Spectre Of The Black Rose

Seven

Azrael should have realized something was wrong when the voices at the Lake of Sounds went suddenly silent.

When it happened, the dwarf was listening to the dark describe what his kingdom would be like. There were other things he should have been tending to-the hunt for the White Rose, eavesdropping on Soth or the Wanderers-but those were tedious, empty pursuits compared to the construction of the new Sithicus, even if only in his mind.

As always, the dark had been describing his realm with the stolen words of others:

"You've never seen such a look of terror."

"It will be easy to get her to leave."

"All of this needs to be cleaned up."

"It was Azrael"

Somewhere at the back of his mind, the dwarf dimly recognized that last voice. He had no time to identify the speaker, though. A hush had settled over the lake, a fear-thick pall that seemed to make the purple twilight tremble. Azrael's white brows knitted together in consternation. "What's going on?" he murmured.

The question had not died upon his lips when the answer came. A hand gauntleted in ancient, fire-blackened armor gripped Azrael's shoulder. "Traitor," said a hollow voice. The word reverberated across the still, black water. A heartbeat later that sound was joined by the dwarfs groan as he slammed against the cavern's salt-crusted wall.

"Mighty lord," Azrael gasped, scrambling to his knees before Soth, "what have I done to offend you?" Soth did not answer, merely traced a symbol in the air. The glyph hung there, burning with the same orange fire that lit the death knight's eyes. It appeared an instant later on Azrael's forehead. The brand flared, then vanished.

The dwarf stiffened, and a strangled cry of agony rasped from his throat. Rivulets of blood trickled from his snout and ears.

The death knight clamped his hands to either side of Azrael's head and lifted the dwarf from the ground. Slowly, he began to tighten his grip, pressing his palms together like the jaws of a vice. Azrael howled in pain. With fingers ending now in a badger's thick black claws, he tore at Soth's arms. "Mercy," he cried.

"You showed Magda no mercy," Soth replied coolly. In his hands the dwarf's face shuddered, bones sliding into their hybrid configuration. In response, the death knight shifted his thumbs up from Azrael's cheeks to the dwarf's tearing eyes.

"I did it to protect you!" The werebeast thrashed like the captured animal he was. He clawed at Soth's helmet, kicking his armored chest "She'd joined the Thorns," he snarled. "Allied with the White Rose. She was plotting to destroy you!"

Soth's grip went slack, and Azrael dropped to the cavern floor. He writhed there for a time, retching from the pain. The ringing in his skull made him claw at his temples. Finally he slumped back against the cavern wall.

"Proof," Soth said. "Convince me of what you say, or you will die."

"After the meeting with Aderre, Magda went off alone into the Iron Hills to find the White Rose," Azrael replied. He wiped the vomit from his muzzle. "She must not have thought you capable of protecting her. Or maybe she had been in league with the Rose all along."

"Conjecture," Soth rumbled.

"No," Azrael said quickly. With one clawed hand he indicated the vast and silent lake. "This place allows me to eavesdrop on her and on almost anyone in the land. Magda wouldn't speak of her mission to her people, or tell them she doubted your ability to protect her, but she whined about those things incessantly to that flea-ridden hound of hers as they traveled to the hills."

"What did the White Rose say to her? What was their plot against me?"

Azrael shifted uneasily. "I, uh… cannot hear the White Rose's voice, or that of anyone within her presence."

"Feh," Soth snorted. "You stall for time." His sword scraped from its scabbard.

"Magda was carrying a white rose," Azrael offered desperately. "It was a symbol of her allegiance. The flower can be grown nowhere in Sithicus but the Iron Hills, in the territory controlled by the Thorns. That's proof she met with the rebels."

Soth sheathed his sword and paced along the stony shelf. "She handed me the flower as she died," he said at last.

Azrael nodded. "She wanted you to think the Rose might help you escape this place. That was her intent all along, to make you a party to your own destruction. It's the only way they could defeat you, mighty lord."

Emboldened by the death knight's hesitation, Azrael struggled to his feet. He slipped his chain of office from his neck and held it out to Soth. Head lowered, he said, "I thought I was doing my duty in sending the shadows against her."

