fight the evil of Kharon. They built this tower as part of a chain of fortifications to shield their advance. They were always methodical when they did such things. It was their way.”
“They probably sheltered here when the Defiler’s Curse fell on the land and they were fleeing southward,” said Kormak. “Its magic might have shielded them against even that.”
“It did,” said Aisha. “I have read the account of the retreat written by General Leonidas.”
“When did you do that?”
“When I was an apprentice,” she said.
“An apprentice what?”
“You would say witch.”
“You would say something different?”
“It does not matter,” she said. “In this matter we are on the same side.”
“I would like to believe that,” said Kormak.
“But you don’t.”
“Let us just say I am not convinced.”
“Your way of life has left you very suspicious.”
“But alive,” he said.
She smiled. “It has that to recommend it, I suppose.”
“I wanted to thank you for looking at my wound last night. It seems to be healing cleanly,” Kormak said.
“I think you heal better than most men anyway.”
“I am blessed by the Sun,” said Kormak.
He meant it to sound ironic but she looked at him warily and said, “I suspect you are. You would not have lived so long otherwise. You heal fast and I would bet that most diseases do not touch you, and those that do leave you quickly.”
Kormak looked away. He did not want to discuss the secrets of his Order with her.
Aisha smiled. “My ears were burning earlier today. Were you talking about me to your friend?”
Kormak looked at the wolf and wondered how much she had in common with it. Had she heard everything they had said. “Sir Brandon is curious about you.”
“And you are not?”
“I already know you have bonded with the wolf or the spirit that inhabits it.” She tilted her head to one side and smiled slightly. The gesture reminded him of the wolf.
“I can see I have few secrets from you.”
“You don’t deny any of this then?”
“Why should I? You have clearly made up your mind and any denial would be useless.”
“And you follow the Old Faith, don’t you? You worship the Moon.”
“At least you are polite. Most Sun worshippers call us moondogs.”
“I have been in places where the term was justified.”
“No doubt. And I have been in places where the Lords of the Sun burn the followers of the Old Faith.”
“We could stand here all night reciting old wrongs,” said Kormak.
“Some not so old,” Aisha said. “But you are right. The time has come for plain speaking between us, Sir Kormak.”
“Why are you here, following the barrow openers?”
“I am concerned by what they might do.”
“How so? This is not your land. How could what happens here affect you? You have come a very long way to involve yourself.”
“The same could be said of you.”
“I am here because of oaths I swore and the duty I must perform.”
“Perhaps I am here for the same reason.”
“You are not a Guardian.”
“Other people than your Order oppose the Shadow, Sir Kormak. If that were not so it would have swallowed this world a long time ago.” She took out the amulet she had taken from the dead ranger, looked at it reflectively then seemed to come to some sort of decision. She produced a second amulet, identical to the first.
“I am a Watcher, Martin was one too.”
“I thought they were just another northern hill-clan.”
“They use the name because it is their function to watch the Cursed Lands and the Barrow Hills. There are other watchers elsewhere. They follow the Old Faith but they are sworn to oppose the Shadow.” Kormak considered her words. He had heard tales of such things. A secret society was very much the Lunar way.
“A Watcher— what do you watch for?”
“The coming of evil. Shadowfall.”
“Why are you here now? It is more than that, isn’t it? There is some connection between you and this necromancer, Morghael.”
From her expression Kormak could see that his shaft had hit true. “You know him, don’t you?”
“Yes.”
“How do you know him?”
“He is my brother.”
That took Kormak aback. She smiled. “I can see there are some things you do not know. My brother is a necromancer and a very powerful one. The gift for sorcery runs strongly in my family. It always has.”
“He is a necromancer and you are not.”
She gestured to the wolf. “I followed a different path and that is the core of the thing.”
“How so?”
“My brother and I were both Watchers, as was our father before us. Our family were entrusted with the safekeeping of certain objects and scrolls. My brother read the wrong books, became obsessed with the darker paths. He stole from the Order and used the knowledge he had wrongly gained to build his army. Word came to us that he had fled north. I came to try and stop him.”
“On your own? When he had his men and his undead creatures to protect him?”
“I have counter-spells against the undead. You saw me work one back in Hungerdale. And I had hoped to raise the Watchers of this land, but my brother had obviously thought of that.”
“How so?”
“He lit a signal fire at the agreed meeting place, the place where we first met. A Watcher is always somewhere near there in case of need. Morghael lured Martin there and killed him. Martin would have been my contact with his kin. Now if I encounter them it will be accidental.”
“There must be fallbacks.”
“There are but it would take too long to use them.”
“The creatures with your brother, what are they?”
“Some of them are his acolytes no doubt. Some of them are things he found in the old tombs of Kasuliyan and called back from beyond.”
“It was one of those things that drove Lucas and his brothers away then. The thing they riddled with arrows but could not kill.”
“Yes.” Kormak found he was a little angry.
“Why did you not tell me this before?”
“I did not trust you.”
“You did not trust me?”
“Ah, I see, only you have the right to mistrust other people. We are all supposed to be able to see how righteous you are by your mere appearance. I have news for you, Sir Kormak; your Order is known to be a corrupt one. And perhaps you don’t understand what you are to many of my people. You are the mailed fist of the Sun, your god’s executioner.”
Kormak turned this over in his mind. She had a point.
She pressed her advantage. “Did you trust me when first we met? Do you trust me now, for that matter?”
“I trust you a little more since we’ve had this conversation,” Kormak said.
“And I have had some time to observ
e you,” she said. “Perhaps we can both be a little more trusting.”
Kormak looked at her. She seemed very serious. He was not sure how to take her.
“Have I answered all of your questions to your satisfaction, Sir Kormak, or do you have any more.”
“The Tinkers - what is your connection with them?”
“They are distant kin. They trade in goods and information. The Spymasters of your Order know this. It seems to me that I have given you a great deal of information and not gotten a great deal in return.”
“What do you wish to know?”
“Will you really kill Morghael when we meet him?”
“Yes. I don’t have any choice given what he has done. Does that trouble you?”
“I welcome it.”
“That’s not a very filial sentiment?”
“Morghael betrayed a trust that has been in our family for centuries. He betrayed me. He betrayed our father. He will work great evil. He is doing so already. Can you not sense it? Already the Shadow is wakening in this land. It has been dormant a long time. It is rising now.”
Kormak thought of the lights he had seen in the Barrow Hills, of his own sense of gathering doom, and he could see she was right.
“What has he done?”
“He is calling the Black Sun to rise again over Forghast.”
“How will he do that? The tomb was sealed and cannot be opened.” He wondered if she knew about the keys; pretending ignorance was the easiest way to find out.
“There is a way,” said Aisha.
“Somehow I knew you were going to tell me that.”
“The Defiler planned for his defeat. He knew he was going to be sealed in his tomb. Before the Solari besieged Forghast three of his lieutenants fled the city, each with one of the keys to his tomb. They were to return when the time was right and free him.”
“Three? It makes sense, I suppose. If something happened to one of them, the other would have the key.”
Aisha shook her head. “It was not that at all. He did not trust any of his people and they did not trust each other. He picked three who hated each other, who would not form a cabal against him. Each of them needed to be present with his key to open the ziggurat.”