Knight Eternal (A Novel of Epic Fantasy) (Harbinger of Doom Volume 3) Page 9

  “If we were out to sea, I would try it,” said Ob, “but on the river, it’s futile. Close as she is, if she’s a fast ship and has a mind to, she’ll catch us. Besides, the way this fog is thickening, if we speed up, we’d risk running aground. We can’t chance that. If this ship gets disabled, we’ll never catch The Rose.”

  “We must keep our guard up and meet those that trail us at a time of our choosing,” said Theta.

  “The Fens, dead ahead,” called the lookout from the crow’s nest.

  Ob turned toward the east. “I only see dark waters and mist. Stinking mist.”

  In mere moments, the air grew chill and strangely pungent. A light rain began to fall. Flashes of lightning appeared in the sky followed by angry peals of thunder.

  “What’s that smell?” said Claradon.

  Ob wrinkled his prodigious nose, and rubbed his right forearm with his left hand, as if it were sore. “I’ve been down this river more than a few times and there is always a stink from the Fens, rotting plants and such, but this is different. It’s too strong and came on too sudden. Something is not right.”

  Captain Slaayde stood at the forward end of the bridge deck beside his first mate. N’Paag’s hands gripped the ship’s wheel like vises; sweat dripped down his cheeks. “Captain, we should drop anchor before we run aground. I can barely see; the current may run us into the rocks.”

  Slaayde peered into the mist for some moments. “No, stay on course as best you can. I have a bad feeling about this storm and this stench. You’ve heard the stories about the Fens. I will not have The Falcon be her next victim. We keep moving.”

  Slaayde yelled up at the lookout, ordering him to help keep the ship well away from the banks and clear of any rocks.

  Pain flared in Ob’s arm—centered around the scar from the wound he suffered in the Vermion Forest. He clutched at it and winced.

  The river went silent, the air went still but for the rain that continued to fall.

  Theta drew his sword, spun around, and scanned all about them.

  “What is it?” said Claradon, moving his hand to his sword hilt.

  “Your amulet,” said Ob, fumbling to pull his axe from his belt. “It’s glowing. There’s danger afoot.”

  The air grew more chill. Steam rose from Ob’s breath.

  Strange bubbling and plopping sounds came from the water. Ob leaned between the rail posts and looked straight down. “That’s not good.”

  “What?” said Claradon.

  “The river,” said Ob, wide-eyed. “It’s boiling, and it’s red. Red like blood.” Ob bounced up and turned back toward the deck. “Did you hear that?

  Theta raised his hand for silence. No one moved or spoke for some moments. “Somethingis happening,” he said, his hand now gripping the ankh that hung about his neck.

  A horrid scream erupted from somewhere down on the main deck, lost in the mist. It lasted but a moment before it abruptly cut off. Men yelled in the darkness, their words muffled. Then came another scream.

  Claradon dashed toward the ladder that led down to the main deck, Ob at his heels.

  “Claradon,” boomed Theta. He stopped in his tracks.

  “Don’t move until we know what’s happening. Gnome—keep a lookout behind us and to the sky, we know not yet what we face.”

  “To the sky? Look for what? Pigeons? There’s nothing to see but mist.”

  “Just look and listen,” said Theta. Theta moved to the head of the ladder and peered below into the mist that clung to the deck.

  A crewman ran toward the bridge deck, shouting. “Captain, some thing came out of the mist. We can’t stop it.”

  “What thing?” yelled Slaayde as he moved up beside Theta. “What is it?”

  The crewman scrambled up the ladder. Theta stepped aside and the sailor collapsed to the deck, panting. “I couldn’t see it clearly, Captain. Some kind of creature. A monster.”

  “What?” said Slaayde. “Are you drunk?”

  More crewmen and soldiers came into sight, racing across the main deck. A strange luminescent figure stalked their heels. Shaped much as a man, but it was shimmering, translucent, and indistinct. The creature moved at a slow walk, with knees deeply bent, plodding as if it bore a great weight. A scent of brimstone and burning wood polluted the air at its approach. Steam sputtered and rose from its feet with each step it took, as if the water on the wet deck boiled away at its very touch.