Sardonic laughter escaped Soth's lips. Another seneschal had spoken similar words of contrition, in a time and place far removed from Sithicus. Back in the days when Soth's heart still beat, before his damnation to eternal unlife, he had confronted that minion with the disappearance of his first wife. The Knights of Solamnia had accused Soth of murdering Lady Gladria, to clear the path to his bed for the elf maid with whom he had betrayed his marriage vows.

"A hundred times I'd heard you voice a wish that the woman be gone," Caradoc had said. He, too, had presented Soth his chain of office. "I thought I was doing my duty in sending her away."

Soth had been unable to deny that he'd secretly longed for Gladria's demise, that Caradoc had only acted upon desires he himself had been incapable of acting upon. The man had merely done what he thought best for his lord, for the land.

So, too, with Azrael. The dwarf could see Magda's treachery where he had been blind. He should have seen the white rose as a sign of her alliance with the rebels. Instead, he had misinterpreted it as a sign of hope. And hope is something better left to fools and madmen in Sithicus, Soth reminded himself bitterly.

"I no longer have need of a seneschal," the death knight said. He took the heavy chain, letting it dangle from his mailed fist. "The office seems to corrupt whoever holds it. There is another mantle for you to wear, Azrael-one to which you are much more suited."

"Anything, mighty lord."

"Devote yourself, and whatever agents you can muster, to the eradication of the White Rose's allies. She is a general, a clever one, but a general is nothing without troops."

"And the Rose herself?"

"I will deal with her when the time comes," Soth replied.

Azrael turned to go, but the death knight held up a restraining hand. "Do not mistake this stay of execution for a pardon," Soth said coldly. He tightened his fist and crushed the heavy chain. "Know that my gaze will be upon you as you do my bidding. You are my minion, Azrael. Reach above that station again, and your death agonies will be legend, even in Sithicus."

Glumly, Azrael nodded.

"Good." Soth dropped the broken chain. The metallic clank rang out over the lake. "You will explain this place to me," he said, turning to the water. "I can see that it might be quite useful."

Azrael chronicled how he had discovered the lake and explained the water's properties. He failed to mention that the dark spoke to him in special ways, that those voices told him of the palace he would raise upon the ruins of Soth's crumbling keep. The death knight's anger and the narrowness of the dwarf's escape had engendered a new caution in him, even a little fear. But he did not fear anything enough to betray the dark.

When the dwarf had gone, Soth removed his helmet and his right gauntlet. Cautiously he dipped two fingers into the lake and touched the salty liquid to his scarred, scabrous lips. Voices filled his ears, a riot of sound more staggering than the banshees' keening. The babble overwhelmed him, and he sat stunned on the stony shore.

Finally, Soth's consciousness found an anchor: his name. Someone in the domain had spoken the death knight's name.

Slowly, warily, the master of Nedragaard Keep gained control of the clamor. He listened for hours as his subjects spoke of him, as he would many times in the coming days. From those confused, fractured exchanges he plucked bits of his story that he had forgotten. These divers tales could not completely mend the death knight's ravaged memory; there was too much of his life that the peasants did not know. Yet each new breach that was filled, every gap bridged, let him realize how much of himself he had lost and made him all the more certain he would recover every bit of his forgotten life.

Evening at Veidrava usually found the day-shift miners and their spouses at Ambrose's store. The place was more than a market; it was a meeting hall and tavern, even a hospital when circumstances demanded. On most nights, people crowded together in knots, trading tales of woe or laughing at execrable jokes. The men congregated at the makeshift bar Ambrose set up in the empty area used for gatherings and weddings and such. They talked of the pit. The women milled in the store proper, poking through the knicknacks and sundries, discussing life aboveground. Grubby children dashed between the two camps, and everywhere else, until Kern or Ogier or one of the other "regulars" chased them outside.

That was before Azrael commenced his hunt for agents of the White Rose.

The dwarf had always been an unwelcome presence at the mine. He was brutal and prompted the pit bosses to be the same. The seneschal had ears in every wall, it seemed. Sometimes he would recite the most intensely private conversations as if he had been right in the room when they'd been spoken.

