Samples from books that we have published at Eartherean Books.
This is another in a series from the fourth book in the 4-book series The Doom-Quest of Ara-Karn: Darkbridge.
© 2009 by A. Adam Corby
This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 License.
Glory
ON THE LAST STEP of the battlements the guardsmen struggled, their strokes weary and discordant. The barbarians had lost their most-feared foe. They crowded the guardsmen against the rearward parapet; but somehow the defenders rallied.
Berowne led them now. He planted himself in the middle of the lines, not so great a fighter as Ampeánor, but still, in the girth and weight of his body, a shield-wall in himself.
Even so the defenders despaired. With the passing of Ampeánor they lost all hope of victory. Their reserves were no more. Each time a man chanced for a moment to lift his eyes, he beheld through the dark-weaving weapons the summit of the wooden tower. Even if they could by some untoward burst of strength have hurled the barbarians back, they could not hold the parapet beneath that rain of arrows. They had their superior position no longer. That tower robbed them of it forever. They fought on hopelessly, for soon they knew they must all die.
‘We do no good here!’ Ullerath screamed in Berowne’s ears. ‘The way is too wide for our numbers. Fall back to the inner gates!’
‘No!’ Berowne shouted. ‘Flee, and the barbarians will spear us in the back. Not five of ten would gain the inner gates. Here we stand and here fall, if Goddess will have it so – but we will move at no command of mine!’
‘Why then were these defenses made with two sets of gates? I obey you, but you are wrong. Now let me take your place. For too long you have borne the main blows of the barbarians’ swords. Go rest, but leave me not long alone here, for I haven’t your waist!’
At that Berowne loosed his voice in laughter, and the sound, unwonted in that place, sang in the ears of the guardsmen. It set in their hearts thoughts of their relatives and beloveds in the Palace and tents behind them. Once more they remembered that for which they fought, and drove with renewed courage against the mass of savage bodies.
§
LIKE A PILGRIM, Gundoen stood in the shadow and gazed up at the battle. He saw the upraised lances, toiling bodies and seething arms, but he heard it only faintly, as if it happened beyond a hillside. This gave Gundoen wonder, for he was not yet accustomed to his deafness. The Vapionil had burst one of his eardrums with long silver needles, nor had they left the other ear untouched. Ara-Karn had had almost to shout into his ear to make Gundoen hear him in the cell below the Palace.
He stood in the middle of the yard between the gates. In front of him beneath the battlements the outer gates closed in a smooth wall. To either side the face of the stone was broken by portals leading into barracks and supply-rooms hollowed out of the rock. Silent as a shadow, the adopted father of Ara-Karn crossed the yard and entered the portal nearest the gates.
He passed through empty rooms. In the room housing the mechanism controlling the gate in Gerso there had been huge wheels. Now in the half-darkness Gundoen studied the mechanism of the Iron Gate of Elna. He found no wheels here. The first blush of strength was fading now; not even Melkarth and wine could overcome for long the mutilations his body had suffered. Deafened, dizzy and purblind, Gundoen could not sort out the mechanism looming vaguely against the long wall before him. Then at length a kind of sense emerged from it.
He he saw a huge bar of bronze resting in wooden brackets. The bar was driven into the body of the Iron Gate, but not deeply. Another bar would be found in a similar chamber on the other side of the yard. Horizontal posts emerged from it at intervals; there were four such, each long enough for four men to bring their strength to bear against it. Sixteen men should trod the ancient upraised walkway to open the Iron Gate. There must have been another, simpler way to open the gate, but Gundoen could not fathom it.
Gundoen clambered up to the walkway.
Carefully, with reverence, he laid the sword with the hilt of Tont-Ornoth to one side.
He put his shoulder against one post, shifting to find the most advantageous position.
Then he began to push.
The veins of his brows burst out and his face waxed dark. His naked feet clawed the walkway. The muscles of his arms and legs swelled and strove; new stains darkened the cloak. Once he heaved, and again, and a third time.