  Men poured onto the main deck from the lower levels, weapons at the ready. They surrounded the creature but gave it wide berth, reluctant to attack the unnatural thing.

  “Stand aside,” said Slaayde, pushing past Theta. Slaayde leaped from the top of the ladder and plunged to the main deck. He landed lightly on his feet despite his bulk. N’Paag remained at the wheel.

  Slaayde pushed past the crewmen and soldiers, charged forward, and swung his sword—a two-handed overhand strike, aimed for the monster’s neck. The vicious blow passed clear through the creature, but met no resistance, no impact at all.

  Overbalanced, Slaayde stumbled to his knees directly before the thing.

  The creature’s claws raked down.

  The captain ducked, evading the blow that would have killed him instantly. The creature’s claws no more than brushed across the blonde hair atop Slaayde’s head. Such was the thing’s unholy power that this merest touch did damage enough. Slaayde’s head rolled to the side; his limbs went limp, his eyes closed.

  The creature stepped forward to finish him off. A massive figure appeared behind Slaayde, grabbed him about the collar, and flung him clear just as the creature’s claws raked down again. “Take it down,” shouted Tug.

  A crewman swung down from the mast on a rope and crashed feet first into the creature from behind while Tug dragged Slaayde clear of the battle. Just as Slaayde’s sword, the man sailed clear through the thing, as if it were completely insubstantial, some mere apparition or shadow of what once was. The crewman howled when he passed through the thing and let go the rope. When he hit the deck, his body exploded into a cloud of dust and rotted clothing.

  Men rushed in to strike the creature, but each blade passed through it, just as ineffective as the last. The creature lashed out and struck one man and then another. Both exploded into heaps of dust at the hellspawn’s touch, their screams echoing through the souls of all aboard.

  “Devil’s work,” yelled one man.

  “Demon,” cried another.

  The creature moved ever forward, toward the bridge. Men scattered and fled before it, falling over one another to get out of its path. Glimador appeared with his bowmen. They sent a flight of arrows at the thing. Each hit its mark, but just as all the other weapons, they passed through, doing the creature no harm. An unlucky seaman across the deck fell with an arrow in his arm, another took one in his belly.

  “Torches,” yelled Ob through the bridge deck’s rail. “Burn the stinking thing.”

  Several men grabbed burning brands from sconces at the ship’s rails and moved toward the creature.

  “Shouldn’t we do something?” said Claradon to Theta.

  “Not until we know how to slay it. Let’s see how the torches fare.”

  The glow of Claradon’s amulet brightened sharply. Claradon started, grabbed at the amulet’s chain and pulled it away from his chest. He winced in pain, for the amulet had grown fiery hot and electric to the touch, even as a blast of icy cold air washed over him, and the rain turned instantly to sleet and hail.

  Beside him, Theta spun around and raised his sword just in time to block the blow of another creature that had appeared behind them. Like the one below, it was luminescent, translucent and blurry, more spectre than man. The creature’s clawed hand thundered into Theta’s falchion, but did not pass through. The impact slammed Theta into the rail. A loud popping sound rang out as the rail cracked and splintered and nearly gave way.

  The creature held fast Theta’s falchion in a grip stronger than any mortal’s. The tips of the thing’s
deadly claws were just inches from his flesh; only the ancient sword and Theta’s muscle held it at bay. But since Theta dared not touch the thing except with the sword, he had no leverage and could not push it back.

  Nature turned to chaos. The rain became frost and ice in Theta’s hair, mustache, and on his cloak. Brimstone burned his nose and the air grew thin and frigid, and sapped his strength. Theta’s face contorted as he strained to push the creature back, but then, where the creature’s claws enveloped it, his sword’s blade began to warp and melt and threatened to collapse.

  Claradon stepped behind the creature. Two-handed, he slammed the ancestral sword of House Eotrus into the creature’s back with all his might. The blade passed through it, meeting no resistance, and sliced into Theta’s chest. Sparks erupted as the sword’s tip cleaved through Theta’s cloak and into his breastplate.

  “Zounds!” said Claradon. He stepped back, shock, confusion, and fear filled his face.