Now, though, Azrael and his police-the Politskara, he called them-loomed large over every aspect of life at Veidrava. He recruited the most vicious of the pit bosses, the toughest miners, and most feared soldiers. It was their job to root out traitors. They suspected everyone of subversion, of secretly supporting the White Rose and her Thorns. When they found the least bit of evidence to support that suspicion, people simply disappeared.

The workers and their families feared the Politskara like nothing Ambrose had ever seen. Worse, they'd come to mistrust their friends and neighbors. Old grudges prompted brothers to inform on their brothers, wives to turn in their husbands. Almost no one came to Ambrose's now. It was better to stay at home and wait for the reign of terror to end.

This night only a half-dozen or so stalwart souls lingered at the store. Ambrose, Kern, and Ogier hunched over the bar, arguing their way through a game of Stones and Bones. The three were all but inseparable and had been ever since they'd first gone down the pit together. Only Ambrose's accident kept them apart during the day. The other two still went down the mine, as they had every sunrise for the past thirty years.

Ganelon slumped against the store's counter, fighting off boredom. Two women were picking over Ambrose's supply of cloth, and a rag-clad little girl, some maltreated miner's child, wandered in and out of the aisles. Ganelon suspected she was hiding from someone by the way she looked over her shoulder at every odd noise. She also kept the hood of her threadbare cloak pulled up around her fine-boned face. Probably on the run from some drunken lout of a father, Ganelon mused. Still, he watched her carefully, in case her skittishness proved the sign of an inexperienced thief.

A sudden cough of Ambrose's phlegmy laughter startled Ganelon out of his scrutiny.

"Here's a first," Ambrose wheezed. "Ogier comes out the victor in a battle of wits!"

The big man nodded proudly. "That's a bottle of Malaturno you owe me," Ogier said. The prize was a dear one, wine from an obscure Invidian vineyard.

Kern still stared down at the remnants of the game. "Bleat away," he said, tugging at his thin beard. His foul mood radiated from him like heat from a well-banked stove. "I still think you've pulled the wool over my eyes somewhere here, Sheep."

Ogier's thick head of curls, now gone white with age, had inspired that nickname. His gentleness made it stick. From Kern's lips, though, the name was a direct comment upon Ogier's low intelligence. The big man's smile drooped into a pout.

Kern regretted the insult the moment he saw its effect upon his friend. "Two bottles," he offered. "If you think you're a big enough boy to handle that much-and Ambrose can provide the goods."

A decade past, Kern might have trekked across the border himself for the prize. He always was the most adventurous of the trio. Like Ambrose and Ogier, though, concern for Helain kept him closer to home these days

The shopkeep clapped the smaller man on the shoulder. "Ill see what I can do," he said. "The Vistani haven't been much for trading with me since Magda died, and no one else is going to be caught dead bartering at the border. How about another game? See if you two can even things up and save me the trouble."

The store's main doors burst open. One of the wooden panels shattered; it fell to the floor like so much kindling.

Framed by the doorjamb were two of Azrael's Politskara. The miners knew one of them, a heartless tough named Markel who'd been conscripted from the pit. He brandished a small silver axe. Each politska carried one, though Markel seemed intent on using his every chance he got. Hence the shattered door.

The other was an elf. He regarded Ambrose, Ganelon, even Markel with a look of open disdain. Azrael hadn't exempted the citizens of Mal-Erek, Hroth, or Har-Thelen from service; the wild elves were their enemies, too, though it was hard to imagine them despising the savages any more thoroughly than they did the humans.

"We have a report of a stranger hereabouts," Markel announced. "Seen on your doorstep, in fact."

The pair offered no more of an explanation before splitting up to search the store. They pulled Ganelon from behind the counter and shoved him roughly to the floor. When he tried to protest, the elf kicked him in the ribs. "You've gotta teach the boy manners," Markel shouted to Ambrose.

The two politskae moved on, shoving aside any barrel or crate in their way, causing as much casual chaos as they could manage. When they came to the two women, they snatched the cloth bags that held their purchases.

"Sorry to have to do this, dears," Markel said as he upended the sacks. He poked through the scattered contents with the toe of his boot, searching for the white rose carried by the Thorns.

"I've never even seen a white rose," one of the women cried.

"No one around here has," her friend added, "not in ten years."

"The Politskara knows otherwise," Markel said smugly. He slapped both women hard enough to drive them to their knees.

