Goddess Worldweaver

7
Matriarch

Darann gave up resisting as soon as she figured out that the guards were taking her to the Royal Tower. Not that she could have escaped the strong hands grasping like clamps to each of her arms, but she found some little cause for optimism in the realization that her captors were marching her directly to the place that had been her original destination. She marched along in step with the royal guardsmen, having wrested her arms out of their grasp. As they neared the king’s hail she looked for her father, hoping to intercept him on his way to his audience.

That hope was dashed as they approached the lift station in the base of the tower and found a scene of chaos and destruction. Dwarves in guardsmen’s tunics were pulling desperately at the wreckage of steel bars that lay tangled at the base of the long chute. King Lightbringer himself had descended by a secondary lift to examine the scene, and he noticed Darann as soon as the guards brought her through the outer doors.

“A terrible accident!” he exclaimed, rushing forward with outstretched arms. In that instant Darann’s heart turned to stone and her knees gave out; she would have collapsed if not for the two guards quickly grasping her arms again.

The dwarfmaid drew a ragged breath, burying her face in the king’s embrace, vaguely aware of many others gathered around, silent and tentative. “He felt no pain, I can assure you,” the king was saying. “It was all over in an instant… The cable broke, and the lift came down. The brakes should have locked on, but they failed… My dear, it is so tragic. Axial has lost a man who will be missed, sorely missed…”

The words seemed vague and distant, as if they bore no relevancy to her life, to this strange situation. Through her shock she tried to make sense, and to make decisions. What should she do? The answer was beyond her right now… but there were things that she felt, that she understood on an instinctive level.

Slowly, determinedly, she broke from the monarch’s embrace and looked into his eyes, then past to the many guards and Lord Nayfal, who were all gathered in the cavernous anteroom at the base of the vast pillar.

Her eyes were dry, though as she drew a breath it took all of her willpower to keep the tears from exploding. But instead she studied the ruler of her people, saw his ashen complexion, the redness that smeared his own eyes with grief. King Lightbringer choked back a sob but freed the dwarfmaid from his embrace as she took a slow step backward. His grief, she concluded, was real.

Next she looked at Nayfal. His face was a mask, and when her gaze fell on him he turned away, barked a few unnecessary orders at the guards who were still trying to untangle the wreckage of the lift.

“A terrible, unhappy coincidence… nothing like this has happened here, not in all my reign,” the king was saying to nobody in particular. “To have the cable snapped-and the brakes fail at the same time! Why, it’s unthinkable, tragic!”

It was not an accident. Darann wanted to bark the statement loudly, to throw it in Nayfal’s face just to see his reaction. But a small voice, coming from a place below her grief and through her shock, counseled her that this would be madness. No, such an accusation-now, with no evidence, barely a moment after hearing the news-would only play into the lord’s hands and make her look like a vengeful and irrational child. There would come a time for accusations and for vengeance, Darann vowed, but she would act with great care. And she would choose her moment, take advantage of careful planning and preparation. Oddly enough, it was her crystallizing fury that seemed to give her a measure of self-control.

“W-when did it happen?” she asked, allowing a tremor to creep into her voice. Her mind was in a tangle, silently crying even as it groped for a truth and for proof that she wondered if she could ever find.

“Not more than half an hour ago, my lady,” volunteered one of the guards. “I was on duty at the outer doors there when it come down with a mighty screech-then a crash as loud as a pipe chorus!” He blanched as he absorbed the impact of his own words. “That is, er, beggin’ your ladyship’s pardon…”

She walked past him, up to the mangled steel, until another guard stepped in front of her. “Nothin’ that can help you to see here, my lady,” he said firmly. “We’ll have the, er, body out of there before long, but it’s too late to do anything to help.”

Too late-Hiyram had risked his life to warn her, but she was too late! Now Rufus Houseguard was dead, and she was alone… so utterly alone. Karkald was dead, her brothers gone to the far edge of the First Circle… There was no one, no dwarf she could turn to.

So she would have to act, very carefully, on her own. Coolly, she looked around the anteroom. The two guards who had brought her here from her own tower were sidling to the door. Obviously, they were in no great hurry to press charges against this dwarfmaid who had just been hugged by the king himself. That was fine with Darann. She turned her attention back to the monarch as the two dwarves made a hasty exit.

“I thank you for your concern, Your Majesty. The death of my father has stunned me, and my wits are slow to gather. Did you say he was on his way to meet with you?”

