Dark Magic (12 page)

“Hold onto the rope,” Brand told Gamal.

The miner eyed him then nodded and wrapped his burnt hands up in it, grimacing.

Brand unsnapped the chain at his waist. He grabbed the rope, which a moment before he had quailed at the very sight of, and half-fell out into the chamber. He swung on the rope for a few seconds, slipping and thanking the Kindred for insisting he wear gloves. He got a firm grip with his left and drew the axe with his right. A dozen paces below, Telyn leaned out and scored a slashing hit upon a buzzing wing. Damaged, the beetle fell and landed with a crunching sound. Its companions immediately set upon it and tore it apart, as he realized they were doing with corpses of those Telyn had managed to shoot earlier.

Brand commanded Ambros to flash, and it did so, lighting up the nightmarish scene fully.

They were in chamber full of hundreds, perhaps thousands of the insects. In the middle of the chamber rested a vast corpse, reduced now to little more than bones and scraps. He had no idea what the creature had once been, as it was too alien in aspect to compare to any surface-dwelling creature. He’d seen pictures of whales in books, and perhaps that most closely described it. If one could imagine a fanged whale that lived in caverns a mile beneath the surface of the Earth and which dragged itself through tunnels on its flippers.

Surprised by the light, some of the beetles crashed into walls and fell down into the main mass of them. At least he knew then they had eyes.

Part way down now, he was uncertain how he might help Telyn. He was above her, and could not pass her without knocking her from the rope. Worse, beetles worked on the rope now at both ends, ravenously devouring it as he suspected they would devour any organic material that didn’t fight back.

“Telyn, we have to drop down into the chamber.”

She looked up at him, still slashing with her blade. She looked down then and saw the seething mass of beetles down there.

“You first,” she said, grinning. But he could tell there was fear in her. How could there not be?

“Okay, slide down, we will get close to the bottom then both jump.”

Telyn sucked in a great breath and slid down until she was no more than ten feet from the ground. Brand followed.

“The rope’s giving way!” called Gamal from above them.

Brand looked up to see several of the beetles working on it. Then he jumped, pushing away from the rope so that he wouldn’t land on Telyn’s head on the way down.

He landed on several beetles, popping them like gourds. It was disgusting, but it broke his fall. He was up and hacking at them before they could mass and pull him down. The axe flashed and they snapped and chewed at his boots. A dozen fell and his boots were scarred when the rope gave way.

Telyn gave a surprised whooping sound as she landed behind him. She found her bow again, but discovered the beetles had devoured her string. Down to her knife, she stood behind Brand, mostly ducking his backswing.

The fight lasted several more minutes, when suddenly, the beetles retreated. Brand had no idea why. Perhaps they had some kind of commander, or maybe just an instinct that triggered to cause them to flee when enough of their kind stank up the air with their crushed bodies.

In any case, the chamber soon emptied and they were left alone.

Gamal applauded them, his popping gloved hands sounding loud and echoing in the chamber. “Well done!”

They looked up at him askance. “What of the rope?”

“That one is wrecked. You carried the spare, Telyn.”

They checked and found much of her pack was torn apart. She had dropped it from her back in order to fight the insects.

“It’s too far down to jump,” said Gamal, “you will have to proceed on your own. I’ll take word back up to Gudrin.”

Gamal told them to find another shaft down, a very hot one, that would lead to a magma chamber. From there, they must find a tunnel where rubies could be found gleaming in the walls. Following that for some miles should lead them to the spot he had last known Modi to be.

Licking their lips and trying not to feel fear, the two River Folk gathered their packs, or what was left of them. They made ready to travel more deeply into the Everdark, and Brand thought to himself he had never been more afraid of a place.

Chapter Twelve

The Hag’s Long Leather Bag

Mari decided to run away the very next morning. The entire night, she could hardly sleep. She listened to the crone’s sighs, snores and grunts with trepidation. What would she do when she found Mari gone? Would she send for Mother? Would she cast a spell? Would she let that burning troll down out of the chimney, and send it running through the forest after her?

She shuddered on her dirty mat. She would not let such a thing happen to her baby, even if it were a troll. If she birthed something with hair and claws, she would cry and she would scream and perhaps die. But
no one
was going to burn it alive in a stove.

That night, the snow blew in under the cracks in the hut, which were numerous. The snow swirled and drifted about Mari’s mat, which lay upon the floor a few feet from the stove. Before, she had huddled even closer to the stove to keep warm, but tonight she couldn’t. The thought of that skeletal foot, ever growing new flesh and ever having it burnt away again made her skin crawl. She had wanted to run, screaming, when she had first found it. But she had controlled herself. In order to escape the crone cleanly, she needed to vanish and get several hours head start before any kind of pursuit could follow. She could have run in the night, while the crone slept, but she was afraid. She didn’t want to freeze in the dark forest. The Haven wood was not as dense and dangerous as the Deepwood, which stood on the other side of the Berrywine, but it was still a forest. She would have to wait and run in the morning.