Ganelon watched the brutality with growing anger and indignation. He pushed himself from the floor. Someone has to stop this, he decided. His hands curled into fists, and he took a step toward Markel.

"Don't even think about it, son," Ambrose warned in a quiet tone. He wrapped one flabby arm around the young man's shoulder. "You've got to remember your promise to Helain and stay out of trouble. That oath might be the only thing she has to hold on to. Let them break a few chairs, feel big about themselves. They'll be gone soon enough."

Helain's name struck Ganelon like a dash of ice water. For her sake, and his own honor, he would stay true to his oath.

"All right," the young man growled. He moved to the counter, limping heavily on his left leg. He still didn't know how he'd injured himself, but whatever strain or sprain he'd suffered wasn't getting any better. At the moment, it felt as if unseen hands were twisting the limb, wringing it like a wet cloth.

Markel didn't bother to interrogate Ogier or Kern. Instead, he headed up the wooden stairs to the second floor. Ganelon turned pleading eyes toward Ambrose, begging for permission to act.

"I said stay out of this, and I meant it." A dark expression clouded the shopkeep's face, one Ganelon had never seen there before. "Trust me. I'll handle this," he whispered.

Ambrose trundled to the foot of the stairs. "There's a sick girl up there, Markel. Azrael himself told me that she wouldn't be disturbed."

The politska regarded the door before him. "Which room's she in?" he asked. Before Ambrose could answer, Markel kicked in the door. "Not this one, I hope."

Shocked from sleep, Helain let out a terrified shriek. Ambrose was up the steps much faster than Ganelon would have suspected possible, though he was clutching his chest as he lumbered across the landing. If he's not careful, his heart will burst, the young man brooded. Another thought followed that, as disturbing as it was sudden: No, it can't. Ambrose is already dead.

A high-pitched scream from the store's shelving made Ganelon start. "The little girl," he hissed.

He found Markel's partner shaking her violently. "Why are you here?" the elf shouted. When she didn't respond, he slammed her against the heavy wooden shelves. The impact shook loose a box of iron nails; they rained down onto the floor like metallic hail. Keeping the girl pinned against the shelving with one hand, the elf reached down for a nail. The use he intended for the spike was clear in his hate-filled gray eyes.

"Leave her alone!" Ganelon shouted. "She's only a child!"

One eyebrow quirked in surprise, the elf regarded the young man. "Hey," he called out to his partner, "this bumpkin is interfering with my interrogation."

Over the sounds of Helain's frightened weeping, Ganelon could hear an argument building on the second floor. The interplay of murmurs had devolved into an exchange of barked insults.

"Markel?" the elf shouted. But the argument had become a scuffle. The politska tossed the child aside. He barely spared her a second look as she tumbled into a pile of Borcan cloth. "I'm coming," he called.

Too late. From the landing came a gasp of pain and a wet, lingering death rattle. A heavy thud, thud, thud told of a body bumping down the wooden stairs. Ganelon's heart stopped. They'd killed Ambrose!

When the young man emerged from the shelving, the elf close behind, he found not Ambrose but Markel heaped at the foot of the stairs. The shop-keep was crouched over the corpse. The silver axe clutched in his hand was dark with the politska's blood.

Ambrose gestured with the axe toward the two women. "Get them out of here." His voice was deep and resonant, unburdened by the constant wheeze caused by his accident. "Now!"

Kern and Ogier were as startled as anyone at the change in their usually mild-mannered friend, but they didn't hesitate to follow his orders. "An unfortunate accident," Kern said as he shepherded the women into the night. "The man tripped and fell upon his own weapon."

Ogier scowled. "But the wound's in the middle of his back."

"No more unusual around these parts than someone strangled by his own tongue," Kern replied with a sigh.

The elven politska shouted after the women, "You'll be called as witnesses. Don't think I've forgotten your faces."

"I'm sure they've already forgotten yours," Ambrose said. He raised the axe and started forward. There was something liquid to his movements, a grace he'd never demonstrated before. He swayed like a serpent, or a shadow cast by a flickering fire.

Ganelon found himself backing away along with the elf. "Ambrose," he said softly.

"Shut up," the innkeep hissed. "See to the girl."

