The Grim Company

Summer Time

The sound of drums dragged her awake.

Yllandris had been dreaming of a morning long ago, when she had been a girl not yet blossomed to womanhood and the arrival of summer had been one of the highlights of her year. Her mother had been tending the hearth, a broad smile on her kindly face. Her father was nearby. The promise of the new season appeared to have softened even his dark mood, and he gave her an affectionate grunt as he passed her a warm bowl of last night’s stew and a hard heel of bread.

She sat up, wiping sleep from her eyes. Had she imagined the sound?

No. There it was again. Boom. Boom. Boom.

She thrust the fur blanket away from her, jumped up from the pallet and pulled on some clothes: a pair of deerskin trousers, her purple shawl and some boots. The beating of the drum was growing louder. She quickly washed her face, not bothering to apply any paints, and then hurried outside.

Has the King finally returned? A full three days had passed and still no word from Magnar or his huge entourage had reached Heartstone. Additional riders had been sent to investigate. They had not returned either. With the Shaman still absent, an undercurrent of panic was beginning to pervade the town.

The sun was up already and the skies were clear. The snow had melted, revealing soggy green grass and mud underneath. As she joined the townsfolk making their way towards the northern gate, she could hear the trickle of the last of the snow melting on the roofs of the huts and longhouses that lined the thoroughfare. Soon Lake Dragur would thaw, if it had not already, and the boats would be out on the water bringing in trout and perch and anything else the fishermen could catch. All in all it was set to be a beautiful day.

‘Sister,’ called a slightly shrill voice somewhere to her right. It was Thurva. The young sorceress scurried through the crowd to intercept her.

Yllandris suppressed a sigh. ‘Greetings, sister,’ she said with forced pleasantness. ‘It appears our king returns to us.’

‘With the head of the demon, I hope,’ replied Thurva. She made a face. ‘I don’t enjoy burying the dead. It’s a grisly business.’

Yllandris stared at Thurva’s mismatched eyes, not bothering to hide her annoyance. You barely lifted a finger to help, she thought. I did most of the hard work.

One of the circle’s duties in Heartstone was to perform last rites for the dead. Though the gods were gone, there were other, even more ancient forces in the world — the many spirits of land and sea and sky — that demanded supplication. In return for worship the spirits were said to bestow the gifts of foresight to the wise men and women and magic to the sorceresses. Males who possessed the spark underwent the Shaman’s ritual and transcended, becoming one with the animal that best represented their nature.

The spirits were also said to shelter the souls of the dead once they departed their mortal shells, until it was time to be reborn in a new form. It always amazed Yllandris that the men and women of the Lowlands held no such beliefs. She didn’t know how a people could survive without faith. Perhaps that was the secret of the Lowlanders’ love of gold — it was their religion, one they could see and feel and spend and pretend mattered. Until, inevitably, the moment arrived when it no longer did.

She and Thurva finally reached the crowd gathered around the gates and pushed their way through to the front. The huge wooden structures were flung wide.

A loud cheer erupted as King Magnar melted out of the early-morning mist, high and proud on his stallion. He had his war helm on and his visor pulled down to shield his eyes from the sun. He saw the gathered townsfolk and raised a hand in salute, provoking a fresh round of cheers. Yllandris felt her heart flutter. He is a king, truly.

Behind Magnar rode the Six, his elite bodyguards. Their helms, too, covered their faces. As they emerged out of the mist she saw that their horses dragged an immense wooden sledge behind them. It was covered in a tarpaulin, pulled tight over a huge form. Another cheer went up as the sledge trundled into view.

Following the Six were the drummers, who marched on foot, beating out that same relentless rhythm. Boom. Boom. Boom.

‘Move aside!’ commanded a haughty voice that could only belong to Shranree. The senior sister waddled up to Yllandris, her cheeks flushed and her oversized chest heaving from exertion. The other three members of the circle scurried along behind her. Shranree stared out at the approaching horsemen and clapped her hands together happily. ‘Finally! I was beginning to grow concerned. And it would seem our king has brought the body of the demon back with him.’

Yllandris frowned. There was something bothering her, a sense that everything was not quite as it seemed. She had grown up learning to read her father’s face. The way he breathed. The way the muscles around his jaw twitched. The moment of discord — that one dreaded sign was all she had needed to seek refuge in her small room. To pull the blanket over her head and wait for the inevitable to pass.

Was it the way the King sat his horse that troubled her? She narrowed her eyes against the sun’s glare.

The first of Heartstone’s warriors trotted into view. He halted just as he emerged from the mist, while ahead the King and his small retinue of guards and drummers continued on towards the gate, towing the sledge behind them.

Shranree suddenly leaned in close. ‘I expect our young king will desire some company shortly,’ she whispered. ‘Remember what we discussed. I would see our circle expanded. The damage wrought by that fiend would have been considerably less had I more sorceresses at my disposal.’

‘Yes, sister,’ replied Yllandris, still distracted. The shoulders are a shade too narrow, she thought. Perhaps the light was playing tricks on her eyes.

The King cantered through the open gates and tugged on the reins, bringing his mount to a halt. The Six did the same and drew up beside him. The drummers stopped just outside the town, but the relentless throb of their beats continued unabated.

Sudden dread seized Yllandris as she watched the King dismount and walk over to the sledge. The way he moved was too tense, his strides a fraction too short. Her eyes made their way up his legs to his backside, and one glance at that too-bony posterior was all she needed to confirm her suspicions.