Somehow, she managed to fall asleep before dawn, only to be awakened with a rough kick to the head, as had become the daily custom. The crone almost toppled to do it. Lifting one foot from the ground for any purpose other than taking a step was difficult for the ancient woman, but kick her she did. Mari wondered that the woman always awakened before her, just as the sun tinged the skies. She was part rooster, that old crone.

A dark thought struck her then. She thought of something, as her head throbbed and she struggled to get her swollen belly off the dirty mat. It was something she shouldn’t have thought of at all. She was a good girl, not an evil one. But she had the thought, just the same.

She thought of the bag of silver in the tree. The old woman’s hoard.

When she ran, she could hardly go back to Mother. Her mother had abandoned her here, in this horrible place, fully knowing some horrible fate awaited her. Mother had left her, rejected her. Mari knew she was on her own now.

Being on her own, traveling anywhere, getting lodging and food, would take money and she had none. But up in that leather bag, the crone had the money Mother had given her. Mari would take it, and run.

She did her morning chores. It was Saturday, and soon Mari noticed that the crone heated water upon the stove. At first, she thought she planned to brew tea as she often did, but long before the water boiled, the crone took the pot to the floor and sat in the only rickety chair the hut had.

“It’s time, dearie,” she said, gesturing toward the pot.

Mari took a step forward, uncertain as to the old woman’s meaning. “Time for what?”

The crone cackled. “How soon you forget you promises, maid of mine! It’s time for you to wash my feet. It is Saturday, you know.”

And so Mari knelt. She struggled to keep from retching as she washed the woman’s crusty, dirt-black feet. There was something different about these feet, and it was not just her annoyance with them for kicking her awake each morn. It was more than that. She knew they were not normal, human feet, not entirely. They were more like the feet of a raven, or some other creature with thick skin and nails like clicking claws. The crone never wore shoes, not even when she spent hours in the snow. Never. Mari knew something of feet in the snow. No normal feet could take that much cold. But the crone did it, every day.

Finally, at long last, the old woman left on her mysterious rounds, collecting bark and insect husks and squirming things that hibernated in holes. All the stuffs she stirred into pots to make her disgusting potions. Mari waited only long enough for the old woman to vanish into the trees.

Gathering her pitiful collection of belongings, she headed out into the open. She paused, staring up at the tree where the crone kept her stash. She chewed her lip for a full minute, then dashed to it, stumbling in the snows which were a foot deep today.

She produced a knife and stood at the foot of the tree. She hesitated, but thought of the thing that burned in the stove. She could not let her child, whatever it might be, suffer such a fate. She slashed the line. The long leather bag fell with a tinkling crash into the snow. Mari dug her hand into the bag and pulled out a surprisingly large number of coins. Mari wondered that the crone lived the way she did. Some of the richest folk in Riverton could not have owned such a fortune.

She did not take them all, just a handful. It would be more than enough.

She almost left then, but thought the better of it. She hauled the long leather bag up into the tree again and tied it off. With luck, the hag wouldn’t notice the theft for a long time, if ever.

As she made ready to leave for good, Mari had a chilling thought. She recalled the day she had looked into the chimney. The crone had known. She had known, and she had been there in an instant, gazing over her shoulder. She understood as she thought about that moment the old Fob woman was much more than a strange old woman in the forest, she was a witch. Only a witch would do these things. Only a true witch would live as a beggared hermit while a fortune sat up in her bag in the treetops.

Witches had ways of finding things, of finding
people
. The crone would hunt her down, and finish her and her child in the forest, or she would send something to do it for her. She would never give up, not after she realized she had been robbed.

Mari looked about the place, wondering what she could do to give herself more time. She could fire the hut, but that would just signal the witch to return sooner.

Then she thought of the thing in the chimney, and she shuddered anew. She had a new, dark thought. It was a
much
darker idea, one that was the worst idea she’d ever had in her life.

She decided to do it. There was no other way to be sure the crone was delayed.

She took the pot of water she’d used to wash the crone’s feet and dashed it into the stove, extinguishing the fire that had burned there for so many years.

Then she ran into the woods.

Behind her in the hut, inside the belly of the cooling, ticking stove, a skeletal foot waggled.

* * *

Piskin had had words with Puck. He had talked to him of injustice, of unfairness and greed. Puck had lamented with him, because he was upset and had been cast out of Oberon’s presence. He had been mistreated, and ever it was with such folk in such a state of mind, that creatures like Piskin found them weak and easy to move.

And so Puck had told Piskin of the maiden he met in the Haven wood, and how he had turned her from a maiden into a maid one autumn afternoon. He explained how the girl had tempted him, had teased him, had driven him wild with lust. Was this not a normal reaction for any male, especially an elven male? Had not Oberon himself reportedly done the same a millennium before, producing as a result that character known as Myrrdin? Who was Oberon, lord of the elves, but a sod who had managed to lose the Blue Jewel twice to a pack of Wee Folk? Who was such a lord to cast out Puck for a single minor trespass?

