Shadowdance 05 - A Dance of Ghosts (30 page)

“Welcome to my home,” said the man. “It has been a very, very long time since I had company.”

Haern stood, both hands falling to the swords at his belt.

“Who are you?” he asked. “Where am I?”

“Beneath the Stronghold,” said the man. “In a place forgotten by most, though I would guess you knew that. As for who I am, well…”

He rose to his feet, dust billowing off of him. His armor groaned with each movement, and the way he moved, the way his joints cracked, made it seem as if he were a statue come to life. When at his full height, he stood at attention and saluted.

“Boris Marchant, at your service,” he said, his deep voice scratchy and frightening in the enclosed space.

“Well, Boris,” said Haern, trying not to panic, “care to tell me how to get out of here?”

Boris laughed.

“Look at me,” he said. “If there were a way out, do you think I would still be down here?”

It was hardly what Haern wanted to hear, not that he could deny the logic.

“Perhaps you want to be down here,” Haern said, hoping to keep the man talking. Something about him unnerved Haern immensely. He hardly carried the look of a paladin of Karak. In fact, he bore no markings at all of the god. His clothes were ratty and torn, and his armor was of a most peculiar make. He’d not seen banded mail of that style before, nor did he recognize the crudely drawn golden hawk on his chest. Much of it was crumbling along the edges, the metal tinted with green. At his side was an ancient sword, still sheathed.

At Haern’s words, Boris erupted into laughter that went on for far too long.

“Want to be down here?” he asked when finished composing himself. He wiped at his face as if to remove a tear, yet there was not a hint of moisture on his skin. “Oh, no, good sir, I do not want to be down here. I have not wanted to be down here for decades, yet still I am.”

“Decades?” Haern asked. “Then the paladins must bring you food and drink.”

Boris shook his head.

“I do not require food to live, nor drink. Not here, not in this prison the prophet made for me.”

Haern felt all the more certain something was amiss. The man looked to be in his thirties, a far cry from a man who had spent decades in isolation. And what man alive could survive without food and drink? He looked at the pale skin, the body covered with dust.

Unless he wasn’t alive …

“My name is Haern,” he said, deciding to introduce himself. Until he knew what was going on down there in that blue cavern, he’d try to play along. “And forgive me, but I still do not understand. You say you’ve lived here for decades without food and drink … I do not see how that is possible.”

Boris sat back down on the smooth floor, and it was as if he were settling into a throne of bones, judging from how many were piled on either side of him.

“Sit,” Boris said. “There is nowhere to go, and we have all the time in the world.”

Haern did so, but only after ensuring he sat on no bones.

“When I say there is no escape, you must believe me,” said Boris. He pointed to the blue light above him. “It lights only when the night is deep and the moon shining. I have used it to count the days as they pass, and those days have passed into years, and years into decades. For over five hundred years I have dwelt underneath the Stronghold, for that is my curse.”

“They will not let you die?” Haern asked.

“Oh, I am already dead, but they will not let me pass on. I am bound here, forever bound until the curse is broken.”

Haern shuddered at the thought of such torture. To be alive yet alone, locked in solitude with no hope of escape as the years rolled on and on, with no promise of relief?

He glanced at the bones around him. Well, not quite alone …

“What did you do to deserve such punishment?” he asked.

“I stole from him,” Boris said. “Jacob Eveningstar, Karak’s special little chosen servant. I never thought he’d find me, that he’d know I took it … but he did, oh, yes, he did, Haern. He found me, and he dragged me here, back when the Stronghold was first built. They flung me into the depths of this cave, sealed me in, but not before he used his magic. The prophet is powerful, so very powerful. ‘You will not die,’ he told me. ‘Not until Karak once more walks the land.’”

Boris gestured about his prison.

“And so I wait.” He grinned. “Tell me, Haern, does Karak walk the land?”

“No,” Haern said, the very thought of it unnerving. “No, he does not.”

“Of course not. I doubt he ever will. And so it goes. I’d ask you what transpires above ground, but after the first two centuries, I learned nothing changes. The names of rulers shift and dance, a few wars move the boundaries of lords like pieces in a game, but nothing ever truly changes.”

“Used to ask … the bones, they throw prisoners down here to starve with you?”