‘Wait! This man is not the King-’

The words died on her lips as whoever was behind Magnar’s helm drew his sword and thrust it through the tarpaulin, dragging it down the length of the sledge with a tearing sound that seemed to hang in the air. With his other hand, he grabbed hold of first one side of the split canvas and then the other, yanking them apart.

Gasps and screams exploded from those close enough to see the sledge. Six headless corpses were piled on the platform, leaking black blood. The stench was nauseating.

‘What is the meaning of this?’ Shranree demanded, striding towards the false king. The impostor reached up to his helm, Magnar’s helm, and yanked it from his head.

‘The meaning?’ sneered Krazka, chieftain of the Lake Reaching, his dead eye weeping foul white mucus in the beaming sun. ‘I’m seizing this town and installing myself as the new king. Effective immediately.’

‘What have you done with King Magnar?’ Shranree thundered.

The Butcher of Beregund grinned. ‘You’ll see soon enough. He’s alive — after a fashion. Now, I’m going to beckon to my men over yonder and they’re going to trot right in here. Any trouble and I’ll start killing folk where they stand.’

‘You will do no such thing,’ Shranree said. She raised her hands, muttered a few words… and then stared at her palms.

Krazka tapped the blade of his brutal single-edged sword. ‘You ever heard of abyssium? Me neither, until recently. Got me some new friends up in the Spine, you see.’

Shranree spun around and gestured desperately at Yllandris and the other sorceresses. Thurva immediately pointed a finger at Krazka. A flicker of lightning crackled at the tip of her outstretched digit only to sputter out harmlessly.

Krazka sighed dramatically. Then he strolled over, grabbed the cross-eyed sorceress by the hair and slit her throat. Blood welled up around the wicked sword but he kept cutting, not stopping until the blade had severed the neck completely and the head came away in his hand. He tossed the grisly trophy on the ground where it rolled a couple of times and came to a halt, surprised eyes staring off in opposite directions.

Yllandris stared dumbfounded. The crowd broke and townsfolk started to flee. Some of the hardier men went to their weapons. Krazka gestured to the fake Six, who drew their swords, and then he pointed to the horsemen who were even now approaching the gates.

‘I got me three hundred warriors from the Lake Reaching,’ the one-eyed killer shouted. ‘Any of you greybeards or cripples cause any trouble, I’ll cut your throats. Then I’ll find your wives and children and cut theirs, too.’

‘The Shaman will not stand for this!’ Shranree gasped, her voice quivering.

Krazka grinned. ‘The Shaman will be dealt with. There’s older and nastier things than him.’ He looked up at the sky. ‘I reckon one of ’em is due any moment.’

While Krazka had been speaking the drumming had been getting faster. Now it rose to a crescendo. Boom. Boom. Boom. There was a sudden ripple of wind and, like an unholy comet, the black-scaled horror plummeted down out of the clouds to land just outside of town. It unfolded like a monstrous black flower, rising up a good head and shoulders above the walls to gaze down with a trio of sinister eyes. The grievous wounds it had taken only a few short days ago had already healed.

Yllandris heard her sisters turn and run, but she was rooted to the spot, too terrified to do anything but stand and stare.

Krazka faced the towering demon. He appeared to be listening to something. He nodded, and then gestured at the fiend. ‘It calls itself the Herald,’ he said.

‘This… creature talks to you?’ asked Shranree, aghast.

‘It don’t speak. It forms words directly inside your skull,’ replied Krazka. ‘And it serves another, whose name it’s too afraid to even think. Aye, you heard that right. Anyways, the Herald leads those of its kind that’ve made it through. Most ain’t as bright as he is but that don’t matter, see, since killing is what it’s all about. The only way more of ’em can escape into our world is by sending souls in the opposite direction. So that’s what they do.’

‘And you… you are allied with this thing?’ There was a note of curiosity in Shranree’s voice now.

‘It made contact. Offered me a deal I couldn’t refuse. You don’t know how many men I had to murder to become chieftain of the largest Reaching in the High Fangs. I thought to myself, why stop there? The Lowlands, they’re a hundred times the size of this place. There’s a whole world to conquer, I figure.’

‘What will you do with us?’ Shranree asked quietly.

‘I saw your work at Frosthold. Got to say, I was impressed. Make me a new circle. One big enough for all the sorceresses in the Reachings. Those that refuse to swear fealty…’ Krazka raised his sword and examined the glistening edge, still dripping with Thurva’s blood.

Shranree stared at that deadly blade, as did Yllandris. Then the leader of the Heartstone circle straightened her robes and bowed to the chieftain. ‘I am yours.’

‘Excellent.’ Krazka leered at Yllandris with his lone eye. ‘And you?’

And me? I… wanted to be Queen. To marry Magnar and have children and prove to Shranree that I am no child. You’re a butcher. A monster. You’re worse than the Shaman.

Krazka’s leering eye began to narrow. His sword shifted a fraction.

She gulped. ‘I… I will serve you.’

‘Good,’ grunted the chieftain-who-would-be-emperor. ‘Start by rounding up a few foundlings. They’re no use to me, but they’ll serve.’

‘What do you mean?’ asked Yllandris, though deep down she knew.

‘Been a while since the Herald last killed. It needs to feed.’