The Forgotten War (166 page)

‘Any guesses who?’ Whitey wondered.

‘That is what we are about to find out. We call those stones The Sentinels in our legends and it means that the lake itself is very near.’

Whitey realised talking was helping his nerves. He decided to ask something else. ‘Your tales of the lake. Just how big do they say it is?’

Cygan steered his boat towards the right fork of the river. ‘Huge. The biggest lake in the Marsh. A short channel from it leads into the sea but even when we get to the lake that channel
will still be some two days from us. It is almost as broad as it is long and is surrounded by great flaming pits of tar. We should start to see some of them shortly.’

Whitey could think of nothing else to ask and soon drifted back into gloomy introspection. He felt guilty about Sperrish. His insect bites were itching and right now his flea-ridden hovel in
Sketta had never seemed more attractive.

The two forks of the river rejoined each other and for a while the channel narrowed. It was here that Whitey soon saw signs of the tar pits Cygan had mentioned. The riverbanks here had little
vegetation, occasional clumps of yellow grass or thorny bushes dotting the walls of bare mud, but behind them he could see steam rising into the high mist and occasional tongues of licking flame.
Now and then a jet of fire would leap skywards causing the rowers to exclaim loudly. The air became warm, moist and sulphurous, a rotten smell that caused Whitey to spit into the river in disgust.
He kept his head down and concentrated on his paddling.

When he looked up again he started in shock. He could barely see either side of the river through the still mist; he could only tell for certain that they were there when a sudden tongue of
flame illuminated the dark smudges of the distant bank. Here the mist and the steam meshed, together forming an impenetrable shroud that made it impossible to see too far in any direction. Apart
from the lapping water there was no sound; something about this place seemed to suck all noise from the surroundings – no water fowl were swimming on the water, no birds flew overhead. There
was nothing; this place was a desert.

‘We will be on the lake very soon, I guess.’ Whitey’s voice sounded like an intrusion.

‘Barris,’ Cygan replied acerbically. ‘We are already here.’

‘Shit,’ said Whitey, shocked. ‘That’s why the banks have gone. I thought it was just that the river was wide here.’

‘So wide it has become a lake.’

‘Oh yes.’ Whitey felt like a complete idiot. ‘What happens now?’

‘There should be an island close by; we will moor there. Terath has a ritual to perform, one that should attract Ventekuu and the Malaac, although I imagine we have already been noticed.
No one ever comes here after all; this is a place of dread to us, true dread.’

Whitey was not heartened. He looked around him to see all the other boatmen looking nervously over the water as if expecting the dark heads of the Malaac to pop up at any moment. He soon found
himself doing exactly the same. The current had slowed to a crawl and soon everyone was having to invest their energies in propelling their vessels forward as quickly as possible, Whitey was soon
bathed in sweat, which the heavy cloying air did nothing to alleviate. Much more of this and soon none of them would be up to much of a fight.

But none of them had to wait long. Cygan was the first to see it, his call attracting everyone’s attention. Whitey looked up as the mist receded before him.

It was a low island, clearing the water line by just a couple of feet, even at its highest point. Low and broad, little more than a great sand bar pushing out of the great, grey morass that now
stretched as far as the eye could see in all directions. It looked treacherous underfoot and hard to defend, but Cygan and the Marsh Men headed there anyway. The boats were hauled out of the water
and placed together at the isle’s centre. As Whitey suspected, the sand on which they stood was not too firm; water rose to the surface and pooled around his boot every time he set his foot
down. He decided to complain to Cygan about it; he had not complained for a while and so felt it incumbent on him to do so.

‘We have no choice,’ Cygan told him. ‘All the islands on the lake are like this, all except the isle at the centre, the pupil of the eye, the one that gives the lake its
name.’

‘Then why don’t we go there?’ said Whitey encouraged.

‘Two reasons, my friend. The first is that we would have to row through the night to get there and I don’t think any of us really want to do that. The second is that it is supposedly
an island of mud surrounded by rocks with a great cave at its centre. And in that cave, according to the legends, lives Ventekuu. I think we would all rather lure her here than fight her in her
home.’

