Death of a Darklord

NINETEEN

Twilight lay in thick purple clouds across the sky. The snow that had threatened all day began to drift down in huge, fluffy flakes, like the down of some gigantic goose. The village of Cortton lay in a small valley. Lights glimmered from windows here and there. Chimney smoke rose into the fading light to mingle with the purplish clouds.

Jonathan tried once again to explain to Silvanus and his party what lay ahead of them. The elf was mounted just behind him, sharing his horse. Jonathan turned in the saddle and found the elf's disconcerting eyes inches from his own. "There is a plague in the village below. You might live longer if you went on to the next town. Another day will see you to Tekla."

"If there is a plague, where else should a healer be?" Silvanus said. He made a gesture with his half-grown arm.

"I cannot argue that a true healer would be very helpful, but I want you to understand what may lie ahead."

"I appreciate your concern, Jonathan, but we have faced evil before. We have even faced the walking dead before and lived to tell the tale."

Jonathan stared into that strange face and tried to read the expression. Silvanus seemed so confident. The mage-finder remembered being confident once, secure in his own beliefs, but that was before. He glanced back, eyes searching for Elaine. Her yellow hair glowed in the dying light. She rode behind Elaine, having generously offered her horse to the large, mustached man. Her hair glowed against the white of Blaine's hood, and Elaine seemed to feel his eyes upon her, for she turned to look at him.

Jonathan looked away before their eyes could meet. He didn't want her inside his mind again. The thought made him shudder as if something had slithered over his foot in the dark. She'd had no right to invade him like that. It was evil. Yet, he wanted to mend things between them, but didn't know how.

Short of her magic's disappearing overnight, Jonathan wasn't sure things between them could ever heal. He hadn't anticipated Blaine's taking her side, but should have. He'd been blind not to expect that. But Thordin? That had been a complete surprise. Their cell of the brotherhood had more successes than any other-more monsters slain, evil wizards prosecuted, charlatans unmasked. They were a good team. The fact that Elaine's magic had broken them up was proof enough that her witchcraft was a corrupting influence.

He stared down at the lights. Putting to rest the dead of Cortton would be their last task as a family. He was the head of this family. The leader of all who obeyed the brotherhood in his house. So why could he not find a way out of this moral dilemma? It was like watching a wagon barreling down a narrow path. He knew it was going to go careening off into space to smash to the rocks below, but could not stop it, not by wishing or screaming. It was an accident happening slowly before his eyes, and he could do nothing to stop it.

He could not solve his own problems, but he could help this village. Jonathan would have rather faced a dozen zombies than strife in his own household. Perhaps he might yet defeat both.

"Do you still worry over the girl?" Silvanus asked.

Jonathan wanted to say no, but nodded.

"Averil is often strong willed. We quarrel, but we make up. They never stop being our children, no matter how angry we get."

"This not a fight over an inappropriate suitor," Jonathan said. "She invaded my mind without my permission. She showed that she would abuse her power."

"She is what. eighteen of your years? She is young. You are the one with the patience and wisdom of years. It is your task to heal this fight, not hers."

"Is that the way you deal with Averil?"

"Yes." That one word sounded tired, as if the good advice was harder to swallow than to dish out.

Jonathan glanced back. Elaine was looking at him. He held her gaze for a moment, then looked away. Did her eyes seek him as his did her? Did she long to mend this quarrel? If so, why had she done it? He could have ignored much, but not this outright invasion. She had to know that. It was almost as if she had done it deliberately.

"I cannot mend this," he said, at last.

"Will not," the elf said.

Jonathan nodded. "Will not." He kicked the horse forward. It began winding down the path.

"Pride is a cold thing, my friend."

"It is not pride."

The elf's voice came close to his ear, like his own conscience. "Then what is it, if not pride?"

It was fear, but Jonathan didn't know how to explain that to the elf. Silvanus's dead wife had been a witch, a human mage. If the elf could love, bed, and father a child with a magic-user, he would not understand Jonathan's fear.

"Please, Jonathan, you have been so kind to us. I will listen with an open mind. You can use my ear to bounce ideas from, until you find a way to approach Elaine."

It sounded so reasonable. Jonathan didn't feel in the least reasonable. How to explain his fear to someone who did not share it in the least?

