Master Of The Planes (Book 3) (58 page)

“Please Kimbolt,” she gripped his hand.  “Do this for me.”

He shook his head doubtfully.  “I will do it,” he said, looking over the princess’s shoulder into Elise’s eyes.  “But I charge you Mistress Elise to make sure the princess is well looked after.”

Elise scowled back at him, gripping her staff more tightly.  “Haven’t I always, seneschal.”

Dema stared through the gate and its view of a disconsolate wizard sitting on a cold tower top.   “He can’t see me,” she said.  “How can I be sure he is well if I can’t ask him?”

“You can ssseee for yourssself,” Maelgrum assured her from within a small cloud of mist.  “Do you not trussst the evidencsse of your own eyesss?”

“I would as soon hear from his own lips.”

“You know that isss impossssible,” Maelgrum hissed, his eyes flaring red.  “What I have done hasss broken every ssstricture I laid upon myssself and othersss in timesss long passst. You can have no communication with the little wizard, but remember if you ssshould fail me then I will have no reassson to ssspare him what isss hisss due for the treachery he hasss committed.”

Dema turned from the window on the imprisoned wizard with a nod and a sigh.  Maelgrum gave the merest twitch of a blackened finger tip and the room darkened as the light from the distant tower top was shut off by the closing of the gate.  “Very well then,” she said wearily.  “Tell me, what is it I must do?”

Maelgrum settled his physical form into the only chair in the medusa’s spartan quarters.  Dema took a seat on the bed, she was buggered if she was going to stand while the Dark Lord sat.

“Come, dearessst Dema, why ssso glum?”  He chided her.  “You may have died already but I can ssstill offer you the great opportunity, the chancsse for sssucccesss in battle sssuch asss will make generationsss tremble at the mention of your name.”  One red eye flickered in what may have been a ghastly attempt at a wink by the undead wizard.  “There are few who are able to boassst that they did their greatessst deedsss after they have died.”

“You did,” Dema shot back.

The room grew a little colder but then Maelgrum threw back his head and a dry laugh echoed from the walls.  “Quite ssso, Dema, quite ssso.”

“And my task?”

“The trollsss are battle ready?”

She gave a brief nod of irritation at an unnecessary question.  “They will rip your enemies to pieces at my command.  And by the same token they will not rip your allies to pieces.”

Maelgrum nodded.  “Then we are ready to begin our campaign and we will not ssstop until I ssstand at the ssshoresss of the great ocean and all of Eadran’sss realmsss lie behind me in abject ssslavery or sssmoking ruinsss, I care not which.”

“Admirable ambition, but every great conquest begins somewhere,” Dema reminded him.  “Where do we strike first?”

“Where the enemy is weakessst, though they may think themssselvesss strong.  My sssourcess of intelligencsse may have been compromisssed by the half-elf’sss unmasssking.  But they too are blind to the forcesss I have mussstered. 

“You will be my lightning ssstrike, Dema, the sssharp point of my ssspear.  But in your wake will roll legionsss and orcsss in sssuch numbersss as thisss isssland hasss not ssseen in a thousssand yearsss.  It isss fortunate that both the dead and the living can be bred at sssuch ssspeed.”

Niarmit stood on the battlements of Karlbad and ran a hand over the curve of her belly.  She found no outward sign of the quickening within her.  There was no swelling. Her clothes all fitted her as well as they always had, both the ill tailored garb she had accumulated in her forest haunts in plundered Undersalve and also the borrowed finery she had been acquired since accepting her royal destiny.

She shook her hair loose as a fresh gust of wind whipped in from the East. The grace of the Goddess kept the dawn sickness at bay and her breakfasts down. But secrecy could not last.  She had resolved that she would carry the child, but that in no way meant she had the slightest idea what to do about it.  Nor had she found anyone whose counsel she would trust in this most delicate of matters. 

Within the Helm she would readily trust her ancestors to consider any question of military strategy or national governance.   However, the many monarchs were still too new found acquaintances or too austere of manner for Niarmit to share so personal a dilemma. 

