Dirge for a Necromancer (24 page)

Dohrleht seemed about to argue, but the sound of hooves on the stairs behind him caught his attention. He turned around and said down the stairs, “Daeblau—I was just talking with Raettonus.”

The hoofbeats stopped. Raettonus peered around Dohrleht into the stairwell, but couldn’t see anything through the shadows. After a long moment, the hoofbeats began again and Daeblau appeared on the stairs, wreathed in darkness. “Good night, Magician,” he said with a thin smile. “I’m surprised to see you still up.”

“I could say the same.” Raettonus nodded toward the stairs. “Have some business down in the basement levels?” he asked.

“I was checking supplies,” Daeblau said, his smile plastered in place. He came to stand beside Dohrleht, taking one of the young centaur’s hands in his own.

“I’ll bet,” said Raettonus. There was a thin, fresh cut on Daeblau’s forearm, alongside a number of red scratches that hadn’t broken the skin. “Looks like the supplies fought back, huh?”

Daeblau followed Raettonus’ gaze to his arm and turned it away. “I tripped,” he said. “It’s rather embarrassing. I suppose I’m just tired and clumsy. I think I’ll head to bed now.” He kissed Dohrleht and turned back down the stairs.

Dohrleht stood awkwardly at the top of the stairs, watching Raettonus after Daeblau disappeared back into the gloom. Raettonus cocked one eyebrow. “You’re not going with him?” he asked.

“Oh, no,” said Dohrleht. “I was planning on staying here a bit longer and, um, looking at the paintings in the hall.”

“In the dark?”

“I’ve got very good night vision,” insisted the centaur.

“Well, then, good luck with that. Try to get some sleep soon though,” said Raettonus.

“I will.”

“Good night,” said Raettonus, and he withdrew from the corridor and continued on his way back to his chambers.

* * *

In his room, Raettonus laid with his face half buried in his pillow and drifted into a fitful sleep. He dreamed of famine and plague and war. He dreamed he was a child again, and Slade was leaving him behind for a place Raettonus couldn’t fathom. He begged and begged not to be left, but Slade couldn’t hear him. He grabbed hold of Slade’s sleeve, and the man turned and looked at him. Smiling kindly, Slade pushed him harshly away. He cried out for Slade to wait, but still he went unheard. Slade was getting farther and farther away, and Raettonus found it impossible to follow him. He tried to call for him again, but he had no voice. Still soundlessly crying out, he watched Slade meet up with a woman dressed all in black. Slade took the woman by the arm, and she laughed at something Raettonus couldn’t hear Slade say, and they walked together into the distance.

“Don’t go with her!” Raettonus tried to tell him, but nothing would come out of his mouth. A wind began to howl as Slade and the woman disappeared on the horizon. It seemed to carry Raettonus away from that place, and he found himself at a feast.

The hall was dark, lit by a single red candle in front of him. A heavy stench hung in the air—the smell of rot. He could hear a great number of flies buzzing around himself and the other guests, and one landed on his cheek. He swatted it away irritably and turned to see who was seated beside him, but the shadows were so heavy he couldn’t see the faces of the guests to his left and right. He could barely make out their outlines in the darkness as they slowly ate, silent but for the sounds of their utensils clattering against their plates. Raettonus turned his face toward his own plate and found it cracked and empty. His wine glass had a tiny hole in it, and red wine was dribbling slowly out of it, staining the tablecloth at its base.

He turned his eyes up and looked beyond the candle to the other side of the table, only to find it—predictably—obscured by gloom. A pair of glowing yellow eyes appeared in the dimness and gazed at him. “Kimohr Raulinn,” he said, recognizing them immediately.

“Hello, Raettonus,” purred Kimohr Raulinn, his eyes half closing. If Raettonus concentrated hard, he could just make out the god’s outline, but the only thing that came close to actually being visible were his glowing eyes.

“Where am I?” asked Raettonus. It didn’t feel like Kimohr Raulinn’s temple, which had always been lit inside and had never smelled so bad. There was none of the familiar scent of flower oils, which had been the main aroma in the temple. Instead, the pungent scent of decay of this place was beginning to sting Raettonus’ eyes.

“In a dream.”

Raettonus could feel Kimohr Raulinn’s smile through the blackness even if he couldn’t see it. His tone seemed to smile. Raettonus looked again to either side, where people continued to slowly and silently eat. It was strange; they’d always been alone before. “Who are they?” asked Raettonus.

