The Dark Remains (41 page)

“There were no men in Falengarth then, save the Maugrim, who were not like the men of today. The Maugrim lived in the forests, wearing the skins of animals, making their homes in caves, and hunting with knives of stone, for, like the Little People, the Maugrim could not bear the touch of iron.

“For eons, the Old Gods were the mightiest beings in all of Falengarth: Olrig One-Eye, Ysani of the Meeting of Ways, Durnach the Smith. And Mohg, Lord of Nightfall, who was stronger than all but Olrig when the sun slipped beneath the edge of the world and the day died.”

“So even then he was wicked,” Aryn said.

“No,” Melia countered. “There is no evil inherent in the night. Only what men and gods would bring there.”

Falken nodded. “Melia’s right. But then, more than a thousand years ago, things began to change. While only the Maugrim dwelled in Falengarth, for eons men had dwelled in Moringarth, the great, hot land south of the Summer Sea. The Old Gods never ventured to Moringarth, preferring the cool, moist forests of the north, and so the shining cities of men did not trouble them.

“But there came a great conflagration in the south, and many men fled north across the sea to Falengarth. There they founded many cities, including one that, in time, would become the greatest city in the world.”

“Tarras,” Lirith murmured.

“That’s right,” Falken said. “Now, the founding of Tarras and the other cities along the south of Falengarth sent a tremor through the Old Gods and the Little People like a wind through a forest. They did not understand these people who came across the sea in red-sailed ships, who piled
stone into high towers and worked bright metal into sharp swords. But it was not just iron that men brought across the sea. For they brought their gods as well—strange, new gods.”

Melia folded her arms. “I resent that, Falken. We are
not
strange. Nor are we particularly new.”

“And yet the Old Gods are more ancient still,” Falken said. “They were deities of forest, stone, water, and sky, called into being by the runes spoken by the Worldsmith as were all the things on Eldh. However, the New Gods of Tarras were different. The Nindari were gods of men, granted their godhood by the belief of their worshipers, and their birth was a mystery. League by league, the men of Tarras pushed farther north, bringing their gods with them, and the Old Gods sensed that their days upon Falengarth were waning. One by one, along with the Little People, they began to fade into the Twilight Realm, the land that is no land, which is everywhere and nowhere at once.

“However, there was one among the Old Gods who refused to fade into the Twilight Realm. The sight of men marching into Falengarth filled him with a burning rage, and he accused Olrig, leader of the Old Gods, of treachery and cowardice for his unwillingness to fight.”

“And this god,” Durge said, “it was Mohg?”

Falken nodded. “And in his words, the other Old Gods sensed at last the ancient jealousy Mohg harbored for Olrig. Mohg felt that he should be leader of the Old Gods, but they turned their back on him. Yet that only fueled Mohg’s hatred, like wind on a flame. He went in search of one who might yet help him—a dragon. Now from the beginning of the world, the dragons were ever the foes of the Old Gods, seeking to bring down and destroy everything brought into being by the Worldsmith.”

“Or Sia,” Lirith murmured. She met the bard’s eyes. “In some stories, at least.”

Falken gave her a sharp look. “Or Sia, if you will.
Mohg went to the Barrens and climbed a mountain so high it pierced the sky, a mountain which has since been cast down into rubble. The sharp stone sliced his hands and feet to ribbons, but at last, bloodied and battered, Mohg reached the top, and there he found the dragon Hriss.

“Now Hriss was a great and ancient dragon, for she was one of the brood of Agamar, who was the first of the dragons, and she was terribly wise. Like all the Gordrim, she coveted knowledge and hoarded it, and in Mohg’s coming she saw an opportunity to gain knowledge she had always craved.

“ ‘I will grant you the knowledge you require,’ Hriss told Mohg. And with her own talon she cut a deep gash in her belly, and blood flowed, and she bid Mohg drink it, which he did greedily. Her blood was hot and thick with wisdom, but even as he drank, Hriss stretched her neck so that she might reach Mohg’s body, and while he was drunk with the taste of her blood, she ate his living heart from his breast, for she had always wondered what the taste of a god’s heart would be, and at last she had that knowledge. Satisfied, she flew from the mountaintop, leaving Mohg to be picked at by vultures.

“God though he was, Mohg would have died there on the mountain but for the pity of a witch named Cirsa, who saw Mohg in a vision. Cirsa climbed the great mountain with a lump of Tarrasian iron, and this she placed in his breast, enchanting it with spells, so Mohg lived.”