King Lightbringer blinked, as if he had to think about the answer to the question. “No, well yes. Actually, he saw me-my first audience of the day-and was on his way back down. Lord Nayfal escorted him to the lift.”

“How thoughtful,” she said dryly, not wasting a glance in the lord’s direction. “Sire, if you would direct your men to bring me his possessions, all that he carried with him when he came to see you, I should like to retire to the Houseguard manor. There will be matters requiring my attention, arrangements to make…”

“Indeed,” agreed the king, nodding almost eagerly. “You men, see that it is done, and quickly!”

Now she allowed herself a look at Nayfal, saw the lord watching through narrowed eyes as a burly guard captain unbuckled the belt from around the figure in the lift. He came forward with the object, and Darann recognized the golden buckle, in the shape of the square doorway, that was her family’s ancient symbol.

For some reason this brought the truth of her father’s fate into sharp focus, and she did sob softly as the man wiped off the blood Rufus had spilled and then gently handed the heavy belt to her. She was gratified by the weight, for it seemed that something of her father had been given to her, a solidity that she didn’t know she had lacked. Carefully she lifted the belt and let it hang over her shoulder.

Nayfal was watching her now, she noticed from the corner of her eye. It suited her to let him think she was ignoring him, so she turned back to the king. “I… I will send word, Your Majesty, when I have been able to make the necessary arrangements. Naturally, I will want to wait for my brothers’ return before we proceed.”

“Of course. And know this, my dear: Rufus Houseguard was a great man, and I intend to see that his legacy shall not be forgotten.”

“Thank you, sire,” she replied softly. To herself alone she added her own vow: and I intend to see that his death is avenged.

Politely declining the king’s offer of an escort to her father’s house, Darann, new matriarch of clan Houseguard, made her way out of the palace, through the streets of her city, toward the manor of her ancestral home.

Borand listened for sounds made by Konnor and Aurand. He wanted to shout, just for the reassurance of a reply, but he dared not make a sound. For the hundredth or maybe the thousandth time, he silently cursed the injuries that forced him to remain here, sitting at the base of the great-but apparently abandoned-cliff city, while his two companions boldly explored.

They had been here for two intervals now and had yet to see sign of a living Delver. Even so, they all acknowledged that it would be worse than foolish to announce their presence by unnecessary sounds. So the two younger dwarves skulked about, seeking and searching to gather as much information as they could before returning to Axial, while Borand waited here and listened to the vast silence.

Slowly, painfully, the injured Seer walked around the circuit of the small room they had taken for their base. It was open at the ceiling, with the great vault of the First Circle yawning overhead, but the four ground-level exits were all barred with solid iron doors. A pool of fresh, cold water bubbled constantly from a small well, filling a raised bowl and then draining through a grate in the floor. Gold embrasures were built into every wall, while strips of the precious metal had been used to edge the frames of each door. The half-dozen sturdy chairs were made of pure loamstone, as comfortable as any in the First Circle. Following comparisons with some other apartments in the area, the three Seers had concluded that this had been the residence of a very wealthy Blind One.

They had immediately recognized a secondary advantage: the faint noise of the flowing water would provide some minimal masking for the inevitable noise made by their own existence-though they limited themselves to a few careful whispers, as well as the incidental sounds of respiration and simple movement. They had set their soundless coolfyre beacon a hundred feet away, strapped to the balcony of a tall building high enough overhead that it still cast generous light into the chamber.

They had found several crates of dried rations, of the virtually tasteless bread that was a staple of lower-class Delvers, and after carrying these here had established a camp where they could remain for an indefinite time. They had a good supply of flamestone, maintaining lights not only for the searchers but also the beacon that illuminated the floor and the four walls around Borand. Still, none of them felt comfortable enough in this city of the Blind Ones to want to remain here any longer than necessary.

Borand was already feeling as though he would be strong enough to make the long trip back to Axial. Though several of his ribs were clearly broken, he would endure the pain and still maintain a reasonable pace as they rode their ferr’ells back to the Seer capital. The fierce creatures had been turned loose several miles away, but the three explorers knew their mounts would return within a reasonable time when they whistled for them.

Ferr’ells were fast, but they were not easy to ride, requiring a lot of strength from the rider. It was to prepare for his saddle that Borand now paced around the room, working his muscles and lungs into some sense of readiness.

He froze suddenly, hearing a scuff of movement, hoping that it was his two companions returning. Turning slowly on his heel, he checked the four doors, ensuring by sight that each was locked and barred. He made his way toward the exit through which the others had departed, expecting them to return there. The sound was not repeated for several heartbeats.