The post yielded, a little. A dull groan sounded. The bar had moved. Gundoen threw himself against the post, careless of blinding pain. With each effort the bar moved a little more. When one shoulder was useless Gundoen turned the other to bear. Like some great living hammer he used himself, mindless of hurt. So at last it came to a point where the bar would move no more, no matter how Gundoen might hurl himself against it.
Gundoen staggered to the end of the walkway. He passed his arm between the end of the bar and the opening into the body of the gate. It was done and he was glad.
‘Now,’ he mumbled, ‘once more.’
He picked up the sword and drew the peak of the cloak over his head. Once more he passed through empty rooms, finding his way out of the rock. It seemed almost as gloom-ridden outside as it had been within. His sight, vague and dim, came to him coyly as Alli, his last concubine. She had been a bold-eyed wench, and sweet; but when she had failed to give him a son to grow to manhood, then Gundoen had let her go, never regretting the loss of the embrace of her soft thighs. Of all the women Gundoen had known, Hertha-Toll had proved the only one he could not have done without. He wished she could have seen his final deed.
A group of Southrons was in the yard talking together. Gundoen did not see them until he stumbled into them. One seemed to be saying something to him, but Gundoen pushed his way through. Another stood in his way; Gundoen swept up one of his massive arms like a club, knocking the man backwards. Then from behind Gundoen strong hands grabbed the cloak and tore it from his back.
‘Sweet Goddess!’ swore Berowne.
§
NOW A RUMOR ran among the barbarians below, bright like the first green shoots of spring: the Southron Elna-Ana was dead, slain by Estar-Brin even as he avenged himself upon his slayer. Many scoffed at the report. How could Elna-Ana be dead, when he was deathless? Could a rock be killed, or a spirit? Roguil Arn most of all denied it. He could not bring himself to give up his cherished hope of another encounter with the Southron. So Roguil Arn climbed to the peak of Erion Sedeg’s tower to see for himself.
When Roguil Arn descended, his face was downcast. He pushed men away from him angrily, and proclaimed that, dead or alive, the Southron no longer fought in the battle.
‘Then he is dead,’ said Nam-Rog, and at his words a cheer went up. ‘Or else he is so wounded he can no longer hold a weapon. Roguil Arn, will you now lead a new force up the ladders to win the stronghold for us?’
‘No, I will not fight again in this place.’ Sourly he tore off the armor he had so recently girded on, and cast himself on the dusty ground. ‘How could he die, and rob me of our next encounter?’
So Nam-Rog himself raised his sword and spear, and the warriors around him shouted their war-cries. They leaped onto the ladders at his heels and ran upward. They hurled themselves over the parapet and across the battlements. First was Nam-Rog himself, bloodthirsty as few had ever seen him: with the first blow of his sword he split open the helmet and head of a guardsman from crown to chin, so that the blood sprayed, the brains splashed, and the teeth flew out like beads from a broken string. So Ullerath of Egland fell, and was trampled underfoot by the contesting forces.
§
A SNARL burst from the barbarian’s lips as he crouched in the yard and faced the small band of men with his broadsword. Silently the guardsmen surrounded him. They gazed with horror upon the blackened lips, toothless mouth, gaping eyehole drooling pustulence, bandaged hands, scars, discolored secretions, twisted knees and twisted apelike feet. It was hard to believe that this thing had been the magnificent warrior who had hurled a guardsman from the parapet.
‘Listen to me, barbarian,’ Berowne called. ‘I have no heart to fight you. What they did to you was none of my doing, nor would I have your blood on my hands now. Give up your sword. We will see that you are treated in the tent of the wounded, and no man will harm you, not even if he is of the highest rank. You have my oath before Goddess.’
A bestial growl issued from the barbarian’s throat. He stepped forward, swinging the sword. The blade struck against one man’s shield.
‘Attack but do not kill him,’ Berowne called. ‘Maimed as he is, he will prove a small threat.’
But the captain did not know Gundoen. Again and again the ring of lances and swords closed on the nearly naked man, but each time the barbarian drove them back. Half a dozen men surrounded him; and yet the barbarian twisted and fought in sudden, savage flurries, and the guardsmen could not get at him. Gundoen had ever preferred wrestling to the sword, but in the battles of the wars he had learned swiftness and cunning. Now not all the numbers of his assailants availed then. Four he wounded, and two went down in death beneath the brutal blows of the sword of Tont-Ornoth.