“Aren’t you hungry?” asked Kimohr Raulinn, brushing off his question. “Your plate is empty. Your wine glass is leaking.”

A plate of meat was lying near him on the table and he wondered how he hadn’t noticed it before now. Flies were swarming about it in heavy clouds, and the rancid smell seemed to be coming chiefly from it. “It’s spoilt,” Raettonus said. He reached out and took up his wineglass in his hand and brought it to his lips only to find the smell of it was all wrong. “This isn’t wine.”

“Sure it is. Drink it.”

“This is blood.”

“Does that bother you?” asked Kimohr Raulinn. “Go on. Drink it.”

And Raettonus did.

The smell of decay was getting heavier and heavier. Between it and the taste of warm blood in his mouth and running down his throat, Raettonus was beginning to gag. A fly landed on him and he swatted it away. “Where are we?” he asked again.

“In a dream.” The eyes bobbed in the darkness as Kimohr Raulinn leaned forward. The light from the candle reached toward him, but it couldn’t quite close the gap. Instead, it just barely showed his mask, outlined against an abyss of blackness.

Raettonus glanced again toward the person beside him. If the stranger noticed, he gave no sign. “Why is no one speaking?” asked Raettonus.

“You already know the answer to that,” said Kimohr Raulinn.

“Why’s it so dark?”

“You have a candle,” said Kimohr Raulinn. He turned his gaze on the flickering flame. “You could make it brighter.”

“I could,” said Raettonus. The thought hadn’t occurred to him, but it seemed like a solid idea. He reached out toward the dancing fire only to find there were now two candles before him. He reached out toward the second candle, only to find a third lit a little way away from it. As he turned his attention toward this new candle, another one down the table lit, and then another; spontaneously, candles all along the table burst into flame.

By their light, he could see the food on the table, all covered with flies and teeming with maggots. Everything was green and rotting, and all the pitchers were cracked and leaking blood. The tablecloth was stained red and green and gray. Swarms of mice chewed at the festering carcasses laid upon the tarnished dishes. Farther down, Raettonus caught sight of some rats, and his stomach rolled over and filled with dread. Near him—near enough he could brush it with his fingertips if only he reached out his hand—a tray of something sat quivering as if it were alive. The putrid food on the tray burst open, and maggots surged out of it by the thousands and began to march across the tablecloth, a disgusting, ravenous army of devourers.

And there in the seats all around him, corpses with their skin sloughing off in great, wet chunks were silently staring down at empty plates, pantomiming eating or drinking. To either side of Raettonus, the corpses were dried and eyeless, with thin, greasy hair and bare, yellow teeth. He looked across the table at Kimohr Raulinn and found that beneath his mask he too, was a corpse with pale, blue-tinged skin that looked as though he’d been a long time under water. His drowned flesh made Raettonus’ bowels turn over in revulsion.

“What is this?” demanded Raettonus, unable to keep the alarm out of his voice.

“A dream,” said Kimohr Raulinn. When he spoke, his lips moved stiffly and unnaturally. Raettonus felt his stomach clench and turn. “But, happily for you, it’s not that kind of dream.”

A horn was blowing hard somewhere beyond the feast hall. “What’s that?” Raettonus asked, peering upward into the still-thick shade all around them.

“A death sentence,” Kimohr Raulinn told him. “But not yours. Stay awhile longer. You haven’t eaten.”

“I don’t want to eat,” Raettonus said. The horn blew again, and he stood up. “They’re calling me.”

“Stay,” said Kimohr Raulinn, grabbing Raettonus’ hand. His flesh was cold and clammy—not at all as Raettonus had known it. “Everyone’s here. We’ve been waiting for you, Raettonus. Everyone’s been waiting for you. We’ve been waiting so very long…”

“Let me go,” said Raettonus, tugging away, but Kimohr Raulinn held tight. The magician reached up with his free hand to shoot a fireball at the god, but nothing came. “Let go!”

Kimohr Raulinn’s cracked blue lips, once so soft and warm, pulled back into a sneer. “We’ve been waiting for you,” he said.

The horn blew again, louder.

Raettonus’ eyes shot open, and he found himself in his bed, all in darkness aside from the soft glowing of his own flesh. His pillow was wet with sweat, and his cropped blonde hair was matted and sticking to his forehead. His heart thumped so wildly his chest hurt. The details of his dream became hazy as he thought about them, but he didn’t particularly care. Now he was awake, however, he was certain he had dreamed a normal dream—nothing more.

