The Dragon-Child (2 page)

After a time, the spell was complete. Soon thereafter, glimmering spirits enveloped Therian and he vanished from sight. Gruum could hear the howling of the summoned winds.

The sails snapped and pulled with unnatural force. The ship heaved around to starboard, and set a course not laid by human hands. The course was commanded by the sorcerous winds, and no rudder could alter it.

Barely audible beneath the roaring wind, Gruum could make out Therian’s faint screams. Gruum shuddered, knowing his master was paying whatever price the wind spirits demanded for their unearthly service.

For four days and four nights the wind spirits drove them with speed that all but broke the mast. The crew became increasingly restless. They muttered openly of murder and stared at Gruum with furrowed brows. Therian, the moodiest passenger, seemed unconcerned with their discontent. Rarely did the crew dare meet eyes with the sorcerer, and Gruum knew Therian preferred it that way.

As they sailed quickly southward, moving with unnatural haste, the air grew thicker and hotter until it felt like the velvet-gloved fist of a lady giant. The humidity softly wrapped Gruum in an inescapable grip. Never in his life could he recall feeling such heat outdoors. He found the sensation odd, but not altogether unpleasant. He was from the wild, wind-swept Steppes. Cold and heat he knew, but not this clinging air that draped him like a blanket. On the Steppes, when he had huddled near a roaring fire, the heat that stung his skin had been dry and less penetrating.

“I’ve been watching the others,” Therian said, appearing at Gruum’s side. Knowing the step of his master, Gruum had not startled at his approach.

“Yes, milord?”

“None of them seem discomfited by this wet heat. In fact, they seem to relish the sensation. They are smiling more, and they remove their helms. Watch—often they will close their eyes and turn their faces up to the sun.”

“The sun itself is no longer a pale, ghostly disk in the skies above,” said Gruum. “Does it not bring you good cheer as well?”

“Cheer? I do not want to freeze, but this is too much. It is a hot malevolent eye that glares down with the intensity of an angry god.”

Gruum had no answer to this. The air was cloying, but not overly-so. He suspected that his King’s pale blue skin was overly-sensitive. Together, they watched the crew further. When the crewmen noticed the scrutiny, they quickly darted their eyes from Therian’s smoldering gaze in fear. This didn’t seem to perturb Therian.

“These men are like stray dogs,” said Therian, as if reading Gruum’s thoughts. “If they didn’t deeply fear me they would come for us in the night with bared, dirty blades. Look how they remove their helms, something unthinkable for a Hyborean when outdoors. Some even loosened the straps of their ragtag doublets and spread open their tunics at the chest.”

“It relieves the heat, milord.”

“It also serves to reveal the disgusting froth of spindly hairs most of them conceal beneath their filthy clothing. I can only surmise that this heat is stimulating the furry growth.”

“Don’t the men of Hyborea bear hair upon their bodies?” asked Gruum, honestly curious. He’d never seen much naked skin among the people of Corium. It had always been too cold.

Therian made a dismissive gesture. “Sometimes, it occurs amongst the low-born—or those who’ve crossbred with beings such as these.”

Gruum blinked at him. He wondered if his master truly considered himself human at all. Perhaps, he thought after a moment, Therian had a point. The Hyborean people were a different race, if not a different creature altogether. He thought to himself that Therian’s Queen, the Lady Sloan, had clearly been ‘crossbred’. Her skin had a healthy glow to it that attracted everyone to her. Her allure had certainly entranced Therian, for all his scoffing about barbarians.

“What of Lady Sloan?” Gruum asked.

Therian looked at him in surprise. Gruum tried to appear nonchalant, but he felt his face redden. He’d again brought up a sore topic, one he’d sworn to avoid.

Therian looked away again and nodded, conceding his point. “You are correct. Her skin tones show as much pink as blue. And she has attracted me like no other. I suppose I only dislike the looks of barbarian males. I find their females strangely acceptable.”

They smiled at each other. Therian enjoyed his joke while Gruum felt relief at his master’s good humor.

“What I can’t abide is the sharp increase of floating stench that follows this ship now in a roiling cloud. Can the heat possibly be making these barbarians even more offensive?” asked Therian wrinkling his fine, aquiline nose. “I had not thought it possible.”

“I believe you are correct in that assumption, sire,” said Gruum.

As the heat wore on into the fifth day, Therian finally relented and removed his own helm and opened his own tunic. Gruum watched the reaction from the crew with interest. Seeing him thusly revealed for the first time, the men’s response was one of startlement. His exposed chest was as hairless, smooth and pale as his face. This no doubt seemed perfectly natural to Therian, but gained him many new, furtive glances from the bemused crew. Indeed, his flesh was a great deal more pale than their own ruddy, craggy, randomly-haired heads. The King’s jet black hair flowed over skin that was a very pale blue intermixed with very light pink. No beads of sweat stood upon his forehead.

“Do you not sweat at all, milord?” asked Gruum after watching his master for a full day in the sun.

“I’m not sure my body is capable of producing such a vile substance.”

“Are we only so many red, dripping beasts to you?”