The sun died in a flash of golden blood in the purple clouds. As they rode down the hillside, the light slipped away from them. Konrad rode ahead, his figure growing dimmer, blending with the coming dark. Konrad was the only one of them who wasn't riding double. He and the paladin. The paladin was simply too large to share. Konrad simply hadn't offered.

"My parents were slain by magic." Jonathan said, at last.

"As was my wife," Silvanus said.

Jonathan shook his head. How to explain? "No, they were not just killed. They were degraded, tormented."

"Tell me, my friend."

But he did not want to. This grief was too intimate. Even after nearly forty years, the wound was still raw. His mother had been a gypsy like Tereza. Perhaps that was why from the first her dark hair and rich voice had captivated him. Do we not all spend our lives trying to get back to happier days? Of course, if that was all Jonathan had wanted, he wouldn't have joined the brotherhood. He wouldn't have become a mage-finder. He would have taken Tereza and found some quiet corner and hidden away. But he hadn't, perhaps because he believed that the evil would find him. Those who did not seek out evil to slay it, would be sought out by evil. Better to face it, hunt it down, than to be caught unawares.

He had been ten the year the wizard rode into the yard of their homestead. His father was a sheep farmer. His mother, with her delicate hands and rich, contralto voice, was a noted bard. If she had traveled, she might have become a meistersinger, but she was not ambitious. It was a very gypsy trait to have great talent and not worry about whether it was used to best advantage. Happiness was more important.

They had a small inn where travelers could come and stay. Mother sang in the evenings. Father was often away during the day, tending the flocks, but every sheep had to be in by nightfall. The wolves could destroy an entire flock in a single night.

The wizard was a tall, painfully thin man, as if he never got enough to eat, but Jonathan remembered watching him eat great quantities of his mother's food. He never grew fatter, and fascinated Jonathan and his younger brother, Gamail.

The wizard, Timon, stayed for a week. The two boys hadn't even realized he was a wizard until the day the woman rode into the yard. She was small, dainty, with a fall of hair down her back the color of autumn-bronzed leaves. She came looking for an old foe, Timon, and challenged him to a duel.

Jonathan's mother tried to stop it by stepping between them.

The red-haired witch raised her hands to the sky. "Get out of my way, woman. My quarrel is with him."

"This is my home. If you must duel, duel elsewhere. That is all I ask."

"If Timon will go with me, that is acceptable."

The tall, thin man just shook his head- "If I am going to be executed, I will not go willingly."

"Please, Timon," Mother said, "go outside the homestead."

He shook his head again. "I am about to die, and you complain about your house. A house can be rebuilt."

"Timon, my lady, please."

Timon scowled. "Leave us, woman." He made a flat gesture with his hand, out from his body.

Mother fell to the ground. Jonathan and Gamail ran toward her.

"No, stay back." She shouted the words in her wonderful voice. The sound carried into the house. Guests and servants came to the windows and the door, and the cook dashed out and took the two boys by the hands, then pulled them back toward the house.

No one helped Mother. No one helped.

Mother tried to crawl away in the dirt on her hands and knees, but the red-haired witch pointed one hand. A bolt of sizzling green light roared outward, engulfed her. Mother screamed. They could see her through the green light as if through colored glass. Her body began to melt, falling down and down, impossibly small. Her clothes formed an empty puddle on the ground when the light died away.

Jonathan tried to run to her, to help her, but the cook clung to his wrist as if her life depended on it. Her fingernails dug into his skin. From that day on, he would carry a perfect imprint of her fingernails there.

Timon walked forward, carefully, never taking his attention from the red-haired witch. He poked the cloth with his foot. Something small moved under the cloth. Something impossibly small.

Timon stooped and jerked the cloth up. A cat stood huddled on the ground. The cat hissed at him, hair raised on end. It scratched him. He jerked back, tumbling to the ground. The cat ran toward the house, darting inside.

Jonathan didn't realize the cat was his mother. He couldn't hold such an absurdity in his mind, not at ten years old.

The red-haired witch laughed, finger pointed at the fallen wizard. No blaze of light burst forth. Jonathan saw nothing, but Timon screamed. There was a swimming in the air; a nothingness seemed to wrap round him. It squeezed him, that nothingness. It pressed tighter and tighter, until his screams died for lack of air. No air, no screams. He burst in a splash of red and darker fluids. The body fell to the ground.