Outside his door hooves were pounding on stone—hundreds of hooves, beating like hearts against the cold stone passages of the citadel. Beyond the sound of that he could have sworn he heard the faint, dying clicks of a lonely clock.

The horn blew again somewhere above him.

War was upon them.

Chapter Sixteen

Dawn was breaking by the time Raettonus got onto the battlements. Centaurs in plate and scale mail were bustling about, maneuvering the catapults and ballistae into place. Diahsis was up on the roof, directing the action and looking very much like he hadn’t slept at all the night before. When he spotted Raettonus, he came jogging over. “Thank the gods you’re here,” he said.

“Thank them? The gods got us into this mess,” Raettonus said.

“There are a lot more of them than we thought,” continued Diahsis without pause. “They’ve got trebuchets, and they keep—”

He was cut off as a large rock slammed into the metal cage atop the citadel, causing the roof to quake and the iron spikes to reverberate as the rock rolled down off it. “Christ,” said Raettonus, covering his ears from the sound.

“Yes, that,” said Diahsis. “Could you get rid of those for us? Those iron rods extend quite a way into the wall, so they’re not in danger of giving out, I think, but it’s making it really hard to concentrate.”

Another rock crashed into the metal, shattering and spewing dust and pebbles all over them. A larger chunk hit a soldier, who cried out and fell to the ground. “You’ve got it,” said Raettonus, running his hand through his hair to get the dirt out. He hurried back inside and met Brecan coming up the stairs.

“They’re here, aren’t they, Raet?” asked Brecan. His body was covered in centaurs’ armor, which left his wings and head unprotected but was, all things considered, better than nothing.

“What do you think?” said Raettonus. The walls shook as another boulder battered them. “We need to go destroy their siege machines.”

“Okay, Raet,” said Brecan. His voice wasn’t steady.

Raettonus mounted the unicorn. There was a leather pad between the metal plates for him to sit on, but it still wasn’t as comfortable as riding bareback. In any case, it was a necessary evil and better than sitting on full plate armor. Drawing his rapier, he urged Brecan down the stairs. As they made their way through the fortress, the walls shook and moaned from the impacting boulders. Beneath Raettonus, Brecan shivered.

“Come on, now,” Raettonus said, giving him a sharp pat on the side of his neck as they drew near the fissure in the outer wall of the building. “I don’t want to see you pussying out on me, do you hear?”

“Y-yes, Raet. Of course I won’t,” Brecan said, flattening his ears. Still, there was a quiver to his voice, and he couldn’t keep from shaking.

They flew out of the still-gaping hole on the side of the citadel, which had been repaired only on the bottom few stories. As they emerged into the early morning light, Raettonus got his first real glimpse at Cykkus’ army. His stomach shriveled inside him, and for a moment he went completely slack.

Beyond the wide trench, which had been dug and filled with pikes by Diahsis’ soldiers, a great, gray mass punctuated by enormous trebuchets sat hunched on the mountainside, spilling over onto the neighboring mountains. Lipless, dead-eyed, goblin-like creatures all in chain mail stood with pikes and axes, their terrible, metal teeth glinting in the dawn light. Some of the gray-skinned abassy were astride armored rats larger than draft horses, which made Raettonus blanch and feel faint. Enormous maggots—at least twenty feet long—were also in attendance, armored and saddled with the supplies, but nothing was more horrible to Raettonus than the rats. A regiment of abassy lifted their empty arms and pantomimed pulling back on bowstrings. They released, and arrows of black miasma shot upward from the air before them, arching up toward Kaebha’s walls.

“There’s so many of them,” said Brecan, gliding along the outskirts of the army. He was noticed by a couple of abassy, and they lifted their hands at him. Ethereal black arrows whizzed up at him, and he had to bank hard to the side in order to avoid being pierced by them.

Seven massive trebuchets were placed on the frontlines of the army. With a loud twang, the arm of one of them shot forward, loosing a boulder on the citadel. It struck against the wall, cracking the stone.

“Over there—quickly,” said Raettonus into Brecan’s ear.