 Therian’s answer smile was slight, thin-lipped and wintry. “Only in odor. I will take my meals from now on at the stern deck while you man the helm.”

The cabin boy was one of the few crew members that didn’t seem to dislike them. He often brought salted meats, fresh fish and warm-clime fruits without being asked. Gruum found the fruits, when sliced and peeled, to be quite palatable. They had a vague sweetness, a rubbery texture, and a slightly unpleasant aftertaste that grew upon the tongue over a period of time. An acquired taste, he supposed, which he was surprised to realize he was acquiring.

Gruum knew there was another, much more important reason why they took their meals upon the stern deck. With each day that passed Therian weakened. Simply remaining upright would become difficult for him, in time.

Inevitably, as each day faded into night, Therian’s false strength ebbed away. Gruum often found his master eyeing the crew in a predatory manner. Would they make it to their next port before the Dragons must be fed again?

Upon the sixth night, in the dark, Gruum found his lord half-slumped over the rail, one hand clutching the pommel of Succor.

“Are you well, milord?” asked Gruum quietly.

“You know I’m not. This blade—and its twin—they beg me to wield them.”

“Are they ensorcelled?”

“Nay. They speak only in my mind. They speak because I give them leave to. In truth, it is not the swords that speak, but my hunger for new strength. Perhaps it is the voices of the Dragons I hear. They beg me every night to allow my swords to drink the blood of just
one more
foul soul. But I will not release the blades. I have done so too often. The crew is close to mutiny.”

“I suspect you are right about that, sire.”

“I must hold on until we reach the farthest southern ports. There they can put me off and there I can sate myself upon some deserving ogre of a man. One more day. The seventh day. We shall reach the last port soon.”

Gruum nodded, but he suspected Therian had even darker reasons for holding back. He suspected that once released in his famished state, Therian may well massacre the entire crew. He eyed his master and chewed his lips until they oozed blood. Only he had any real inkling of the battle that his master must win each night to keep them all alive.

Gruum looked up at the sails then, which still snapped in the unnaturally strong winds. If one watched closely, the glimmer of a wind spirit could be seen. The spirits would blink down at the crewmen when stared at. They could only be seen at night, and for the most part the only thing a man could see was their eyes, which were long slits of glimmering magenta.

Two hours after midnight, long before the dawn of the seventh day, Gruum’s eyes snapped open. At first, he was not sure what had awakened him. Then he heard it again. A creaking, scraping sound. The sound of a boot being dragged slowly over the splintered deck boards.

His hand slid immediately to the pommel of his knife. Hard fingers closed in a claw-like grip over his wrist.

“Milord!” he managed to get out, but then they fell upon him, and he could not make a further utterance. He suspected his throat was about to be slit. He struggled with an animal strength while blows fell upon his body and oaths and grunts of displeasure were muttered by men who received his kicks and blindly thrusting elbows.

“Where is the other?” asked a rough voice.

“He’s not here.”

“Find him, fool,” said the rough voice. Gruum now recognized the voice. It was Bolo, and he had betrayed them. The man Bolo had spoken to thumped away.

Gruum bit down on a filthy set of salt-crusted fingers. The man’s hand leapt away from his face with a curse. Gruum spoke quickly while he was able. “Bolo, I beseech thee for all our sakes, do not provoke the sorcerer.”

In the dark, a chuckle met Gruum’s words. “Let him speak, but hold him,” said the new Captain. “Your master is as weak as a bilge rat. We will not give him time to speak foul spells when we catch him.”

“One more day, Captain,” said Gruum earnestly. “One more day, and we will be off your ship. Let us go and save your crew.”

The other hesitated. The crewmen who held Gruum didn’t slacken their grip, but he felt in their silence a hint of uncertainty. None of them wished to slumber with the Dragons until the end of time.

“The sails rip further every day with his cursed winds. He is wrecking this ship and damning us all further each hour he is upon it. Even now, I feel the worm-like words you speak wriggling in my mind. You are the sorcerer’s monkey, and no doubt when we cast you over the side, you will return to your natural form.”

After that, Gruum was gagged and he couldn’t get out another word. He struggled, but they were too many and they held every limb fast.

A blade reflected in the starlight that filtered down through the cracks in the deck above. Gruum watched as the short line of metal came close to his face.

“Let me end it now, Captain,” said the crewman with the knife in Gruum’s face.

“No, we must find the sorcerer first. Perhaps, if needed, we can bargain with this imp’s life.”

Thumping boots returned to the cabin. “Sir, the sorcerer climbs into the rigging. He is up amongst the strange spirits that haunt the ship’s sails!”

“How did he—?” began Bolo.

“It was the cabin boy, sir. I found him helping him, giving the demon a leg up.”

Bolo loosed a stream of curses. “Let’s go up. Bring the imp with us.”

Gruum was marched up into the starlight. He realized, as he was roughly hustled into the open night air, that it was not only starlight that lit the scene. Overhead, like a celestial shower, the wind spirits moved and shimmered. They looked like soap bubbles, perhaps, bubbles that shown with inner light and twisted into alien shapes. Magenta eyes shown brightly, gazing down upon them. What had Therian done? And where was he?