From above, the chief of the Durbars saw through the press of men, for one flashing moment. He saw his friend. And he cried out, ‘Gundoen! Gundoen! Gundoen!’
Then one of the guards leaped behind Gundoen and with two heavy, chopping blows unstrung him. The lines closed again, and Nam-Rog saw no more.
Gundoen fell clumsily, and the sword spun from his hands. Another guardsman kicked the weapon away. Cursing, the barbarian flung his massive arms about. His huge thighs moved pathetically. The blood streamed from his legs where the blue steel had done its work. With his arms alone Gundoen crawled about, searching for his lost weapon.
‘By Goddess,’ swore one man, ‘is he blind?’
Then the guardsmen would have rushed at him but for Berowne. ‘I will have none of you murder him,’ the captain ordered. ‘He is defeated now and will harm us no more. And surely he has endured enough,’ Berowne mused, kneeling over the fallen man.
The massive arms lashed up and caught the captain in a bone-breaking hold. Berowne cried out. The two men, huge as bulls, strove furiously on the ground. In awe, for a moment, the others hung back. Berowne was the taller man, fresher and whole; but he could not overcome the cunning that long years had given the barbarian. Slowly Berowne bowed to the awful force brought to bear upon his nape. His face went purple and blue, he was choking, he heaved and flailed his arms – in vain.
A sudden, dreadful crack was heard. The life broke from the big body of Berowne, which never again would know the caress or the scent of the beloved Kiva.
With a savage bellow, Gundoen cast the corpse away. He leaned on one elbow, drinking in the air. ‘Thank you, Hertha-Toll,’ he said in a voice scarcely human, ‘It was a good gift.’
He thought of the rest of his enemies, whom he could not see beyond the rust-red fog that thickened about him. He sent them from his mind. They were only Southrons, after all. He wished he still had the wine. No, beer would have been better, the brown foaming beer of his tribe. He had always loved beer – too much, maybe. He shrugged. It had been a good life after all.
One regret he had, that he had never seen the Southern Ocean. It was said there were pools and grottoes there whose water was warmer than the air. Gundoen had wanted to bathe in those pools and search for shells in the grottoes. He had wanted to make a necklet of shells to give Hertha-Toll when he went back home.
‘And the Southron, lord – you will see to him? He betrayed me. Together we fought a Darkbeast, just the two of us, and slew it. He owed me life and brotherhood after that, but he was a Southron and caused my death. Avenge it as befits a son.’
And Ara-Karn had bowed his head. And it had seemed to Gundoen, beyond belief, that he saw tears in the black-green eyes. ‘I will avenge you, Gundoen. Before all the gods and demons, by the horrors of the Darklands, I swear it to you – my father…’
Gundoen leaned back, turning the sky to face him. He heard a step. Hertha-Toll stood over him. She was an old woman now, with wrinkles at her eyes and spots on her hands. Even so she was beautiful. He wanted to tell her he was sorry that he had gone off adventuring in these alien lands. But he was not sorry, he was glad. He had done some things, and won fame and glory.
‘Why didn’t you come to me when I sent for you? We could have been together.’
‘No, Gundoen,’ she answered. ‘I was born on Kaari Moldole, and there in the grove of women I will die. That is my way. But I loved you and chose you before you were ever aware of me.’
§
FILLED WITH HORROR, the guardsmen hung back from the fallen barbarian. Nervously they fingered their weapons. Then without a word they all moved in, all but one, and stabbed and hacked at the great foundering bulk of putrid flesh. Blood and mucous splashed up over their armor, hands and faces. They tasted the death of Gundoen in their mouths and the reek of it consumed their nostrils. They drew back drunkenly. With relief and horror they watched the last spasms of the tortured body.
‘He was no man, but half a beast,’ swore one in a low voice. ‘The captain was wrong, despite his fine feelings.’
‘It was good he was tortured, or else we would never have brought him down.’
‘Even so, he would have beaten and killed us. If Iocantris had not unstrung him, we would all be dead now.’