The unicorn darted through the air toward the trebuchets. Raettonus gripped tight to his mane with his free hand. Fire danced across Raettonus’ shoulders onto the blade clenched tightly in his right hand. Brecan rolled out of the way of another barrage of arrows. One of the maggots hissed and reared at them, a stream of liquid squirting from its mouth. Brecan slowed suddenly to avoid the acidic stream, unsteadying Raettonus. He began to slip from the unicorn’s back, and his stomach tightened into a nauseous ball. Throwing his arm around Brecan’s throat, he managed to catch himself. Brecan sped up again as the colossal maggot shot another excretion at them.

Arrows hurtled through the air around them. A few struck the plates of Brecan’s armor, leaving black marks behind as they evaporated on the metal. One of the arrows grazed Raettonus’ arm, leaving behind the most horrible pain he’d ever felt. It was as though every nerve in the entirety of his body was screaming in agony, like his muscles had suddenly shriveled up and were torn away. He could feel poison coursing through the veins of his arm. There would be time to worry about that later though.

Brecan swooped low, near the trebuchets. Blood oozing down his arm, Raettonus swung his sword at one of the devices. A crescent-shaped blast of fire erupted from the blade. It sliced through the trebuchet’s arm, leaving the wood charred and burning in its wake. The blast of fire was far smaller than he might’ve expected had he not wasted so much energy saving Diahsis. Raettonus winced and gritted his teeth as a horrifying pain shot through his bones. Dodging more arrows, Brecan carried him swiftly to the next trebuchet.

He struck it down in the same manner as the first. Blue veins were beginning to appear around his wound. He took a deep breath and tried to focus on the cold poison in his blood. The injury began to sizzle and bubble as fire filled his veins—the wonderful, caring touch of fire inside of him.

Raettonus was beginning to feel lightheaded as they spun and dodged through the air. Down below he could see the giant rats watching him with their beady eyes, which only aggravated the feeling. He swung his sword at the third trebuchet as Brecan bucked up to avoid another hail of miasmic arrows. Raettonus’ flames missed and scorched the ground instead. He tried again and managed to hit it, sending the burning arm crashing down atop a rat and its rider.

“Raet, are you okay?” Brecan asked as the man swayed on top of him.

“Fine,” said Raettonus. He dug his knees into Brecan’s armored sides. “The next one. Hurry.”

Brecan leaned forward and, with a powerful flap of his wings, started for the trebuchet. A barrage of arrows passed in front of him. The unicorn spun in the air to avoid them. Everything went blurry for Raettonus, and he lost his grip. He crashed hard into the flaming wreckage of a trebuchet. He stumbled to his feet, abassy closing in on him from all sides. The monsters slowly circled him, their eyes like little black holes sucking the light out of the air. He held his rapier up before him and took a defensive stance. In the morning’s yellow light, the bare teeth of the abassy glinted dangerously. They were watching him with blank, black eyes. They were searching for an opening. They were waiting for him to make the first move.

Could they even be killed?

The moment seemed to hold forever. They watched him cautiously, as though unsure what to make of him. He stared back, unsure how to fight them. The abassy circled as he held his thin blade before himself.

The moment broke.

One of the monsters lunged at him spear first. He parried the weapon sloppily and gave the abassy a kick behind its knees, knocking it down. The others had been emboldened by the first, however, and were swarming toward Raettonus from all sides. He swung his sword, sending a fiery crescent cascading into the abassy soldiers in front of him. The abassy he knocked down was getting to its feet. He drove his rapier into its cheek and then its eye. It stayed down. Several abassy behind him surged forward, grabbing hold of him with their clammy, poisonous hands. Fire burst to life all along Raettonus’ flesh, and the abassy relinquished their hold. They hissed and struck at him with their lances. Raettonus parried a few of their blows and dodged out of the way of quite a few more. Some of the sharp points glanced off him, leaving red, bloody trails across his flesh. A couple struck true and hard, impaling his arms and belly.

Everything went white for a moment as pain shot through him. One of the abassy jerked its weapon to the side, and Raettonus’ arm went with it, twisting in a sick, unnatural way. Raettonus cried out. Tears of agony sprung to his eyes, helping the pain to blind him. With a burst of effort, he intensified the fire on his body. The tears in his eyes turned to steam, and the wooden lances stuck through him turned to charcoal and shattered to dust. He struck out with his rapier in all directions. For a little while, at least, he could ignore the pain.

And then Brecan was there, dropping out of the sky, all fangs and white-hot fury. He bowled over a pair of abassy, their ribs crushing beneath his weight. He lashed out with his long tail. The red arrow at its tip caught an abassy in the face and tore its cheek open to the bone. One of the abassy tried to stab him, but the unicorn dodged nimbly. With a quick strike of his hoof, he broke the spear shaft into splinters. He leapt forward and struck with his other hoof, knocking a hole in the abassy’s skull.