"She's my prisoner," the elf said, though he never took his eyes off Ambrose. To lower his guard, to turn away for just an instant, would be death. He could see that in the shopkeep's grim face.

Head swimming, Ganelon hurried into the aisles to find the little girl. He found her lying in the midst of a jumbled pile of Borcan cloth. She was dazed and struggling to free herself. "Here," Ganelon said. "Let me help you up." He pulled her to her feet. As he did, the tattered hood fell away, revealing short blond hair and pointed ears. This was no little girl but a young elven boy. The tattoos curling from his temples down the sides of his neck-a scattering of triangles and swirls-marked him as belonging to one of the feral Iron Hills tribes. Ganelon looked again at the tattoos. Not triangles and swirls, he thought, thorns and stems.

The politskae had been correct. The stranger was a spy, a Thorn of the White Rose.

"Why are you here?" Ganelon gasped. "What do you want with us?"

"With you" the elf said. "I bring a message from the most holy and terrible White Rose."

Ambrose came around the corner, a silver axe in each hand, a trail of bloody footprints behind him. "What's this?" he boomed.

The Thorn's face went pale with fear. It wasn't the weapons or the blood that inspired that fright. Something else he recognized in Ambrose prompted him to whisper a prayer against evil and flee the shop.

"Wait," Ganelon shouted. "The message." 'Your hope lies with her," the Thorn called as he dashed out the door.

The young man crossed the room as quickly as his aching leg would carry him. Ambrose caught him well before he reached the door. "Where do you think you're going?" the shopkeep growled.

"I want to know what this is all about." Ganelon tried to pull free of the older man's restraining grip but found that he couldn't. In fact, Ambrose's fingers were digging painfully into his arm. "You're hurting me, Ambrose."

"You're hurting yourself," was the cold reply. Ambrose released his hold on Ganelon and turned away. "You're hurting Helain, too."

Crouched at the top of the stairs, Helain choked back a cry of despair. She clutched at her long white nightgown, at the flesh beneath, until half-moons of blood welled up. Her eyes displayed an overwhelming sorrow that seemed to stain her soul more deeply with each word the two men uttered. Ganelon covered his face with one hand. "You're right," he said. "Why shouldn't I be tempted to join the fight when all this is going on around me?"

"Because you promised her you wouldn't," replied Ambrose. "Because you love her, and she loves you."

With a howl of anguish, Helain raced across the landing and threw herself at a closed window. The glass shattered, its jagged edges claiming gory ribbons of flesh from her arms and back. Blood stained her white nightgown the same fiery red as her hair.

Helain dropped to the ground with a bestial grunt. Cringing in the light of the new white moon, she wondered if she had hoped for death. That was not to be, at least not tonight. Some terrible benefactor had spared her from serious harm. She could not hear his voice, as she thought she would, but she knew she must go to him. Tears streaming down her cheeks, she ran off into the night.

From the store's doorway, Ganelon caught sight of Helain just before she disappeared amongst the crooked towers and heaps of broken earth at the mine. She was heading over the hill. He didn't hesitate, didn't pause to ask for Ambrose's blessing or his help. Ganelon damned his aching leg and set off after his fiancee.

Ambrose watched him go, then closed the shop's shattered doors as best he could. Ogier and Kern would be back in a moment, to help him dispose of the bodies. There was no need for secrecy, but they wouldn't understand that. They did not know about Ambrose's pact with Azrael or his other, more terrible secrets. He would have to come up with some explanation for his actions tonight, a reason his infirmities seemed to vanish the moment the fight started and blood was spilled.

He glanced down at Markel's corpse and felt the fury well up inside him again. "This is your fault," Ambrose said through gritted teeth.

He snatched up one of the silver axes. With frenzied strokes he hacked at the body until it flew apart. When there was too little left of Markel to satisfy his rage, Ambrose started in on the elven politska. He did not stop until that corpse, too, had been reduced to gory lumps.

Fury spent, Ambrose paused to survey his work. He didn't even realize what he was doing as he slowly crushed the silver axe between his palms. The twisted blade cut into his fingers. He did not cry out, merely watched the blood spatter onto the floor.

As Ambrose turned away, the dark drops slithered across the warped boards to join his shadow.