Valour

CHAPTER ONE HUNDRED AND SEVENTEEN

CORBAN

Corban ran through the corridors of Murias, Fech and Craf fluttering ahead, staying just within sight.

They had encountered no one, the halls seemingly abandoned.

Everyone that lives in this place is fighting for it now.

The stairwell they were climbing spilt out into a chamber, a single fire-pit flickering near its centre. Fech led them unerringly towards an archway on the far side. They were almost there when shouting broke out from behind. Corban spun around, saw giants appearing from another opening — a dozen, perhaps more. At their head stood a white-haired giant, blood caking his face. He held a war-hammer, the entirety of his muscled arms a swirl of tattooed thorns. He saw Corban and his companions and bellowed a battle-cry, his comrades echoing him. They began running towards them.

The Jehar drew their swords, Tukul taking the lead, moving to meet the attack, holding his sword in one hand, axe in the other.

Brina stepped into Corban’s vision, holding a sword in her hand, long and thin.

Where did she get that?

Corban heard her muttering, the words sounding strange and guttural, then the blade of her sword burst into flame. She winked at Corban.

The giants eyed her warily.

Then Meical was in front of him, standing between the two groups.

‘I know you, Balur One-Eye,’ Meical said.

Balur One-Eye. Even I have heard of him, thought Corban.

‘Balur One-Eye,’ Dath whispered. ‘He’s ancient. Even older than Brina.’

‘I heard that,’ Brina snapped.

The giant’s strides faltered as he stared at Meical. He took another few hesitant steps.

‘That was a long time ago,’ the giant said.

‘It was. The time of fire and water.’

‘Aye. And why are you here now? Fighting alongside the Dark Sun. Have you Fallen?’

‘No. I made my choice. The Dark Sun has a captive, someone dear to us. Dear to the Bright Star.’ Meical pointed at Corban.

I wish he wouldn’t do that.

Balur and the other giants peered at him.

‘He has my sister. I mean to take her back,’ Corban heard himself say.

‘We are not your enemy,’ Meical said.

‘Hurry, hurry, hurry,’ Fech squawked. Balur stared at the bird.

‘Fech?’ He shook his head.

‘He is taking us to the cauldron. That is where Nathair will be, the Black Sun,’ Meical said.

‘And these others?’ Balur asked, looking suspiciously at the Jehar. ‘We have just fought their kin in the great hall.’

‘It’s complicated,’ Tukul said, ‘and time does not allow its full telling. The short version is that the ones you have fought have been deceived.’

‘Join us,’ Meical said. ‘If we wanted you dead we would be killing you now.’

The giants bristled at that.

True, but not very tactful.

Slowly Balur nodded. ‘We shall join you. But you go first.’ He smiled.

‘Agreed. Lead on, Fech.’

Then they were running through corridors again. Slowly Corban became aware of a sound, a deep humming, more a feeling than a sound, vibrating up through his feet, out of the rock walls about him. It grew until it was all he could hear, filling his senses.

‘We are here,’ Fech said.

The doorway was wide, like everything in this underground stronghold, room for a score of them to stand across.

It took a few heartbeats for his eyes to adjust, the light in the room lurching from shades of darkness to bursts of incandescent light, leaving after-images seared into his mind. Slowly the scene before him coalesced into a wholeness. First he saw the bodies. They were everywhere, men, horses, giants — wyrms. Most of them had been hacked to pieces.

In the centre of the room stood a cauldron. It was elevated, sitting high upon a dais. Above it hovered a black roiling cloud, bolts of darkness radiating from it, joined to people, hundreds of people, kneeling on the ground before the cauldron.

The Jehar.

They didn’t appear to be enjoying the sensation. Most were writhing, groaning, arms outstretched. And it looked as if something was pulsing through the dark columns, like when a snake swallows an egg, but faster, moving from the cloud into the bodies of the Jehar.

‘No,’ Meical hissed.

Corban hardly heard. Upon the dais he saw two men, one old, silver-haired, a look of rapt awe upon his face. The other he recognized. Nathair, the slayer of his da. He was staring at the cauldron, something close to shock on his face. Corban closed his eyes, for an instant was back in the feast-hall of Dun Carreg watching Nathair stab his da through the heart.