Falken’s visage was grim. “To drink the blood of a dragon grants the drinker great wisdom. But the price of that wisdom is that it darkens the vision, so that never again can one see good in something, or beauty, or kindness. Rather, all the world becomes cold, hard, ugly, and cruel—a thing ceaselessly in decay. Seeing that in Mohg’s eyes, Cirsa realized what a terrible mistake she had made, but before she could undo her spell, Mohg cast her
off the side of the mountain. Such was her reward for helping him.”

Aryn clenched her left hand into a fist. “She should have cursed him.”

“And she did,” Falken said. “ ‘Love shall yet defy you!’ she cried as she fell, then she perished on sharp rocks far below. Of course, Mohg cared nothing for love now that he had a heart of iron, and so he forgot her words. And the blood-wisdom had given him what he had desired—a way to defeat the southmen and their gods.

“You see, centuries before this, the three Great Stones—the Imsari—fell to Eldh, where they were found by the dark elf Alcendifar. With his craft, the dwarf bound the powers of ice, fire, and twilight into the Stones, and then he hid them away, for he was jealous of their beauty, and he did not want the eyes of others to steal it away.

“With his new wisdom, Mohg knew that if he could gain the Imsari, he would have the power to break the First Rune, which was named Eldh, and which the Worldsmith had bound into the Dawning Stone at the beginning, so that the world would know permanence and never fade. Once he broke the First Rune, Mohg would be able to reforge Eldh in his own image, an Eldh where he was master and all others—men and gods alike—were his slaves.

“But first Mohg required servants. He knew that to fight men he needed a man of his own. Now, somewhere in the mists of time, men had come into Eldh, into the far north of the world in Toringarth. They were like the men of Moringarth, but taller, paler, and barbaric in manner.

“In the guise of an old, blind seer, Mohg went to one of the chiefs of these barbarian tribes, a man named Berash, who was as bold, arrogant, and foolish as a man could be. With sweet words and promises of power, Mohg convinced Berash to trade his living heart for one of iron, and
in so doing Berash became dread and powerful indeed—a being known ever after as the Pale King—but also Mohg’s eternal servant.”

Falken paused in strumming his lute. “I think you all know the rest of this story. Mohg seduced thirteen of the New Gods and bound them in undying flesh, and they became the Necromancers. The Necromancers went forth into Eldh and discovered Alcendifar’s hiding place. They wrested the Imsari from the dwarf, slew him, and returned to Imbrifale, to give the Great Stones to Berash that he might present them to Mohg himself. But when the Pale King rode forth from Imbrifale—”

“He found an army waiting for them,” Aryn said, her eyes shining. “Ulther of Toringarth and Elsara of Tarras had forged an alliance, and together they drove the Pale King back into Imbrifale and took the Imsari from him.”

“That’s right,” Falken said. “In a desperate gamble, Ulther and Elsara both sent armies to Shadowsdeep. Ulther arrived first, and he smote the Pale King with his sword Fellring, which had been enchanted by the blood sacrifice of three fairies. Both Fellring and the Pale King’s heart shattered. Ulther would have died himself then, for all his army had perished, but at that moment Elsara rode into the vale with the army of Tarras, and the tide of the battle was turned. The Necromancers fled back into Imbrifale with their fallen master. Elsara had saved Ulther.”

“She loved him, you know.”

All looked at Melia. The lady petted the kitten, a secret smile on her lips. “Ulther journeyed from Toringarth all the way to Tarras to warn the empress of the Pale King’s coming. At first she denied his request for an alliance, saying she cared nothing for wars in the frozen north. However, Ulther persisted, and at last Elsara agreed. But it was not only because she had come to believe in the peril he described. It was because she had come to love him, even as he loved her.”

Falken set down his lute. “If that’s true, then their love was never requited. Their peoples would never have accepted a marriage between a barbarian king and an empress of the south. But when they created the kingdom of Malachor, to keep watch over the gates of Imbrifale, each gave a child to the new kingdom: Ulther’s daughter and Elsara’s son were married, and their heirs ruled over Malachor until …”

Falken’s voice faltered, but Lirith knew what he had been about to say.
Until that kingdom fell
.