Something raised the hackles on the back of the dwarfs neck, and he spun about. The door behind him was still shut, but a flash of movement attracted his attention up the wall, to the open top nearly twenty feet above.

A wyslet crouched there. Lips curled in a fang-baring grin, the wicked carnivore sniffed the air and stared with its dark, tiny eyes. Perched like a monstrous, scruffy weasel, it glared at him, appraising. Instinctive, animal hatred fueled Borand’s reaction, and his sword was in his hand before he even thought about the weapon. Apparently that movement was enough to inflame the beast, for without further hesitation, it leaped into the air, a quick pounce shooting the slender body toward the dwarf like a spring-loaded spear.

The wyslet was long and slender, covered with sparse fur and armed with long, sharp fangs and hooked claws. It was a large specimen, outweighing the dwarf by a factor of two or three, but it moved with a lightning quickness that shocked Borand. He tried to duck away, slashing with his blade, but the creature smashed him in the shoulder. He grunted as claws raked his side, and the wyslet shrieked as the blade ripped through its flank.

But it did not seem to be seriously wounded, not when it pounced off the floor, twisted around on the wall, and came springing at the dwarf again with that shocking speed. Borand tumbled to the side, ducking behind one of the food crates as the monster again darted past. This time it coiled right behind him, low growls rumbling in its belly, a black tongue snaking along the sharp teeth. The drawf crouched, blade extended, hoping only to stab the beast to death as it leapt upon him.

Instead, the wyslet suddenly spun sideways, snapping loudly at its own flank. Belatedly, Borand heard the sound of a twanging crossbow, then another as a second shot flew from the now-open doorway. The wyselt flipped onto its back, kicking wildly, and Borand lunged forward to slice it through the throat. Air escaped with a gurgle of rushing blood, and with a final thrash the beast shuddered and lay still.

Shaking, Borand looked up to see Aurand and Konnor coming through the door, each slinging his crossbow onto his belt.

“Are you wounded?” his brother asked. “It tore your shirt… and the skin, too?”

He checked the skin, which was scraped but barely oozing blood. “Just a scratch,” Borand said weakly.

“Good,” Aurand said. “Doubly good, then, to find this thing here.”

“Good?” groaned the elder brother, shaking his head. “How is that?”

“Once more we found no sign of Delvers-but we’ll never be able to check this whole place. So what better proof can there be that the city is abandoned than to know the wyslets have moved in?”

The pulse of the ground was like a living thing. He could feel it through his boots, thrumming up his legs, into the pit of his belly.

Not very far away, the vast chasm of Riven Deep opened in the fundament of the Fourth Circle, like a wound in the world.

Zystyl smiled. Like a wound in flesh, this one was a weakness, a gap that would allow entrance, a conduit for chaos and evil.

Soon, it would be time.

He turned his back to that chasm then and allowed his senses to wash over the glorious spectacle of his army, arrayed for his inspection. The front rank, a score of metallic giants, black-stained shells pocked and streaked with reddish rust now, after all this time under the frequently rainy skies of the Fourth Circle. But they were still powerful, capable of crushing any warrior-or company of warriors-daring to fight for Nayve.

Beyond the golems were arrayed more than fifty thousand Delvers, the Unmirrored dwarves standing in their crisp lines, helmets and breastplates polished to a reflective sheen. Fifty years ago, before they came to Nayve, the idea of reflection was unknown to this blind race of dwarves, but with the transport to the Fourth Circle had come the blessing of sight, a gift from the Deathlord himself.

Now Zystyl shuddered at the very notion of life without that gift. In his case, the supersensory nostrils of the Delver arcane gave sweet enhancement to all sensations… and the most delicious of all was the power of vision. The gleaming metal, marked by lines stretching more than a mile in length, gave him a physical thrill of pleasure as he looked upon them, a sense as intense as any pleasure given him by female or slave.

The impression was less sublime but still pleasing, as he looked beyond the Delvers to the harpies gathered in loose clumps upon the surrounding hilltops. Some of them wheeled through the air with typical undisciplined insolence, but most had come to land in response to Zystyl’s command. The flyers formed a dirty arc around the rest of the army, fitting for their role as scouts and skirmishers.

How long would it be until he received the order, the command to attack. More than the command, in fact, but the means to attack. As to the intent, he was willing, had been more than willing but eager to launch an offensive for fifty years! But there remained the physical obstacle, this great canyon, yawning in his path.