  Unfazed by Claradon’s blow, Theta rolled against the rail and sidestepped, desperate to evade the thing’s deadly touch, even as his sword folded over in ruin and dropped from his grasp. The ship’s rail iced over, gave way, and slammed into several men when it collapsed to the deck below.

  “What do we do, Theta?” shouted Ob.

  Theta never took his eyes from the creature. “Stay clear, you fools.”

  “I will have thy soul, traitor,” spat the creature in a deep gravelly voice. “Ye wilt not escape this time.”

  Theta backpedaled. The creature pursued him and raked the air with its claws.

  “You fight on the wrong side, Einheriar,” said Theta. “You’ve lost your way.”

  The creature paused for a moment. “I be on god’s side, as always, deceiver. I be sworn to destroy all evil and destroy ye I will.”

  The creature bounded forward and was on Theta in an instant, but he had bought just enough time to slide the Asgardian daggers from his belt sheaths. A thin smile formed on Theta’s face, and his steely eyes remained locked on the creature’s torso.

  The Einheriar launched a hail of murderous blows that belied its plodding footwork. Theta dodged or parried each thunderous strike with one of his long daggers; his iron-like arms shuddered with each impact; ice flew off the blades, shattered off Theta’s arms, and refroze just as quickly. Theta feinted to one side, then sidestepped in the other. Now partially behind the creature, he plunged Dargus Dal into its lower back. With a sound of rending metal, the Asgardian blade sank deep, deep into where a man’s kidney would be.

  The Einheriar howled—a high-pitched, piercing wail that no mortal’s throat could emit. So loud was it, it brought Ob, Claradon, and N’Paag to their knees, though Theta seemed unaffected. The creature spun toward Theta, bile oozing from its lips. It convulsed, and a blast of flaming green ichor erupted from its mouth and sprayed across the deck. Theta dodged, and turned his face away, but some of the vile spray lashed across his torso, shoulder, and back, and set his cloak afire, despite the ice that clung to it. Where the ichor struck the deck, it hissed and sputtered, turned the water and ice to billowing, hissing steam, and seared the deck planks. Wisps of fire caught here and there on the deck, though the rain held them in check.

  Theta barely pulled off the flaming cloak before the creature was at him again, ignoring its wound, from which flowed a thick green slime that was its lifeblood. It lashed its claws at Theta’s face. He ducked below the strike and dived into a roll that brought him up behind the creature. Theta thrust Wotan Dal to the hilt in the left side of the creature’s back, the blow so powerful it lifted the Einheriar from the deck. It wailed in agony as Theta held it suspended in the air.

  “Aargh! You will never be safe, Thetan,” it said, fiery ichor dribbling from its mouth. “My brothers will slay thee. They will send thy black soul to hell at last.”

  Holding the creature aloft, Theta grabbed Dargus Dal’s hilt and pitched the Einheriar over the rail into the fog. The thing wailed anew all the way to the water.

  “Not today,” said Theta.

  Theta had dislodged both daggers but dropped them to the deck as the acidic ichor reached his gauntlets. The polished steel smoked and began to melt on contact with the vile fluid. Everything the creature’s blood or ichor had touched, smoked, crackled, and burned.

  Theta strode directly at Claradon, stepping carefully due to the ice and the warped and melted decking. Claradon’s eyes widened in fear at his approach, though he did not move, in truth, he could not. He half expected Theta to kill him then and there for his errant slash. Ob stood frozen, bug-eyed, by his side.

  “Your Asgardian dagger, quickly, give it to me.”

  Claradon pulled Worfin Dal from its sheath and handed it to Theta, his hand trembling.

  Theta moved to the ladder, dagger in hand, and looked down onto the scene below.

  ***

  Dolan pulled a small object from his pocket and flung it at the Einheriar on the main deck. The object hit the wood decking and exploded in a blinding flash of light. The creature let loose an anguished wail that pierced the hearts of every man on board as the bright light washed over it. The flash of Dolan’s magic quickly dimmed but didn’t go out. Bathed in the bright light the creature took on an altogether different aspect.