"Timon was always easily distracted," the witch said. She turned her horse and rode away.

Jonathan wanted to yell after her. What he would have yelled, he did not know.

His father came home that night. He made a sort of quest of trying to find a wizard to cure mother, to change her back, but it was no use. No one had the power, so in the end, Father set out to find the red-haired witch. He did, and she killed him. Mother was run over by a cart like any common house cat.

Seven years later, Jonathan Ambrose had slain his first wizard.

The elf was very quiet behind him. Silvanus did not ask him to share his confidence again. It was rare to find someone who respected silences, though the few elves Jonathan had met before had all seemed more than able to keep their own counsel. Perhaps it was an elven trait to understand silences. Few humans did.

Tereza knew of his past, and that was all. It was enough.

Cortton lay in darkness. Lamps shone at second-story windows. Light gleamed between the cracks of shutters on the ground floors. Jonathan had never seen such a waste of lamp oil. It was almost as if they thought the light alone would keep them safe.

Childish. But it was hard to give up that love of light, the hope that light alone can banish monsters.

The main street was wide enough for a wagon to drive through. Snow had been shoveled to either side and piled in man-high drifts by the doors. The frozen earth was rock hard under their horses' hooves.

They could have ridden two abreast, but Konrad did not wait. He led the way down the dark street not looking back to see if anyone followed. Jonathan wondered if Konrad would even notice if they all stopped and let him go alone. He had been going alone since Beatrice died. He still did his job, so Jonathan had nothing specific to complain about, but the spirit in which he worked was soured.

If Tereza had been killed, Jonathan was not sure he would be doing as well as the younger man.

Konrad pulled his horse up sharply. A narrower street bisected the main road. There was something about the way he sat his horse, a tenseness that made Jonathan kick his own horse forward.

"What's wrong?" Silvanus asked.

"I'm not sure," Jonathan said. They drew up beside Konrad, who was staring to the right. He seemed mesmerized by something down that black narrow passage, more an alley than a street. The dark ribbon of road was overshadowed by the eaves of the buildings on either side, so the black of night was the color of coal, and just as penetrable.

"What did you see, Konrad?" Jonathan asked.

"I'm not sure. I saw something move." His hand was on his sword hilt. Jonathan could feel the tension radiating from the man, like the cold air itself.

Jonathan peered into the blackness, straining until white spots danced in the darkness before his eyes. "I see nothing."

"Nor I," Silvanus said.

Tereza rode up beside them. Averil sat behind her.

"Why are we stopped?" Tereza asked.

"Konrad thought he saw something down that alley."

"I did see something," Konrad said.

"Whatever it was, it seems to have gone. Let us ride on to the inn," Jonathan said. He kicked his horse forward. Tereza followed him. Konrad stayed behind, staring into the darkness.

Jonathan glanced back to find that everyone else was following. Only Konrad remained, stubbornly staring into the alley. He could have seen a stray cat or dog hunting for a warm place on this bitter night. But then again. Jonathan found himself searching the darkness.

Another narrow street crossed the road. Jonathan stared down both sides of the new street, and saw only thick blackness winding away from them.

A sign hung half into the road. A gust of wind roared down the street like an icy chimney. The sign creaked. The sign showed a white bird winging skyward, pierced by an arrow. Painted blood traced the bird's chest. In small letters the sign read: The Bloody Dove.

Not a cheerful name, but Jonathan had seen worse. His least favorite had been the Lustful Fiend Inn. Its sign had been positively offensive.

"Jonathan," Tereza said. Her voice had a note of quiet panic that made the hair on Jonathan's neck try to march down his spine.

He turned back to her, but she was looking past him, down the wide street. Elaine's face, behind Tereza, was wide-eyed with fear.

It was like a thousand nightmares. Jonathan turned slowly round to face the street. A half-dozen shapes were shambling toward them, man-sized, but moving like drunken puppets. Jonathan had seen enough walking dead to know what they were.

"Zombies," he said softly.

The sound of horse hooves made him glance behind. Konrad was riding toward them at a fast pace. He was motioning for Blaine and Elaine to move. Blaine hesitated for a heartbeat. It was enough. Deadmen poured out of the alley that separated them from Jonathan and the rest.