‘Yes, all honor is owed Iocantris, not only for discovering the danger, but for having more courage than the best of us.’
So they all agreed, clapping hands on the victor’s rounded shoulders. But Kuln-Holn scarcely heard them. He was looking at the dismembered, thrashing carcass of Gundoen, a thing bursting with death horrible and bloody, and he was terrified.
§
GUNDOEN knew now where he was. Something of his sight returned to him. He was lying on the stone of a yard between the gates of the great fastness of the Southron Emperors. Above him the battle raged in silence. He had come so far, and had conquered all the North in the name of Ara-Karn. But his life was draining out of him, mixing with the blood of his victims. The spirits of those he had left unvoyaged in the Taril could now be appeased.
He saw the Southrons regarding him with fear, though he was helpless now and slain. He grinned, baring a bloody mouth. This was a good death. He had never hoped for one so fine. Men would hear of it. Ara-Karn would hear of it, and command that songs be made. Gundoen left behind him a son such as no other chieftain of his tribe had ever done; greater even than Tont-Ornoth was his son. Now there remained only one final deed for him to do here – one last cry to release the spirit and send it flying up to Goddess.
He opened his cavernous mouth. He filled his lungs with air. And he cried out in a voice echoing off the rocky walls, so that it might be heard by all there even above the din of combat, Gundoen’s final words:
‘O Ara-Karn, avenge my death my son!’
§
SOMETHING of that cry pierced even the thick door of the southern lance-tower, awakening Ampeánor.
He had piled barrels against the door, but the barbarians had not thought of passing through the lance-tower as Ampeánor had feared. So he was granted a few moments’ respite, and in the calm gloom of the tower weariness overtook him.
Now he woke, and looked about at the barrels of rope, stacked bundles of headless lance-hafts, amphorae of oil and other stores. Dimly, like the throbbing of a hollow heart, the rising and falling sounds of battle bore in upon him.
He stood. His wounds were cold, his limbs stiff and sore. He limped to the steps. He thrust back the door-panel and climbed into the wind.
In scores the barbarians were swarming over the parapet, crossing the battlements and hurling themselves against the guardsmen. From the wooden tower, bowmen aimed their fiery arrows. In the square below, twenty thousand men milled; against the rearward parapet less than a hundred guardsmen crowded together in a circle. The steps to the yard were empty and open. He saw no sign of Ullerath or Berowne. The last guardsmen fought fiercely but without guidance or reserves.
It was defeat, then.
Ampeánor looked past the inner gates. The Palace of the Bordakasha rose in age-old serenity. The White Tower was beautiful in Goddesslight. The Disk of Goddess atop the White Tower bespoke the pride and sureness that had gone into the Empire. It was said that the Disk of Goddess had been fashioned, upon the return of the armies from their victory at Urnostardil, as a gift to Elna from Torval, the only one of his ancestors that Ampeánor would acknowledge. The gift had so delighted Elna’s heart that he awarded Torval the charanship of Rukor, the strongest of the provinces.
Ampeánor thought of Elna’s last descendant. He was sick at heart for all he had put her through. What did it matter now, that in her loneliness she had proven unworthy and had taken other men to her couch? She was his Queen. And she had loved him, and he might have won her for his bride many years before the name of Ara-Karn ever sounded in the world. Then Dornan Ural would have been no hindrance to them; with a firm heart all the cities of North and South could have confronted the barbarian as one, and destroyed him with ease. It had been Ampeánor’s failing that had doomed their love. He had been a coward and a fool, and all the world must pay the price for it.
He lowered his head, struck his fists on the stone, groaned and gnashed his teeth. The golden armor was covered with blood and muck. Dirt stained his arms and legs. Then he rose and descended again into the lance-tower.
He slung two bundles of rope over his shoulders and picked up two amphorae of oil half as tall as he. He bent beneath the burden, feeling it in his damaged shoulder.
On the roof he passed the lengths of rope through the strong handles of the amphorae, tying them with seamen’s knots.
Then he turned to face the Sun.