  Its form was still strangely blurred, but much more distinct than in the darkened mist. The light revealed the Einheriar’s true shape—that of a man, a warrior, though corrupted and distorted. Grayish white in color from head to toe, save for its eyes which glowed a bright gold, its features chiseled and stony. It wore armor of chain and leather. Strapped to its hands were strange gauntlets, each with four wicked claw-like blades. It raised an arm to shield its eyes from the light but seemed disoriented and halted its advance.

  Men moved in with torches on all sides. The Einheriar careened from side to side avoiding the fiery light. The light revealed that the deck planks along the Einheriar’s trail were smoking and warped as if melted by its very touch. Even now, steam and smoke rose from the wood about the thing’s feet, which seemed to be sinking into the deck, hampering its movement.

  “By the Shards of Pythagorus, gek paipcm ficcg,” emoted Tanch. Nine balls of blue flame erupted in succession from Tanch’s outstretched hand and sped toward the Einheriar. One, then a second, and then a third struck it in the back and exploded—each shredded its armor and tore gory chunks from its body.

  Dolan stepped forward and fired one of Pipkorn’s Vanyar arrows into the Einheriar’s shoulder. It did not pass through, but sunk into the warrior’s shoulder just as any arrow should, and sent green ichor streaming down its torso. Tanch’s other missiles hit the Einheriar and blasted it to its knees. Dolan stepped closer, his jaw set, and put three more arrows into the thing in rapid succession. The third entered the Einheriar’s forehead at point blank range. It slumped to the side, and then dropped to the deck, unmoving. The Einheriar’s body collapsed and dissolved into a putrid ooze. In moments it was naught but a bubbly, smoking stain upon the deck.

  Theta peered down from the bridge deck, dagger in hand.

  The battle over, the deck was quiet again for a few moments.

  “Wizardry,” yelled N’Paag from the wheel, pointing down at Tanch. “And why did his arrows work,” pointing at Dolan, “and not the others?”

  “Foul magic,” shouted a crewman.

  “Devil’s work,” shouted another.

  The crewmen backed away from Tanch and Dolan both. Accusing and fearful stares accosted them from all sides. Even the soldiers of Malvegil, Lomion, and Eotrus, looked shocked and stared.

  “You all know I’m a wizard of the Tower of the Arcane,” said Tanch. “Did you fools think tower mages have no power? Did you think all we could do was card tricks?”

  “We’ll suffer no dark magic on this ship,” shouted N’Paag.

  Ob moved behind N’Paag, a dagger ready for use.

  “Should I have stood by and let them kill you, one by one?” shouted Tanch, his voice filled with
anger. “Fools.”

  “Put them off,” yelled one sailor.

  “Let’s throw them over the side,” barked Little Tug. “Let the Fens have them.”

  “They just saved your behinds with their magic,” said Bertha Smallbutt, who knelt beside her wounded captain. “Show some gratitude, not stupidity.”

  “Maybe so, but they waited until men were dead and the captain was grievous hurt,” said N’Paag.

  Ob placed the tip of his dagger against N’Paag’s back. “Not another word or you’re dead,” he said quietly.

  “No good comes from magic,” said Little Tug. He grabbed Dolan about the collar, lifted him effortlessly into the air with but one arm, and strode toward the rail.

  Artol’s iron grip locked on Tug’s shoulder and spun all five hundred pounds of him around. “Perhaps you’d like to try that with me,” he spat, meeting the giant’s sneer, eye to eye.

  Bertha rose from Slaayde’s side. “The Captain says, leave them be. Any man that don’t, will answer to him and to me.”

  There was some grumbling and cursing, but soon the men began to disperse.

  “Another time, tin can,” said Tug, dropping Dolan to the deck. Dolan landed lightly on his feet and looked not the least bit flustered.

  “Any time, Little Bug,” said Artol with a big, fake smile.

  “Keep your mouth shut from now on,” said Ob to N’Paag. “You’ll live longer.” Ob stepped back and put his dagger away. He turned to Theta and Claradon. “Too bad Slaayde stopped it so soon. Would’ve been interesting to see Artol tangle with that giant.”

  “Why didn’t Dolan try to break free?” said Claradon. “He just hung there, limp.”

  “The boy was scared senseless,” said Ob. “Nothing more than that.”

  “No,” said Theta. “He was deciding whether and when to kill the giant. He just hadn’t made up his mind yet.”