“Only the most disloyal,” Boris said. “Only the ones the paladins feel are truly deserving of such punishment. I am sent the heretics, the doubters, the men who turn from Karak and seek another way. When they are found, they are cast into the pit, where I wait like a monster from stories they tell their children.”

Boris settled in, throwing more of his weight against the wall. It sent up a cloud of dust, and it shimmered a pale blue in the ethereal torchlight.

“What does change,” he said, his voice quieting, “is the
reason
I find men and women thrown down to join me in this pit. So, tell me, Haern, what crime have you committed against the Stronghold? You hardly look like one of their paladins. Did you steal from them, perhaps, or get caught blaspheming a bit too loudly in a tavern?”

Haern normally would have been amused at how wrong his guess was, but there was no room for humor in that dark void. Returning to a stand, he walked toward the wall opposite Boris, his eyes scanning the ceiling. He knew he’d fallen down from somewhere, a chute or hole, and it had to have remained. Yet despite how well the phantom torch lit the walls and the floor, it seemed powerless to light the ceiling. Was it because of how high it stretched up, Haern wondered, or were tricks in play, games messing with the heads of their prisoners?

“What is it you’re looking for?” Boris asked. “I told you, there’s no way out.”

“I wasn’t thrown in here by the paladins,” Haern said, ignoring him. It seemed best that way. “My … friend and I were breaking into the Stronghold, and we used a secret path to climb to the top. I slipped, fell, and landed in here.”

On the other side, Boris broke out into creaking laughter, his voice as pleasant as rust.

“Breaking
into
the Stronghold? You must have balls the size of cantaloupes, boy. Did someone fill your head with wild stories of Karak’s treasure stored in its depths? I’ve had my fair share of fools and blasphemers, but I think you might be the first treasure seeker to stumble down the pit without them knowing it.”

Haern grinned despite himself.

“Always happy to be a first,” he said, grabbing a bone and flinging it at the dark of the ceiling. Instead of continuing on, he heard an immediate clack.

Ten feet up, maybe eight,
he thought, feeling a glimmer of hope. The shadows were there to hide the size. Perhaps if Boris could boost him, or he could use his cloak and swords to form some sort of grappling hook …

“But treasure is not why I’m here,” Haern said, grabbing a few more bones, small pieces that looked like parts to a finger, and methodically walking in a circle from where he thought he’d landed, throwing them straight up to hear the
clack
of the bone hitting hard stone above, followed by another as it landed.

“Then why are you here?” Boris asked. He watched Haern work, clearly curious but saying nothing about it.

“I sought an audience with a priest,” Haern said, scooping up more bones. “A man named Luther who was supposedly imprisoned here.”

“Luther?” asked Boris, and the recognition was enough to bring Haern’s attention back his way. The gray-skinned man worked his jaw as if chewing something in his mouth, and the slopping noise he made was stomach-turning.

“You know him?” Haern asked.

“I do,” Boris said. “He’s the first of Karak’s order to come down to speak with me in over a century. An intelligent man, perhaps too intelligent for his own good. It’s going to cost him his life.”

Well, thought Haern, at least there was a silver lining to his fun little drop. Perhaps he could learn a bit more about Luther and what he was hoping to accomplish in Veldaren. Tossing a few more bones into the air, all three hitting stone, he returned once more to the light of Boris’s ethereal torch.

“What did he want from you?” Haern asked.

“I knew the prophet,” Boris said. “Not well, but I was there when he was alive. Before he changed his name and became the thing with many faces he is now. Luther wanted to know what he was like, what he wanted, what he’d be willing to sacrifice…” Boris laughed. “And so I told him. A man who would imprison me for centuries, all for stealing a stupid book? He’d sacrifice everything, do anything, to achieve what he wanted. And no matter how loyal you think those pieces of shit upstairs are, Velixar makes them look like fair-weather faithful.”

Haern saw Boris had begun to breathe heavily, and both his hands were trembling.

“Is something the matter?” Haern asked, taking a step backward. With another round of creaks and groans, Boris rose to his feet. His sword remained sheathed at his side, but Haern did not wait to draw his own blades and settle into a comfortable combat stance.

“I’m sorry, Haern,” said Boris. “I’ve waited as long as I can.”