‘O Lady, I have been no great follower of yours. I scorned your ways and gave nothing to your temples. So perhaps the old woman in the Sontil is right, and I am hateful to you. But if it is defeat, I pray you, do not let Ara-Karn say it was an easy one. Grant me one gift, Lady, only one, and a small one such as you should be pleased to grant: let Allissál live, and not hate my memory overmuch.’
He lifted an amphora by its rope. For a moment he doubted he could do it. Holding the rope above his head, he swung the amphora about his body. The vessel spun faster; Ampeánor let out the rope. Now he too was turning about. His arms were pulled straight from his shoulders, his back bent, his head tucked between his arms. His legs fought against the pull of the stones. The breath tore from his open mouth. All at once he made it out, dark and unmistakable. Thrice more he spun, watching for it; then loosed the rope into the winds.
The amphora arched over the earth. The warriors in the square saw it for a moment, suspended in the sky as if dark God had dropped it. They began to raise their arms and point. Then it fell.
The amphora crashed amidst of the bowmen on the tower, broke open and spewed its contents over them.
Ampeánor, gasping on the lance-tower roof, saw the anger and confusion among the bowmen. One man, dressed in the fashion of the nomad robbers of the Desert, pointed at Ampeánor, urging on the others with his gestures. Dimly over the clash of battle their cries reached him, as they aimed their bows at him.
The lord of Rukor staggered up. He took the second amphora. The arrows streaked past him as he turned. Round and round, bones aching, thews tearing. His grip was weaker now, he was dizzy, his steps wandered about the small round roof that had no parapet. He let go the rope clumsily and fell.
For a moment he saw the rocky coomb directly below him, its piled red stones bared like the Darkbeast’s teeth.
But this amphora flew true. It stuck down torches at the tower’s side, and the flames leaped up from the oil-washed platform.
Within moments the siege-tower became a beacon.
Ampeánor dragged himself back from the abyss and watched it burn.
The flames clawed at the bowmen’s legs. Their tunics caught and fired. Flames burst out of the barrels of oil-soaked arrows. Some bowmen, blinded by the smoke, fell over the sides. Others fought one another on the way down. The upper third of the tower was in flames. At last only the man from the Desert stood on the tower roof, his mouth open, his fists raised. All his robes were ablaze; like a living torch he staggered to the back of the platform and disappeared like a dropped stone down the black hole of the ladder-way.
From the shelters among the ruins the warriors of the tribes of the far North gaped at the blazing tower. Those on the battlements felt their hearts fall at the sight. Thick coils of bitter smoke engulfed them. They choked and spat in darkness. With a rush the guardsmen joined battle, closing their eyes and driving against the path of the smoke. With their last strength the guardsmen fought, slaughtering the barbarians. The barbarians fell back and dropped their blades. Red swords and cruel lances did their work, and hurled the Northerners off the parapet as a herd of sheep is driven by flood or fire over a cliff-side in the mountains by Bollakarvil.
§
NOW IN THE SQUARE they saw their fellow-tribesmen falling and were sick at heart. Some had seen Ampeánor as he released the second amphora. The dreadful rumor of Elna-Ana sped among them once more. At that, the chief of the Vorisals emerged from his shelter. The hope of meeting again his enemy made Roguil Arn eager to mount the ladders again. He delighted in the towering pile of burning timbers, which reminded him of the fire Ara-Karn had lit on Urnostardil. With ringing words the Vorisal went among the tribes, daring men to follow him. None of them would have gone leaderless, but behind such a man as Roguil Arn was at that moment, they would have marched even into the Darklands. Seven hundred or a thousand men the Vorisal gathered and led grimly up the ladders.
§
WEAKLY the lord of Rukor leaned against the battlements. Strange quiet had fallen across the wide space between the lance-towers. Billows of smoke from the burning tower flowed across the stones, but otherwise all was still. The guardsmen lay empty-eyed on the third step, weapons scattered at their sides. They lay there almost naked, as if it were over.
Ampeánor stood over one who seemed to have more of his wits about him than the rest. ‘I don’t remember your name,’ Ampeánor said.
‘Sevirin Lirne, my lord.’
‘Sevirin Lirne, where is Berowne?’