Beyond the Helm, in a fortress still shaking off the grasp of winter, there was only Lady Isobel who had any awareness of the queen’s situation.  The Lady of the North had been the soul of discretion, eschewing any unwelcome questioning and Niarmit in turn had been reluctant to volunteer any information.  The combination ensured Isobel knew nothing more than that the pulped juice from the leaves of mother’s bane had been discarded unused.

Niarmit found she had reached for the crescent on its chain, gripping it tightly.  She had perhaps as much as another fortnight before the matter of her confinement would have to be made public.  Distasteful as the prospect was, she would have to wrench Kimbolt from his painted whore to let him know what fruit the folly of their lust had borne.   This child would know its father and its mother, that much at least she could promise it.  But against the future worries of the as yet unborn, there were still the present tribulations of its mother to be resolved.

“Your Majesty.”

She turned slowly, settling her thoughts once more to matters of statecraft. “Yes, Pietrsen.”

The Master of Horse stood to attention, Chancellor Margrave at his shoulder.  “The last of the northern levies have arrived by the eastern crossing.  We have eight thousand battle ready and fit for the march.”

Niarmit nodded grimly.  “The waiting is over then, time to return to war.”

“It is a great honour that the host of Nordsalve should be entrusted with the task of reclaiming the lost province of Morsalve.”  The chancellor’s jowls wobbled with his enthusiasm.

“Indeed,” Niarmit arched an eyebrow.

“Perhaps you would care to march with us,” Pietrsen suggested with a smile.  “Share in the honour at first hand.”

The gyrations of Margave’s full figure reached a new pitch of intensity as he bowed and scraped and waved away the Master of Horse’s offer.  “Oh no, I couldn’t. I am quartermaster to this great endeavour, supplying the stores and essentials on which such an army marches.  Martial glory is not mine to claim.”

The corners of Pietrsen’s mouth twitched briefly upwards to accompany the sparkle in his eyes.  “No, I thought not.”

“I will take my leave of, Lady Isobel,” Niarmit said.  “Chancellor, please see to the packing of my belongings.”

Margrave quivered anew at the fresh privilege and Pietresen merely grinned.

Without quite realising it Hepdida’s feet had brought her out on a broad ledge of rock overlooking the plain of the river Saeth.  She sat down, hugging her knees and gazing out beyond the river at the teardrop shaped town that was Listcairn, perched on the side of the hill and at its point was the eight towered castle, her target.

She shivered and hugged herself a little tighter.   She had been scared before, mortally afraid.  There had been the deepening nightmare of being Grundurg’s prisoner.  Time and distance had gradually eroded the veneer of fearful obedience which Dema had laid upon the vile orc, and exposed the full range and cruelty of the imagination he had vented on her pale form.  She winced in remembrance of the staggeringly insensitive epithet which Jay, in his anger had flung at her.  “Orc whore.” She bit her lip and buried her head on her knees.

Then there had been the curse that Quintala laid on her, the awful sane sick madness.  Her body wasting away and the brief periods of consciousness little more than a dreadful sleep paralysis;  one part of her mind travelling a helpless passenger within a body consumed by a rage that wanted only to destroy and  to kill.

But then for all the fear and despair, the future had been less certain and less full of dread than now.  She was going to go into that castle where Quintala ruled.  Quintala who had lured her into the forest, who had cursed her so many times, who had set her loose a raging lunatic against both Elise and Giseanne.  Quintala who had come to her in her sleep and bid Hepdida drive a knife into her own heart.  Smiling, laughing Quintala who had buried a malice so deep within her that no-one, not even she who had been its principal target and victim had realised the serpent coiled within their midst.

She knew she would go into that castle, she knew what she would see, what she would say.  But no-one knew for certain what would happen after that.  Would she come out?

“Hello, I thought I’d find you here.” 

She looked up as the young illusionist joined her on the ledge.  He settled companionably beside her, two old friends admiring a view of the Salved Kingdom in all its summer glory.  Provided of course that one could ignore the dotted encampments of disparate orc tribes, provided one could turn a blind eye to the pens of the undead whose stench reached even this far - a faint whiff carried on a gust of wind, provided one could be oblivious to the dirt of the unploughed fields where a shrunken and enslaved population no longer had the manpower to reap all that the bountiful land had to offer.