“The bones,” Haern said. “All the victims. You’re their executioner, aren’t you? Why, if you hate Karak so much?”

“There’s no way for you to understand,” said Boris, and he sounded sad. “You see, Velixar was a cruel one, and he was clever. Very clever. He knew what it’d be like to be down here alone, to crave company. I’d give so much for you to remain with me, Haern. I’d love to hear you speak of the outer world, of nations, your family, your friends. I yearn for stories like a drowning man craves land, but it never matters. Velixar did not just leave me imprisoned here. He filled me with a need.”

Boris took a step closer.

“A need to feed,” he said. “To taste blood upon my tongue. To tear flesh apart with my bare hands. I’ve fought it, Haern, but you are one of many, and I have long learned how useless it is to try.”

Another step.

“The paladins send me company,” he said. “Send me men and women who hate Karak as much as I do, who could ease my burden even if only for a few days, yet all I can do … what I
must
do … is kill any hope I have of escaping my solitude.”

“Stay back,” Haern warned, “unless you wish to test your claim at being unable to find death.”

Boris smiled so wide, it stretched ear to rotten ear.

“I will feed,” he said, and he licked his lips, his tongue like a dry sponge, and it left no moisture upon his cracked skin. “Many have tried, Haern. They always die, and as I feed, I cry their names so they may be remembered among the bones.”

His mouth dropped open, thin lips pulling back to reveal chipped teeth stained by the blood of the dead. From his throat came a screech, animalistic in its sound and intelligence, and Haern felt his skin crawl. Weapons ready, he braced himself as Boris charged, sword still sheathed. Against a normal foe, Haern would have thought it an easy victory, but the bones all around him provided ample warning. The man raced toward him like a bull eager to ram its target, the popping of his bones and clanking of his feet on the stone only heightening the horror of his mindless shriek.

Just before reaching him, Boris spread his arms as if to embrace him in a hug, and Haern leaped to one side, twisting his body in the air so he could lash out with his left hand. The sword sliced along the side of Boris’s neck, severing what should have been his jugular vein. But when Haern landed and he looked, he saw no blood, just a dry tear in the side of gray flesh. Boris turned, and the only visible life in him was the amused twinkle in his eyes.

“I don’t bleed,” Boris screamed, flinging himself at Haern again. Haern jumped back, slashing Boris’s throat and face. More cuts, doing nothing.

“I don’t sleep.”

Haern found himself running out of room, the gray man faster than he had any right to be. There was no hesitation to his moves, nor the slightest fear of harm coming to himself. Nearly trapped against the wall, he waited for another lunge from Boris, then dropped to a roll, slicing out in hopes of taking out the tendons in Boris’s legs. Instead of leaving him hampered, though, Haern’s swords caught on the thick banded plates protecting him, unable to penetrate further.

In mid-roll, Haern could only try to kick out fast enough to avoid Boris as he dropped atop him.

“I don’t breathe.”

Haern felt Boris’s hand catch his ankle, putting an end to his roll. He slammed onto his stomach, one of his swords slipping from his grip as his face struck the stone floor. Meanwhile, Boris tugged and tugged, his mouth open, his tongue hanging down like a dead gray worm as he pulled Haern’s leg closer.

“All I know to do,” he said, “is eat.”

With nothing else to do, nothing else to try, Haern took his sword, twisting to a sitting position, and plunged it straight into that gaping maw. It punched through the back of his throat and out the other side, lodging in tight. Haern released it when it was sunk all the way in, leaving Boris snapping his teeth down on the metal of the hilt. As the ancient man hacked and coughed, his head shaking violently as he tried to expel the blade, Haern repeatedly kicked the hand holding him. Fingers snapped one by one, and the moment he was loose, he rolled away before Boris could attempt to grab again.

Now free, he reached for his other sword and stalked back toward Boris.

“I’m sorry, Boris,” he said. “But I have a priest to find.”

He slammed the blade with all his strength against the man’s throat until it hit bone. The power of it knocked him to his back, and Haern struck again and again, as if he were a lumberjack trying to fell a tree. At last he heard a crack, and at that, he reached down, pinned Boris with his knees, and then twisted the head until there was a second, far louder crack.