“Wait a moment,” Durge said in his rumbling voice. “We know the Pale King was defeated in the War of the Stones. However, you have yet to tell us of his master. What became of Mohg?”

Falken picked his lute back up. “It’s a story few know, for while the War of the Stones was fought here on Falengarth where all could see, the war against Mohg took place on the shadowy borders of the Twilight Realm, where no man may tread, save perhaps the Maugrim in their time. However, just as the armies of north and south allied themselves against a common foe, so did the Eldhari and the Nindari.”

Lirith sat up straight. “You mean the Old Gods and the New Gods worked together?”

Melia nodded. “It’s true, dear. We did. I can’t say we understood one another very well, but we all knew it was the only way to save Eldh from Mohg.”

“Together, all the gods created a trap,” Falken said. “They wove a shining illusion of the three Imsari and the Dawning Stone. In his lust, Mohg raced toward what he perceived as the keys to his victory. But even as he grasped for them, they dissolved into shadows, and he knew he had been tricked. However, it was too late. In following the illusion, Mohg had stepped outside the circle of the world. With powerful runes, the Old Gods bound the circle, imprisoning Mohg beyond the borders of Eldh. Forever.

“The trick was not made without sacrifice, however, for it was said that a few of the Old Gods wove the spells of illusion to the last moment, and they were shut outside the circle of the world with Mohg.”

A sharp pain pierced Lirith’s heart. Could one really love something so much one would abandon it? The thought was beautiful, but so terribly sad.

“What happened to the rest of the Old Gods, Falken?” she asked.

“Their time was over. The world of men held no place for them. They faded into the Twilight Realm, and the Little People with them.” He cast a sidelong glance at Melia. “But then, as we learned last Midwinter’s Eve, while they are mostly forgotten, the Little People are not entirely gone.”

Lirith had not been there, but Aryn had told her the tale, how tall, radiant fairies had carried Beltan’s wounded body into the great hall of Calavere, and how queer figures had gathered the dead
feydrim
in twisted arms and carried them away. But then, the
feydrim
had been Little People once, before they were corrupted by the magic of the Necromancers.

“So the fate spoken by the witch Cirsa came true,” Aryn said.

Falken cocked his head. “How so?”

“It was because of Ulther and Elsara’s love that the Pale King was defeated and that he did not give the Great Stones to Mohg.” The young woman smiled, pressing her left hand to her breast. “ ‘Love shall yet defy you.’ ”

Falken cast a startled glance at Melia, then looked back to Aryn. “Perhaps you’re right at that,” he said gruffly.

Lirith sighed. She might have thought the bard would tell a lighter tale as an antidote to their somber mood. Yet this one had been appropriate in its way. Once again she found herself wondering who could possibly murder not one god, but two. A dragon had nearly slain Mohg, but
then only by his own willing participation. Whoever had murdered Ondo and Geb must have incredible power—enough to threaten all the world even as Mohg had once done.

But the Old Gods had banded together with the New Gods to save the world. Was there even the slightest chance they might be able to help again? After all, if the Little People could return from the Twilight Realm, why not them? She opened her mouth to ask Falken—

—and a scream came forth.

A dark thing fell onto her lap with a
plop
, then wriggled across the gauzy fabric. It was a spider: black, shiny, and large as a coin. She leaped to her feet, and the spider fell to the floor.

The spider started to scramble away, but Durge stood and placed his boot over it. There was a wet sound. However, terror still surged in Lirith’s veins.

“It is only a spider, my lady,” the knight said, his brown eyes grave. “There is nothing to fear.”

The others gazed at her in confusion. Lirith knew she was going to have to explain. She reached into her gown and pulled out the Mournish spider charm. Then she told them of the dreams she had been having, of the golden spiders, and the hungry thing lurking in the shadows. However, she did not tell them of Sareth. He was not important, she told herself, although that was a lie. But he was secret, and so she said nothing of his place in her dreams.

Melia touched her arm when she finished. “I can see to it you sleep tonight without dreams, dear. If you’d like that.”

Lirith gave a stiff nod. She started to slip the Mournish charm back beneath her gown, then with a jolt memory came to her. “Melia,” she said, “this reminds me of something I wanted to ask you after I visited the goldsmiths. I completely forgot about it after the attempt on my life.” She held out the Mournish charm. “When one
of the goldsmiths saw this, she called me a follower of Sif, and she said I would never have the golden amulets I had wanted.”