Konrad pulled his horse up. It reared, screaming as the dead things clawed at it. Konrad's axe slashed downward frantically, but he could not break through. He was forced to back away, trying to control his screaming horse. Blaine had drawn his own sword, but was hampered with Elaine so close behind him. He used his other arm to slide her down to the ground, behind him, away from the zombies, then kicked his horse forward into the shambling horde.

Jonathan watched it all in dawning horror. Elaine's yellow hair vanishing behind the screen of zombies. Had Blaine forgotten there was another alley behind this one, and alley near where Elaine stood, alone and weaponless?

He started to turn the horse to help them. Tereza called, "We've got problems of our own, Jonathan." She had regained control of her voice; it was almost matter-of-fact.

He wheeled the horse back. Silvanus clung desperately with his one arm.

The shambling dead were still coming slowly down the street, but there was something crouched in the mouth of the alley. It looked like a man, but scuttled from shadow to shadow as if even the cold, distant moonlight hurt it.

Tereza had her sword out, trying to keep the creature in sight. A zombie stumbled from the alley, clawing at her horse. The horse reared; Averil screamed, clinging to Tereza's arm, crippling her sword. The man-thing leapt. There was a shimmer of pallid skin, and it hit Tereza and Averil, knocking them both to the ground. More dead closed in, and Jonathan lost sight of them.

He urged his horse forward to help them. A zombie stumbled into the horse. Hands clawed at Jonathan's leg. He kicked at it. The thing staggered backward a few steps. Something that had once been a woman grabbed Silvanus around the waist.

The elf's one arm jerked into Jonathan's stomach, making him gasp. A zombie with most of its face rotted away grabbed the horse's head. The animal tried to rear, but the zombie had been a big man. Its weight kept the horse down. The dead closed in, pressing the shuddering horse back against the inn door. Jonathan kicked the door. "Open! Open!"

Silvanus was pulled from the horse; only his arm around Jonathan's waist saved him from being lost completely. Jonathan grabbed a handful of the elf's tunic, the other hand tight-gripped on the saddle horn, legs digging into the horse's side, holding them against the pull of the dead.

Thordin and Randwulf were there, swinging blades, nearly maiming each other. Blood fell on the snowy street. Dead flesh gave way, but dead hands still reached for them. The horse shuddered, but did not rear. Thordin had trained the mount himself, and that training saved them now. If it had reared, they would have been lost, as Tereza and Averil had been.

Silvanus's fingers slipped. His hand was torn away inch by inch. The elf's fingers bruised Jonathan's skin through the clothing. Jonathan dug his hand into the elf's clothing.

The big zombie clawed the horse's eyes. The mount pressed against the door, pinning Jonathan's leg. Jonathan screamed, "Open the door!"

A blinding burst of light shot the length of the street. The zombies cowered, hands before faces. Silvanus sat upon the road, fingers still laced in Jonathan's clothing. The elf, weary in the brief respite, leaned his forehead against the horse's flank.

Gersalius sat on his horse, hands enveloped in white flame. "Hurry, I cannot hold them long." His voice echoed among the buildings, louder than it should have been.

Tereza had hoisted Averil over her shoulder like a bag of flour, then put their backs to the opposite wall. She pushed through the zombies, using her body to shove them aside. Her sword was naked in her hand, but the zombies seemed uninterested in fighting.

Thordin urged his horse toward the inn. Randwulf poked at the zombies with his boot. The dead simply turned away, barely noticing.

Fredric spurred his mount through the zombies. The horse pushed aside the dead as if wading through water.

"Elaine!" Blaine's frantic cry brought everyone's attention to him. He was wheeling his horse in a frantic circle. "Elaine!"

Konrad rode a few steps into the dark beyond the dead. He called, "Elaine!"

The light was fading around Gersalius's hands, like a white-hot ember dying. "A few minutes is all I can give you. Whatever you're going to do, do it soon."

The zombies were looking at them now. The dead eyes stared at the living, not eager, but patient, as if they knew all they had to do was wait.

Jonathan slid from his horse, banging on the inn door. "I am Jonathan Ambrose, mage-finder. You sent Tallyrand for me." No sound, no movement of the heavy door.