Piskin lamented long and loud with his new friend. Oberon had indeed wronged him most harshly. Ever it was that the low were trodden upon for their mistakes, while the lords did the same in even grander fashion and never felt the burden of it. Nothing could be more unfair!

And what was the name of that maid again?

Why? Just to know, as she might be about to birth a new lord among the River Folk. A new famous personage. Oh yes, Piskin really thought such a thing was more than possible. It was likely.

Mari of the Bowen clan
, Puck had told him. Piskin had tsked and tutted and provided his very best sympathies. As soon as possible, he had bounded away, explaining he had an urgent mission. That much, of all he had said that day to Puck, was the only thing that bore truth.

And so Piskin headed to the River Haven, to the eastern banks of the Berrywine and the edge of the Havenwood. He found Mari’s home, but she was not there. Of course, he could not question the River Folk directly. This would only raise suspicion. Among their kind, at least, they knew enough to be distrustful of any and all of his sort. Elves, in their arrogance, disregarded the Wee Folk as fools. Runabouts and charlatans, petty thieves at best, the lot of them. That disregard was Piskin’s cover amongst the Shining Folk. But with humans, he had to proceed more delicately.

He haunted every window at the Bowen house, that night, listening closely. As a changeling, he had a great deal of experience with this sort of thing, of course. He had been a whisper beneath a thousand such windows in his life, biding his time and listening for his opportunity to snatch a new child. 

It had only taken a single night to get the story. The daughter had been taken away, the mother at first would not tell the husband where, or why, but it all came out in time. River Folk could not really help themselves. They
needed
to talk about things, especially big things. An argument had erupted, naturally. The father was angry with the mother for taking away his daughter without even telling him about her state or letting him have a say in the matter.

There were tears, and shouts. Shames and lamentations. Piskin sighed and rolled his eyes up at the frosty moon. When were they going to get to the point of exactly
where
the girl had been taken? It was a long while, but the facts finally came out. Piskin had a road to follow. And he had to hurry, as the father, that very next dawn, planned to set out to retrieve his daughter. Not much time remained before this venture became more complicated.

And so it was that Piskin’s quick feet carried him to the crone’s hut faster than Mari’s father could ever hope to travel there. When he arrived, it was late morning.

He halted at the edge of the clearing to listen. It was snowing hard by that time, which dampened down all sound. The place was deathly quiet, but he could hear something, something furtive, moving in the hut. The pointed ears of the Wee Folk, when properly employed, were as sensitive as those of a fox.

Piskin narrowed his eyes. The sounds were not those of a River girl. Nor were they the shufflings and grunts of an old woman.

He dared to creep into the open, advancing upon the hut from an angle which bore no windows. This was not difficult, as the hut only had one crudely cut door and one crudely cut window on the opposite side from the door. As he drew closer, and the sounds grew more audible, he was alarmed. Something was in the hut. Something bad.

Daring wait no longer, he bounded up into the window of the hut and gazed inside. There upon the floor lay what had to be the fallen figure of the crone. The corpse was already laid over with snow. There was blood, plenty of it, but it had frozen hard and dark in a pool.

Atop the body sat a troll. A small, young one, by the looks of it. Piskin winced to see it as it turned a wicked yellow eye to him. It was black-furred and had long white claws. The tip of every claw and fang was red with the crone’s blood.

Piskin looked around the place but saw no sign of the maid Mari. He hissed through clenched teeth. The snow was falling hard and had filled in any tracks she might have left behind.

“Where is the maid?”

The troll chuckled. “I use her as a seat,” said the foul thing.

“Nay, not that one,” said Piskin in disgust. “I mean the younger one.”

“She who released me? What business is that of yours?” asked the troll. His yellow eyes drew to slits. “You are a changeling. You wish to steal the child she bears.”

Piskin leaned on his one hand. “That’s none of your affair. Tell me of the girl, help me find her and I will give you a great boon.”

The troll snorted. “A boon? A trickster with one hand can’t be very good at his job.”

Piskin eyed him closely. He glanced at the stove which had iced over now with the water Mari had tossed over it. “I notice you have been mistreated. You have been harshly burned, haven’t you?”

The troll shifted around, crouching in a new spot upon the crone’s stiffening belly.

“What of it?”

Piskin clucked his tongue in sympathy. “I’ve seen it before in your kind. Your hair is toasted black. You’ll never grow to full size now. You’ve been damaged.”

The troll looked uncomfortable. It shrugged. “What can be done? I’ve had my vengeance.”

“Yes,” said Piskin, “yes, sirrah, but let me tell you of something better. Something sweeter. Would you not like to be whole again? Would you not like to be
healed?
”

He had the troll’s attention. Piskin explained that he was upon a quest. That he had his own injury to repair, and that he knew how it could be done. He needed to find the maid, however.

The troll stared at him. “I can follow her scent.”