‘The captain is dead, my lord.’
‘Ullerath?’
‘Him too.’
Ampeánor looked over the others. ‘Are these all who remain alive?’
‘Yes, my lord.’
There were twenty-four men on the third step.
With Ampeánor and Sevirin Lirne, there were twenty-six.
‘Shall I order to form ranks, my lord.’
‘No. What for? There is no more strength in them. They have no more life left to use. But you all did well. If there should still stand cities after all of this, then men shall sing of us. Sevirin Lirne, you are released from duty, as are all the rest of you. Go and do what pleases you.’
The lord of Rukor faced the empty line of the outer parapet. The smoke stung his face. One hand held the shield, the other drew the long sword. Beautiful it was even now, the perfection of the centuries of effort by the armorers of Ul Raambar. It sang as it sprang from its scabbard, weariless and sharp, and Goddess smiled from the stones in the cross-piece. That is the difference between things and men.
§
EAGERLY Roguil Arn and his followers clambered up the ladders. They almost gained the iron-shod summits when the lone figure appeared above the parapet before them.
Roguil Arn stopped. All the warriors stopped. They knew this one.
‘Come,’ the Southron said in the barbarians’ own tongue, in a voice inhuman. ‘Come, and die.’
§
ROGUIL ARN looked up into the bronze-shaded, pitiless eyes, the eyes of the man who killed so many, and seemed himself unkillable. And Roguil Arn knew in his heart a thing inescapable – that if he went to the top of the ladder the dark man there would kill him. He, Roguil Arn, would die, and he would know no more of the sweet pleasures of life, not good wine nor the soft touch of a woman nor the glory of his strength. He would see his home village of the snows no more; his wives there and young children would never know his voice again. But his corpse would lie on that heap below with the others, vile birds would tear his flesh, and he would end his life unvoyaged.
Roguil Arn did not know fear even then, but the loss and evil of such a fate was abhorrent to him like sin to a lesser man. What pleasure or joy was there in dying? It was not fated that they should take this Citadel, but only hurl themselves against its Iron Gate and die. This year had proven that.
Slowly Roguil Arn shook his head and whispered, ‘No.’
The others on the ladders turned their gazes from the chieftain to the figure on the parapet. The first to go against that one would die. The second would also die, and the third, and the fourth, and the tenth. They all would die at his hands. This they knew. Dark God stood beside this one. There was no going against God. Ara-Karn would have done it. Gundoen might have dared. Roguil Arn would not. Nor would the rest go forward but at his lead.
There was no sound save for the crackle and roar of the fire. Roguil Arn backed down the ladder. When he came to the man behind him he pushed at him with his foot, and that one also moved. In silence they descended and gathered on the stones above the coomb. Looking to the figure high above them, they raised fists to him.
It was their sign of victory.
It was as if he had been one of them, and they praised the victory he had won for them.
Then they melted into the crowds beyond the fire.
§
THE GUARDSMEN rose. They would have joined their lord, but Ampeánor, not turning, signed them back.
‘Stay where you are,’ he commanded. ‘Let no man approach me.’
He stood on the parapet. In the square below, the barbarian armies were massed in deep rows bent like a half-wheel that had for its hub the base of the burning siege-tower. The flames gleamed in colors of blood-red and orange and purple off the black Iron Gate.
Perhaps an hour passed so, or maybe two. Ampeánor did not move. Neither did the tribesmen. From time to time a trembling took Ampeánor behind his knees and he was like to fall; with an iron will beyond his strength he held his body fast. He knew that if he showed the slightest weakness, the barbarians in all their thousands would come again.
When the jade orb of God rose to the middle heavens behind the smoke, Ampeánor leaned forward and with a lance pushed the scaling-ladders from the Iron Gate. One by one, the ladders skipped across the face of the stone; then they fell and broke with dry sounds into a thousand fragments on the coomb.
Only then did the barbarians bestir themselves. The waves of armored men broke and slunk back through the ruins as quietly as ghosts.
Then at last Ampeánor turned back his tortured, haggard, sweating, smoke-stained, dead man’s visage to his awestruck men.
‘The war is over,’ he said.
He was right.