Whitey nodded, realising that where they were now was where they were going to remain until this whole nightmare was over. ‘What now then?’ he asked miserably.

‘We form a circle of bows and spears. At its centre will be the men who will use the slings to bring down the controller of the dragon. All we do now is wait for Terath to perform his
ceremony. And then ... well, we just wait. You may wish to tell your men of the north what will happen. I have not told them yet.’

Whitey did as Cygan asked, then returned to the Marsh Man who stood with the boats and Terath and Dirthen. The two elves were talking animatedly in their own language, Dirthen was holding some
sort of shallow bowl in both hands and it was this that was the focus of their discussion.

‘So you will be using that for your ritual?’ Cygan interrupted.

‘Yes,’ said Terath. ‘We are just trying to recall the exact components we should be using. If we get it right, it should cause a flame to rise that approximates dragon’s
breath with regard to the fumes it releases. The dragon here should smell it and think a rival has moved into the lake. That should bring it here pretty quickly. It and its symbiote.’

‘Symbiote?’ asked Whitey bemusedly.

‘Its human controller. Or rather the human that is trying to control it.’

Terath saw the puzzled looks from his audience and continued.

‘Cygan, you yourself saw the creature elsewhere, attacking another village. It has definitely left the lake and travelled, yet now it has returned here. Certainly we have defeated its
thralls, the beasts you call the Malaac, yet the battles have got easier as we have travelled; it is almost as if they have all been recalled here.

‘What I think is happening here is a struggle, a battle of wills, one that could take years to resolve. A man took a dragonstone and tried to use it to control the creature that sleeps
here in this lake, but it is never as easy as that, for the dragon has its own mind and it does not take kindly to any attempts to coerce it. At first, I think the man had the advantage, for your
lands were ravaged and the dragon roamed far and wide. It actually left its domain and roamed, a wonderful thing indeed for a beast that can sleep for millennia. But I think the tide has turned
– the dragon has resisted and called its creatures home. Whatever strange and destructive purpose this man had in reviving such a creature, well his intent has been thwarted, at least for
now.’

‘So why don’t we just go and leave it here, if it has won?’ Hope rose in Whitey’s breast, even though he knew it would be extinguished again pretty quickly.

‘Because,’ said Terath, warming to his subject, ‘it is a battle that could take years, swinging one way then another. This man will not take defeat easily; he will be
attempting to wrest control of the creature even as we speak. Give it a month or two and the Malaac will in all likelihood return to your lands. It is all written here.’ Terath pulled the
dragon’s tooth from its home in a leather pouch he wore at his belt. ‘This is an ancient record of what these dragonstones can do, and of what they cannot. I finally finished
translating all of it not one week ago. An elf or man can enter into a pact with a dragon through this stone. The two beings then become joined, they need each other. If somehow they are separated,
it could prove fatal to them both. Also, once the link has been established, both creatures change – the mind of the dragon becomes receptive to elven or human thought and emotion, and in
turn the human will change physically taking on some of the characteristics of the dragon.’

‘The man changes?’ Cygan sounded horrified.

‘Yes, the degree of change is dependent on who the dominant creature is and also the nature of the initial connection. If when both minds are first joined, one tries to dominate the other,
then the loser will change to a far greater degree. If the connection is made in friendship, or curiosity, then the changes are less pronounced. Ultimately, it is the dominant creature that changes
the least; in fact, if one creature has total mastery over the other, then any changes can be reversed and they may end up almost as how they were at the outset. This fellow, I fear, has done
everything wrong and will barely pass for human anymore.’

‘That is disgusting,’ said Whitey distastefully. ‘Why would anyone want to do such a thing?’

‘In ancient times’ – Terath took the bowl off Dirthen and started to empty components into it from the myriad small pouches in his cloak – ‘when my people invented
and mastered the stones their purpose was religious. We used to worship dragons as the eldest race and to bond with one was to make one as good as divine. Now, why a man would want to do the same,
I do not know. I would imagine the acquisition of power may have something to do with it.’