“I used to sit up here a lot.”  Thom filled the silence with easy chatter. “I was up here when we saw the queen and Kaylan fall from the sky, over there.”  He pointed south.  “Falling a thousand feet and both survived, prospered even.  What greater proof is there that we have the favour of the Goddess?”

He put a fraternal arm around her and hugged her tight.  “It will be all right,” he said.   “You’ll see.”

She shook her head.  “How by all that’s holy am I going to get in there, Thom?”

“There was a lively debate taking place on that point when I left,” Thom admitted.  “It was all matter of how far Haselrig can be trusted.”

“Haselrig?”

“To be honest Mistress Elise and the prince seemed to be having a competition as to who could doubt the man more sincerely and deeply.  So much so that Sir Ambrose had to bid them both be silent so we could at least hear what Haselrig was proposing.”

“Which was?”

“The place we must reach is the castellan’s chamber. That is where the medusa’s body lies.  The door has been locked by Maelgrum, wizard locked and only Quintala was entrusted with the glyph to open it.”

“So, we ask that bitch to just let us in?”

Thom smiled and shook his head.  “Amongst her other faults, the ex-seneschal has a certain tendency to idleness.  A disinclination to exert effort where it can be delegated to others.”

Hepdida gave him a blank look and Thom hurried to explain more simply.  “Checking the condition of the medusa’s corpse is a task that she passed onto Haselrig. Quintala entrusted him with the secret sign to secure access to the room.  Haselrig can open that last door.”

“So he intends to accompany us?”

Thom nodded.  “And Elise and Rugan are both insistent that he should teach one or other of them the sigil just as Quintala taught it to him.  They are fearful that he is intent on leading you into a trap.”

“Is he?”

Thom spread his hands hopelessly.  “I am an illusionist not a mindreader, Hepdida,” he said.  “But the Lady Giseanne spoke right. Since first his identity was revealed he has been entirely remourseful and co-operative.”

“My father trusted him with a message, and he delivered it,” Hepdida said.

Thom nodded and they both looked out beyond the swift flowing summer Saeth and the specks of orcish movement on the plain towards the towers of Listcairn.

“I’m scared, Thom.”

He took her hand and squeezed it.   “I’ll be there,” he said.  “Right beside you.”

“What if she’s there?” She shuddered.  “I don’t think I could face her.”

“She won’t be.  It has been decided Rugan and Ambrose’s task is to draw her out and away.  They’ll lead her a merry dance down a false trail, just as she once tried to lead us on a fool’s errand before the battle of the Saeth.  Listcairn will be practically empty when we arrive.”

She gave him a baleful eye.  “Wearing another of your disguises?”

“If Sir Ambrose’s patrols can capture me some suitable subjects as raw material, I will make of you either a perfect orc, or outlander, or nomad. “

She sighed.  “I’m sure that may help us get in, Thom.  It certainly did at Morwencairn when first we seized the Helm.”

“See,” he gave her a good natured punch on the arm. “A tried and tested method.”

“Getting out though,” she rolled on over his cheerful manner.  “That was an entirely different matter.”  

Dema strode towards the heart of the great encampment, two rubbery skinned trolls loping along at her shoulders.  The impact of their presence brought a broad grin to the medusa’s lips.  No-one spared the trio more than a single fearful glance. Then all who could conceivably find a reason to be anywhere other than on that broad highway beat a swift retreat, anxious to dig latrines or hand feed strips of meat to starving wargs, or fix a bent post around the pens of the snapping snarling undead. Anything was preferable to spending more than a few seconds within notice of the master’s latest allies and their unrivalled general.