Zystyl had no doubt but that his master, the Deathlord, would find a way to pass that obstacle. He was curious and eager, but he knew the time would come. And when it came, he and his army would be ready.

As always, when he pondered the future, Zystyl found his thoughts returning to the past… to a moment in time when his army had embarked on a great campaign. More than three centuries old now, was that campaign, but he remembered the smell and the touch as if it was yesterday.

He had held her in his hands, fingers clenched like iron brackets around her struggling arms. But it was the hair, trailing across his nostrils, fragrant and musty at the same time, an allure that tingled throughout his body. There was no instance, nothing with of the women he had taken before and after that day, of comparable ecstasy in all his experience.

Was she lost to him? Certainly she remained in the First Circle while he was trapped here, with the Delver army, in the Fourth. The power of the Deathlord, Karlath-Fayd, had summoned sixty thousand of the Unmirrored to this place, and Zystyl knew they wouldn’t be going home again-unless such a journey somehow pleased the will of the Carrion-Eater.

So the Delver arcane instead turned his attention to the world beneath his feet, Nayve, the Fourth Circle. This chasm had blocked him, halted the advance of his inexorable army, for fifty years. Still it yawned there, beheld in the darkest corners of his mind, a perfect barrier…

Perfect, perhaps, but not necessarily permanent.

Nayne! Why did they obsess about that accursed, sun-scoured world so much? Lord Nayfal could not understand it: for all of creation dwarves had been creatures of the First Circle, and this was where they belonged! It should have been obvious to the most obtuse Seer, especially in this literally enlightened modern era, when the miracle of coolfyre guaranteed that his people would be the supreme masters of their circle.

Wasn’t that enough?

The questions churned in the lord’s mind often, but never more so than times like now, when he lay in his luxurious bed and sought the blessed release of sleep. Instead, he was cursed with memories.

Vividly he recalled the last moments outside of Arkan Pass, when the dwarf Karkald had taken his small company of dwarves, all those who had survived the battle, and followed the mighty army of Delvers onto the Underworld plain. Nayfal watched, spellbound and horrified, as a storm of magic, great sheets of blue, flickering light, had surrounded the Delvers, their iron golems, and the Seer survivors. The entire group, tens of thousands of them, rose from the First Circle and passed right into the Midrock overhead, vanishing from Nayfal’s view.

He had returned to Axial and, not wanting to appear mad, simply reported that the army had been annihilated. Within a few cycles dwarven merchants had discovered the barrier, the same field of blue magic Nayfal had seen, and all commerce between the First and Fourth Circles had been abruptly terminated.

Nayfal could not know for certain what had occurred above that barrier, but he had a strong belief: Karkald was up there in Nayve… trapped up there for now, so long as the barrier of blue magic held. And if Karkald returned to the First Circle, then the truth about Arkan Pass would be revealed.

And Lord Nayfal would be finished.

It seemed that Darann had never fully appreciated exactly how huge was the manor that was her family’s ancestral home. There had always been life to be found in the big stone building. If nothing was happening nearby, she had known that she could walk down a hall or up a spiraling stairway, wander through some lofty corridor, and eventually come to a place where her mother was painting, or her father reading, or her brothers engaged in some trivial but fiercely contested argument.

Now, there was just the silence.

She had come here after learning of her father’s death, under the initial sense that she did not want to return to her lonely apartment, the cold chambers she had shared with Karkald so many years ago. Yet it seemed that here, in the big house by the dark sea, there were even more memories. Certainly this was a place she associated with gatherings, with jokes and feasts and lively people. She walked the long halls by herself, listening, hoping to hear echoes of long-ago galas.

She spent much of her first several days in the home seeking the letter that her father had mentioned, the note that gave some indication of Nayfal’s involvement in the death of Cubic Mandrill. Searches of her father’s apartments, of his office and his library, had been unsuccessful, and she was forced to admit that there were literally thousands of places where a piece of paper could have been concealed in the great house. With tears in her eyes, she regretted not asking him for more details, even to see the letter, on their last night together.

Finally she gave up and sat in the chair-her father’s chair-beside the great hearth. She was half afraid that she would start to hear those echoes, and that was a very scary thought, for down that road, she was certain, madness awaited.

Where were her brothers? She cursed them, halfheartedly, resenting their freedoms that were so easy to perceive as a lack of responsibility, knowing she was being irrational. They were probably safer out of the city than they would be if they were garrisoned here, she reasoned, for who was to say that Nayfal would not have looked to do them harm, as well as their father?