The ship’s sails no longer luffed and snapped with unnatural winds. Instead, the winds seemed to swirl around the ship in a circular fashion, pushing it nowhere and everywhere at once.

“Devil!” shouted Bolo, holding aloft his cutlass of dark, rusty iron. “Come down and face an honest man’s blade.”

An odd laugh floated down from above them. Gruum thought it might be Therian’s throat that had made the laugh, but he could not be sure. The swirling winds of the spirits that circled the ship masked and warped the sound of it.

“Crossbows,” growled Bolo. “Shoot him down.”

Soon, three men stood on the deck and wound back their winches with grim purpose. Gruum thought them brave indeed to stand in the face of sorcery. Perhaps they’d grown accustomed to it over the last week. Perhaps they believed the wind spirits were frightening but harmless. Gruum himself was not so sure.

When attention strayed from him, he tried to slide a hand to a dirk he had tucked into his tunic. But the men who still held him tightened their grips. Realizing their mistake, they bound his hands behind his back.

“Captain, I beseech you one more time,” said Gruum urgently.

Bolo’s eyes turned to him. Gruum saw there, that despite all his outward appearance of firm command, the Captain was afraid. He did not know what steps he should take.

“He’s a
King
,” Gruum hissed.

“That pale devil?”

“Yes. Imagine the ransom!”

Bolo stared back, more uncertain than ever. But then the crossbows were ready. “He mocks me on my own ship’s deck. He has cursed this vessel and all who sail upon her. His spirits shred the sails further with each day we travel toward the ends of the Earth. I must get him off my ship.”

Bolo waved to the three crewmen with crossbows. They snapped bolts up into the rigging. For a moment, there was no reaction, then a body sailed down out of the night above. It thumped down on the deck, like a slab of meat dropped by a butcher.

The men gathered around the corpse. A crossbow bolt sprouted from the man’s back.

“I know that headscarf,” said one of them. They rolled the man over, so his face could be seen. The cabin boy held up a lantern.

“It’s Abaras. We shot Abaras.”

“No,” said Bolo, kneeling and closing the eyes with his fingers. “The corpse is cold. It has been dead, perhaps for hours. Look at the sunken face. The sorcerer has consumed him.”

Bolo straightened again. His face was full of cold fury. Every glittering eye watched him closely.

“I will not have this devil on my ship for one minute more,” he said. He placed the tip of his cutlass at the cabin boy’s throat. “You helped this monster up into the rigging. You are a traitor, and Abaras’ blood is on your head. You are the sorcerer’s creature.”

The cabin boy’s eyes were impossibly wide. By the light of the flickering lantern he held, and the strange, eldritch light coming from the wind spirits that floated above, everyone watched the tip of Bolo’s sword.

A second resounding thump struck the deck boards. This time, however, the man who fell landed on his feet. Everyone heard the jingling of the man’s chainmail shirt. He stepped forward into the circle of yellow light. Therian’s face was recognized by everyone, but tonight it held a new vigor and intensity of aspect. In each hand a sword flashed. Therian held his blades low, but ready. He approached the group slowly, watchfully.

“Do not slay the boy on my account,” he said softly.

Bolo kept the tip of his cutlass on the cabin boy’s throat. “You must leave my ship. You and this monkey of a man who serves you,” he said, indicating Gruum with a crooked finger.

“Wait another dozen hours,” said Therian calmly. “We should reach our port by then.”

Bolo looked down at the dead, slack face of Abaras. His lips pulled away from his face. “Why? Will that be time enough for you to slay us all?”

“If need be,” said Therian. The shining blades of his twin swords twitched upward. The crewmen who circled around regripped their weapons in response.

Bolo made his decision then. Gruum could see it in his eyes. So could everyone aboard the
Innsmouth
. He raised his cutlass and smashed it down upon the cabin boy’s upturned face. The boy’s angled teeth were broken, his face bled freely. He fell to his knees, choking. Quickly, the lad slumped on the deck.

Bolo then turned his attention back to Gruum. “Throw the sorcerer’s monkey overboard. You may join him, devil-king, or you may die on my decks.”

“You have chosen an unwise path,” said Therian in a cold voice.

Gruum saw little of the fight that followed. Blades flashed and flickered. Men growled and screamed. Therian backed to the rails and held Succor high to catch the weapons that slashed out to taste his flesh. He kept Seeker in a low grip, and snaked it outward with blinding speed when the body of a sailor came within reach. It dipped into the thigh of a man who shuffled close. The man had been quaking with fear and snarling all at the same time. The snarling turned to howls of agony. Another man with a boathook sought to catch Therian with the tip of his weapon. Instead, his weapon was caught by the flashing curves of Succor. He was dragged close and Seeker stabbed between his ribs.

But there were too many, and their rage and their weight of numbers pressed Therian back. Gruum did not see the finish of the battle. An oaf of a man fell back, arms pin wheeling, eyes protruding in shock. The oaf’s slashed-open face fountained blood onto the deck. He stumbled into Gruum and knocked him overboard.

In an instant, Gruum’s world turned dark, cold and quiet.