Gersalius had urged his horse forward, using his knees. The light was the barest of flickers now. "My magic has done all it can. It's your turn, mage-finder."

The dead were moving slowly, drawing closer. The rotting hands lifted, plucking at the air, held back only by the invisible wall of Gersalius's spell.

Jonathan turned back to the door, pounding on it. It felt a foot thick. Even with an axe, they'd never get through in time, but it was the only idea he had.

"Konrad, we need your axe."

"Elaine is missing," he called back. The dead had begun to surround his horse, isolating him.

"We will all die if we don't get through this door," Jonathan said. That spoken realization made his throat tighten. He could barely breathe round the helplessness of it. He could not let them all die to save Elaine. Not all, for the sake of one.

Konrad spurred his horse through. The dead did not give way. They pressed their bodies against the horse and Konrad's legs. They did not reach for him, not yet, but it was coming.

"No, we can't leave her," Blaine said. He kicked his horse into the alley nearest where he had set her down.

"Blaine, no!" Tereza yelled.

Konrad hesitated, as if thinking of following the boy. "Konrad, we need you," Jonathan called.

The warrior shoved his way through the dead, sliding from his horse near the others. "If they die out there, it will be your doing."

"We are all going to die if we don't get through this door."

Konrad pushed him aside. "Step back! Give me room!"

They moved back. The last flicker of light faded from Gersalius's hands. A great sigh rose from the throats of the dead. Konrad raised his axe. The zombies shuffled forward, rotting hands reaching. The door opened.

Jonathan could see nothing but the opening. Did it matter who had opened it? No. He pushed Konrad through the door. Silvanus and Tereza spilled inside. Thordin tried to ride his horse through. Randwulf sliced at the reaching hands. A zombie leapt upon Randwulf, spearing itself on the sword and not caring. Hands dug at his eyes.

Fredric's great sword swung outward, and the zombie's head flew onto the street. The headless body kept scratching at Randwulf's face. Fingernails raised furrows down his cheeks.

Thordin grabbed the corpse by its collar and yanked. The zombie fell into the crowd of dead. The reaching hands tore at the unprotected flesh, shoving pieces in their gaping mouths. They tore the zombie apart, eating it. The night filled with the sound of snapping bone, the wet sound of flesh being eaten.

"Inside, now!" Jonathan said.

Thordin rode his horse through the door. Fredric made a last slash at the feasting corpses, then urged his mount inside, as well. Jonathan gave a desperate glance down the street; nothing moved but the dead.

His horse reared, jerking reins from his hands. A zombie had fastened teeth into its thigh. The thing that had jumped Tereza now leapt on the horse's back, sinking teeth too sharp to be human into its neck.

Hands grabbed Jonathan and pulled him inside the doorway. The dead surged forward, reaching for him. Jonathan lay on the floor where he had been pushed. Fredric, Thordin, and a stranger were shoving the door closed. Arms shoved through the opening. A face half-rotted away showed through the partially open door, wedging its chest within.

"Can't close it," Thordin said.

Konrad hacked at the chest. The flesh carved, but the corpse continued to struggle, trying to crawl its way into the building. Randwulf joined him, slashing at the arms. An arm fell to the floor, flopping like a landed fish.

A woman ran forward, pouring oil over the arm. A boy at her side set a torch to the thing. The flesh burned, sending off a foul smoke that stung the eyes and filled the mouth with an acrid, unpleasant taste.

The woman splashed oil on the dead that threatened to spill through the door. The boy hesitated, and Jonathan grabbed the torch, shoving it against the zombies. Flame whooshed to life; smoke rolled. The dead mouth shrieked as it burned, and the desiccated flesh burned with unnatural speed.

Another man was there, suddenly, and the three men forced the door closed, snapping through brittle bone and charred flesh. The wood banged to, and the stranger threw the bolts. The three men leaned against the door, panting.

The stranger stood, sweeping a plumed hat from his head in a low, theatrical bow. "I am Harkon Lukas. So glad to meet you at last, Master Ambrose."

Jonathan managed an awkward bow. Two servants were beating out the last of the flames around the door, where the oil had spilled. The wood was solid, shut and secure. And on the other side of it, Blaine and Elaine were trapped out in the dark with an army of the dead.