Dema felt the familiar pride of command.  She had won the battle of the Derrach Bridge, she had taken the impregnable fortresses of Sturmcairn and Listcairn, she had welded a group of foul but lethal animals into a disciplined and even more lethal fighting machine.  For a few short minutes, she could forget the body in the castellan’s chamber, she could forget the fate that lurked in wait for her. For the time being there was a future ahead of her that no-one knew, not even Maelgrum, and in that uncertainty lay an infinity of possibilities. The wealth of opportunity lifted her mood still higher as Maelgrum’s command tent hove in sight at the centre of the vast encampment.

Dema did not doubt that Maelgrum could have conjured an opulent pavilion with the merest flick of his gnarled fingers, but she guessed it pleased the Dark Lord to see orcs and outlanders sweating to recreate the same grim perfection through purely physical endeavour.  The outer guy ropes of the rich and gaudy canopy were still being anchored in place when the medusa and her lurching lieutenants arrived.  The guard at the opening somehow managed to back away while making his salute, in no haste to approach still less challenge the fearsome trio.

The medusa swept past him into the pavilion. The trolls straightened into sentry duty awaiting her return.

“Ah Dema, lassst to arrive but firssst in battle,” Maelgrum hissed a greeting.  “You will remember Rondol and Marwella of courssse.  Sssadly our legion of magesss hasss been somewhat reducssed of late, but the necromancssersss continue to disssplay their ssskills.”  The redbearded sorcerer dipped his chin in nervous acknowledgement of the medusa.  The crone, Marwella, sucked indifferently on her gums.

Maelgrum swept out a hand to introduce the other war leaders at his table.  “You may not remember Mazdurg, he ssstandsss here for the orcsss.”

Dema nodded at the battlescarred orc, one deep gouge across his forehead giving the creature the appearance of a permanent frown.  “I remember a young orc warrior of that name,” she said. “He stood fast against the ogres of the grey peaks when they had so foolishly rejected your overlordship, master.  He cut one off at the kneecaps, a tale worthy of telling in the feasting halls of his fathers.”

In so far as an orc could simper Mazdurg did just that.  His broad ugly face creaked into a smile at the medusa’s acknowledgement of his great triumph.

“And Tarkanusss hasss but recssently come into our fold. He hasss proven himssself mossst effective asss governor of our new conquered province, able to harnessss the greed of men to all our advantagesss.   Now he hasss the opportunity to ssshow in battle how men sssserve their own interessstsss bessst when they firssst sssserve my interessstsss.”

Tarkanus was a familiar figure too.  Dema had never seen him before, but she had seen dozens like him.  Men whose criminal greed had swept them beyond the barrier into exile.  The man had a pale face and a thin moustache that twitched as he spoke, his tone a rarely achieved blend of obsequious arrogance. “I am not without combat experience, Lady Dema,” he began. “I served in the Oostport guard.”

“Until you were cashiered for embezzlement,” Dema let a smile play across her lips at the impact of the barbed rejoinder. Tarkanus’s puce expression revealed the accuracy of her lucky guess.

“I spent some time after that serving with and leading mercenary companies in the Eastern Lands,” the man blustered.  “You will not find me wanting on the battle field, Lady Dema.”

Dema gave him the full benefit of the sparkle of her gauze clad eyes. He held her hidden gaze for a second or two longer than she had expected. Perhaps there was more to this weasel than she had expected. She aborted the still born observation that, in the Eastern Lands, three muggers would consider themselves a mercenary company.   Instead she told him soberly, “I want to find you killing on the battle field.”

Maelgrum raised a solitary finger to demand an end to the chatter of greeting.   “It isss of courssse underssstood that in thisss placsse we talk only of the future.  There can be no referencsse to what isss passst and done.”

They nodded their agreement and Dema turned to Maelgrum. “So, master, how many do we have and how many do we face?”

“There are one-hundred-and-twelve sssorcerersss held back from our unfortunate reverssse, the one that prompted usss to sssummon Dema here. Tarkanusss has added to the outlander contingent to give usss four and half thousssand men, mossstly cavalry. Marwella’sss necromancersss have created a legion of the undead full twenty-eight thousssand ssstrong.   Mazdurg hasss been accssepted asss uberchieftain by four more tribesss new joined from beyond the Gramorcsss. Orcsss driven to join our caussse by newsss of our sssuccesss and the opportunitiesss that await thossse bold enough to ssseize them.  Added to what we always had that gives full thirty-five thousssand of the orc nation have marched through Sssturmcairn’sss sssundered gatesss.”