For that matter, how safe was Darann, herself? This was the question that had been dancing around the fringes of her awareness for the three intervals since her father was murdered. She had come up with no good answer.

Despite the chill in the large hall, she felt no desire to build a fire; that had always been her father’s job, something he did with joy and with pride. It would have been blasphemous to his memory had she stooped to arrange the peat and coal in the grate, to touch spark to tinder and ignite a blaze. She started to laugh at a whimsical notion: perhaps she should just wait for Rufus to come in and start a jolly blaze. Her laughter dissolved into a sob, even as the thought drifted past.

Irritated, she rose and crossed to the base of the great stairway, climbing to the second story with a series of stomping steps, until she heard the echoes coming up from the cavernous main floor. Shivering, she moved silently into the upper hallway.

It was in that silence that she heard a single thud of sound, something forceful but vague, originating from one of the wings of the great house. Darann didn’t wait for a repeat of the sound; instead, she jogged down the long hallway, passing the doors to her sleeping apartments and her father’s rooms without hesitation. Only when she reached the end did she pause, carefully lifting the latch and quietly entering the anteroom of one of the guest apartments.

She had chosen these rooms with a purpose, for in one of the closets she knew Rufus had stored several of his weapons: keen and sturdy, each of them, though not ornate enough to deserve display in the family’s great hall. Now she was grateful to find a silver short sword, the blade slick with preservative oil. Gingerly she girded on the scabbard, thankful that it was supple leather and thus soundless to manipulate.

Only then did she notice the tube, a golden cylinder about the size of a small knife. She picked it up, finding that it was surprisingly light; the gold must be a very thin sheet of metal. Curious, she noticed that one end of the tube screwed off; when she twisted this, she quickly discovered that the cylinder was hollow, and that it contained a single sheet of parchment. A quick look showed her a note written in a delicate, female hand. She knew this was the note that had aroused her father’s curiosity, but before she could look further, she heard another scuffing sound from below.

Strangely enough, she never even paused to wonder about the origin of the sound; she was utterly convinced that intruders were here and that they came with violent intentions. That brought to mind the second advantage of this guest chamber: the private balcony, small and well concealed, extending from the metalward end of the house.

Carefully she slipped open the door to the balcony, crouching low as she emerged to peer over the railing. Her stomach tightened nervously as she saw dark shapes moving through the courtyard, four or five dwarves scurrying past to guard the rear exit where the balcony sprawled above the dark, placid water. She forced herself to breathe slowly and calmly, watching until the dwarves were out of sight. There would be others, she knew, guarding the front, and probably still more already in the house.

As if to confirm her fears, she heard footfalls in the upper hall, doors opening as searchers probed through the sleeping apartments. They were moving quickly, more concerned with surprise than stealth.

She wasted no time in lifting herself over the rail and hanging down to the limits of her arms. She notched one toe into a gap in the building stones, then found a grip for her fingers. As quickly as possible she eased her way down the wall, dropping the last six feet to land in a shadowy corner of the outer plaza. She was still concealed from the back door as she scuttled across the open area and slipped down the steps to the rocky yard.

This was her element; she had played tag and hide-seek with her brothers for many years among these very stones. Darting from one to the next, she made her way down the slope until she reached the lakeshore.

The boat was where she had remembered it: a narrow fishing dory of metal, with light tin oars under the bench. With one last look up at the house-there were still no lights on, but she could see figures swarming across the upper balconies now-she pushed the boat away from shore, slipped over the gunwale, and silently paddled away from the house, the city, and the king, which had been constants for all of her life.

Two hours later, she judged that she was far enough from the manor to risk a light. She found a small box of matches near the lamp in the boat’s bow and quickly ignited the wick. Then she sat down, opened the tube, and took out the letter.

She read the contents with a strange sense of sadness.

Dear Lord Houseguard,

I write to you, as I know that you are a goblin friend. You must know that these hapless people are innocent of the charges leveled against them, especially in the matter of the attempt to kill King Lightbringer forty years ago.

I know for a fact that Cubic Mandrill was Lord Nayfal’s toady. The plot was Nayfal’s, and it was intended to fail! I have proof of this, and would share it with you if you desire.

Though I am a dwarf, I am the lowest of the low among our people, and this is a fitting station for me. I will find you at the right time.

One of the lowest of us all