He growled deep in his throat and a few of the abassy skittered back, away from him. “Get on, Raet—we need to get back,” said Brecan, never taking his pale eyes from the abassy. Clumsily, Raettonus mounted. Blood spilled from his wounds, pouring down Brecan’s plate mail.

The unicorn kicked his back legs out at an abassy that tried to sneak up on them. His lion’s paws struck it in the throat, claws tearing through the tissue. Brecan leapt forward, knocking another abassy down. Beneath the unicorn’s bulk, its chest turned to pulp encased in chain mail. With a fierce roar, Brecan took to the air.

“The next trebuchet,” said Raettonus.

Brecan flattened his ears. “No,” he said. “You need to go to the infirmary now. Leave it for later.”

Raettonus tried to argue, but instead he slumped forward and threw up. Between the blood loss, the fight, and the poisoning, he had overexerted himself.

Ducking out of the way of more arrows, Brecan made it back to the citadel. By the time he reached the infirmary however, Raettonus had already passed out.

* * *

The Magician Raettonus came around from a restless sleep sometime during the night and was confused at first as to where he was. With difficulty he cast aside the cold, white sheets and sat up in the bloodstained bed. By the moonlight flitting in through the windows he saw many of the other beds were occupied by bruised, unconscious centaurs. He supposed they’d been struck by debris from the boulders the abassy had been hurling.

“You should lay back down, Magician,” said a timid voice beside him. He looked up to see Ebha standing at his bedside. There were bags under her eyes, and her plump face wore an expression of subdued concern.

He waved her off. “I’m fine,” he said. “Where’s Sir Slade? And the boys?”

“The boys are sleeping before their next shift. Sir Slade is helping the archers on the roof,” she said. He tried to stand, and she put a firm hand on his shoulder. “He said if you woke up to tell you not to worry about him and to get some rest.”

Raettonus lay back down. “How’s the fight going?” he asked.

“I wouldn’t know,” she said. “There haven’t been any hits from those rocks in a few hours. That’s all I know.” The woman poured some tea and held it out to Raettonus. “Here, drink this.”

“What is it?” said Raettonus, taking it. It smelled bitter.

“It’s for the pain, and to help you sleep,” answered Ebha.

“I’m not in any pain and I don’t want to sleep,” Raettonus said. He thrust it back at her. “Bring me my clothes. I’m going up onto the battlements.”

Frowning, Ebha took the tea. “Yes, Magician,” she said, and started away.

His body ached to the bones but had been more than competently patched up. All his wounds had been sewed up and rubbed with medicine and bandaged, and the deeper injuries, such as the impalements of his intestines, had been healed magically—Sir Slade’s doing, he supposed. Even so, he still felt like shit. His bowels felt like they were filled with water, and it seemed to him like each breath was an unnatural labor. After a while, Ebha returned with a clean white tunic and hose. “Those aren’t the clothes I was wearing,” Raettonus said, scowling. “I don’t want those ones.”

“You had to be cut out of your clothes so we could get to your injuries,” she said. “My apologies.”

“Fine, give them here.”

He got dressed as quickly as his still-fresh wounds would allow and then, slipping his rapier into the belt, he started for the roof. Braziers were burning all atop the citadel to give the soldiers light where they knelt behind the parapets, bows in hand. By the pulsing blue light far off in the mountains, their enemy was visible far below, huddled at the edge of the trench they had made. Without a doubt, they were building a means to cross the chasm, far out of the range of Diahsis’ bowmen and catapults.

There was no hope.

“Loose!” shouted a commander. With a loud twang, the centaurs let go their bowstrings, and their arrows wobbled and arched through the sky, landing with a clatter on the shields of the abassy. Among the arrows, something shimmered, and when it hit on a shield, it punched through the wood and metal and exploded in bright light. Raettonus started purposefully toward where he guessed it had originated and found Slade there, crouched behind the parapets with centaurs to either side. Sir Slade was not a small man, but beside the massive centaurs, he looked like a child playing at soldier. Even with his stunning black and red painted armor, Sir Slade looked tiny and out of place beside the brute beasts.

“Master,” said Raettonus as he neared, and Slade turned and lifted the visor of his helm.