Dema whistled softly.  A force of over sixty thousand, such an army had not been seen since the days of the Monar Empire. “Impressive,”she found she had said.

Maelgrum’s eye pits beat a slow glow of pleasure.   “And that isss before we count the fifteen hundred very ssspecial troopsss that you command.”

“And against us.”

“The fortressss of Colnhill isss held by at leassst ten thousssand and no more than twenty thousssand.  Either extreme should be well within our measssure.  Particularly with the ssspecial talentsss of our troll commandoesss.” Maelgrum glanced around at his generals.  “Oncsse Colnhill isss again in our handsss, the ssseven countiesss will ssswiftly fall to usss driving a wedge oncssse more between Medrysssalve and Nordsssalve.  From there we will drive on around the northern tip of the Palacintasss and take the north-eassstern passssage into Medyrsssalve.”

While the rest murmured their delight in the plan, Dema frowned.   Maelgrum was quick to notice the merest hint of dissent.  “You are uneasssy with thisss plan, Lady Dema?”

“Ten thousand?” she said. “Twenty thousand? It is a broad range.   Do we have no more precise intelligence than that?  Can we even be sure of these numbers?”

It grew cooler despite the summer heat radiating from the dark cloth.  “The meansss by which I may gather information have been reducssed somewhat sssince your demissse,” Maelgrum hissed.

“They unmasked your spy?”

“We do not disssscussss what hasss happened, Dema.  The lessss you know the better it isss for you.”

“You mean the less chance I have of avoiding the fate that awaits me?”

Tarkanus was shivering with the sudden cold.  New to Maelgrum’s service he had not the thick underclothes that most of the Dark Lord’s servants learned to wear even in the heat of summer.

“We have dissscusssed thisss, Dema.  You cannot evade the fate that has already happened to you.  There are advantagesss you can exssploit in that, but any information you take back asss to what will happen, the when and the how, will ultimately work to the dessstruction of usss all.”

Dema sniffed, a curt statement of indifference died unspoken on her lips.  There were faces she would have expected to see at this gathering, people, orcs whose names had not even been mentioned.  She had no idea how far into the future Maelgrum’s blue gate had dragged her.  Odestus had looked a lot older, Rondol and Marwella less aged since their parting before the assault on Sturmcairn.   The riddle of her death haunted her, the how? the where? the when? And most of all the who by?   Maelgrum had not even let her examine her own body.   Had she perhaps died of a sickness?   Why had she died human?  She shook her head unhappy with the confusion that beset her.  All that mattered was that there was a battle to be waged and won and they needed better intelligence of the enemy.

“Can you not open a portal, Master, to spy on the enemy.” She dared make the suggestion. “Information is a priceless asset in warfare.”

“Colnhill isss closssed to me,” Maelgrum said.

“But you have walked the top of that hill, Master,” Rondol exclaimed.  “When Mayor Hiral was destroyed, you were there.  You could open a gate, a small one.”

Maelgrum flicked out with a twisted digit and Rondol found he was mumbling in panic through lips that were sealed shut.   “There are thingsss we will not ssspeak of,” Maelgrum told the bearded wizard. “We mussst be sssilent on thossse partsss of the passst that ssstill lie in Dema’sss future.”

He turned his scarlet gaze on Dema.  “Be they ten thousssand or twenty, our forcssse is more than sssufficssient for the tasssk.  We will gain cssertainty asss we draw clossser.  A general of your giftsss should not have to, or even want to rely on the opportunity for magical ssscrying.  Nothing ssshould sssteal the credit for your victory.”

Dema glared back at him.  “A good general uses every advantage they can get, only a fool puts pride before victory.”

“Nonethelessss,”he told her.  “Thisss isss how it will be.”

She tried to hold his gaze, but the fierce intensity of his red eyepits drove even the sparkle of her blue eyes to drop in submission.