Well, we have to make sure he never attains any. We kill him and destroy the stone so it cannot be used again,’ said Cygan.

‘Do not worry on that score.’ Terath continued to fuss over the bowl. ‘Stones can only be used once; thereafter they are drained of power. My concern is that this is but one of
two stones that have been revived of late. The second is to the west of the country of Tanaren. It is something I have to attend to once the beast here is defeated.’

‘Another one!’ said Cygan drily. ‘Rather you than me, my friend. As for this creature, this human, the lime will kill him, I trust?’

‘It should; it is described as the opposite force to water. We just need to get enough of the stuff on him to do the damage required. When he dies, the dragon will be freed and probably no
longer have an interest in us. Probably.’

Whitey watched the two elves at work. Once the bowl had been filled with various powders in different quantities and colours, Terath took out a couple of small flasks, unstoppered the first and
poured a reasonable quantity of a clear liquid into the bowl, causing its contents to hiss and spit. Then he opened the second flask.

‘Dragon gall,’ he said, a touch of awe in his voice, and then poured just a couple of drops of a viscous blue-black liquid into the mix. The hissing stopped and the contents of the
bowl started to rise until it was almost full of an opaque, wine-coloured fluid with the consistency of a heavy porridge. Terath seemed pleased.

‘That looks just about perfect.’ Dirthen, too, was smiling. ‘Perhaps the two of you should stand back,’ he suggested.

Whitey was happy to obey. He returned to the circle of men standing around the island’s perimeter. They were engaged in setting torches into the soft sand at regular intervals. When lit
they could be used to both deter the Malaac and ignite the last of the oil that they had brought with them. Arrows that could be ignited were also being prepared; it was a familiar routine to all
of them by now. He looked back at Terath. The bowl had been set on the ground near the boats at the island’s centre and he was standing close by reciting words in his own language. Once he
had finished, he threw some leaves into the bowl and stood back. Instantly, there was a reaction, a column of flame shot skywards, a pillar rising twenty, or even thirty, feet high, a flame the
like of which Whitey had never seen before. For it was the colour of ink. Not only that but it smelt acrid, attacking the back of Whitey’s mouth, causing him to spit. He looked around and saw
everyone else was affected equally. Cygan came over to him.

‘Apparently this is what the breath of Ventekuu is like. Terath advises that we soak some cloth in water and put it over our nose and mouth. I will go and tell everyone.’

Soon afterwards everyone was holding a cloth to their faces. It did help, partly, but the smell was soon absorbed into their clothes and nothing could stop their eyes from watering. Cygan went
to help the sling-armed warriors unload their clay flasks filled with burning lime. It was the duty of the other men to screen them so that they could go about their work unmolested, for they had
the most important job of all. Fasneterax, who led them, was unloading a couple of small barrels of lime, the reserve stock in case the flasks were not enough.

‘So you are going to skulk behind everyone and throw your little pebbles,’ Cygan joked. As ever, though, Fasneterax was not in a frivolous mood.

‘I wish I was not,’ he grumbled. ‘I would much rather kill these things face to face than do this.’

‘You are a deadly shot with the sling. I have lost count of the number of birds you have brought down with one. You are here because you are the best. Besides, you will have the honour of
bringing down this man who has turned the spirits against us.’

‘I do not want honour or glory. I just want this thing to die so that I can go home, to what is left of my family.’

‘As do I,’ Cygan concurred. ‘Though I have never lost a child.’

‘You cannot imagine,’ Fasneterax said, staring stonily out over the lake, ‘what it is like, having to stay strong for your wife and other children after your heart has been
dashed into a thousand pieces. I left with you to visit the Twin Snake because I could not face them; I could not look into Shettevellanda’s eyes and be the strong man that she needed me to
be. That is why I ran. I would have been happy to die on that trip, yet the Gods spared me; I do not know why.’

‘Perhaps,’ Cygan suggested, ‘she would have been happy with your grief if you had just shared it with her. Maybe you could have helped each other in some way.’