I told him I will kill him.

He scanned the room. Then he saw her. Cywen. She was standing to the left, between Corban and the kneeling Jehar. Next to her a horse stood, pawing the ground.

Shield. It is Shield.

He forgot about Nathair, the sight of his sister filling him with hope, and a great fear. So close, we have come so close. Dear All-Father, do not let us fail now.

He felt a hand grip his arm, squeezing. His mam. She was grinning, tears streaming down her cheeks.

‘What do we do?’ Corban whispered to Meical.

Then there was squawking, yelling, shouting; a giant that Corban hadn’t noticed was waving his arms in the air as Fech and Craf attacked him.

‘Uthas,’ Balur growled from behind him.

Without thinking, Corban ran into the chamber, veering left, heading straight for Cywen.

He heard footsteps next to him, glanced to see his mam, her face determined, gripping her spear in one hand, a knife in the other. Storm and Buddai flanked them, overtaking, bounding low and silent towards Cywen. Somehow he knew that behind him others were following.

Someone passed him, taking great bounding strides — Balur, fixed on Uthas.

The giant in front of Cywen turned then. He saw them all pouring into the chamber, his eyes widening, and lifted an axe before him, its blades a black metal that seemed to shimmer and pulse, like the cauldron.

‘Balur — he has the starstone axe,’ Meical called from behind him. The giant shifted his course slightly, barrelling straight at the axe-wielder. Other giants were close behind him.

The one with the axe bellowed, shoving Cywen to one side and swinging his axe above his head. Cywen flew through the air, hit the ground and rolled, coming up to stare back at the giant. She hadn’t seen Corban or her mam. Shield had, though. The stallion clattered over to Corban, swung his head into him and almost knocked him from his feet.

‘It’s good to see you too,’ Corban said, patting his neck.

‘Get the axe,’ Meical was yelling. ‘It will break the spell.’

One of Balur’s kin reached the axe-wielding giant — a female. She lifted a war-hammer to block the axe as it came swinging towards her head. Sparks exploded as the dark blade sliced through the thick handle, carrying on to crunch into the giant’s face and upper chest. She collapsed in a boneless heap, the axe-wielder ripping his weapon free, turning to face the next attacker.

It was Balur.

He ducked the axe, blades hissing over his head, slammed his hammer into the giant’s gut, doubling him over, then swung the hammer-head up, catching his foe full in the face. The blow lifted him from the ground, hurled him backwards, where he crashed to the ground and slid into the corpse of a wyrm. He did not move.

Balur rushed after him and grabbed the black axe, looking back to Meical.

‘Get it out of here, as far away as you can. That will break the spell.’

Balur didn’t need telling twice. He ran for the doorway, disappearing amongst those coming the other way.

Cywen jumped up and ran. Away from Corban, back towards the giant that had thrown her. She crouched down beside his still form, a hand reaching out to probe his neck.

She’s checking for a pulse.

Then Buddai and Storm reached her. Corban saw her throw her arms around Buddai, then tense as she saw Storm, her first reaction to leap backwards. Then she must have realized. She tentatively reached out to Storm, the wolven sniffing her hand, pushing close to lick her face and rub against her, knocking her over. Cywen leaped to her feet, looked around, and saw him and his mam.

CHAPTER ONE HUNDRED AND EIGHTEEN

CYWEN

I must be dreaming.

Figures were pouring into the chamber, swift and silent, any sound of their movement masked by the throbbing hum emanating from the cauldron. At their head were a man and woman. She stared at them, knowing them instantly, despite the changes. Older, leaner, a grimness about them, in their eyes. And a joy as well.

Mam. Corban.

She felt her heart lurch, as if a fist had grabbed and twisted it.

Then she was running to them and they were together, the three of them, hugging, crying, no words, just a deep heart-swelling euphoria.

Her mam was holding her face, kissing her. ‘I’m sorry,’ she was saying, over and over again.

‘You left me,’ Cywen said, remembering in a flood how she’d woken up in Dun Carreg, finding herself alone and abandoned, and all she had been through since then. A swell of fresh emotion welled up in her. ‘You left me,’ she repeated.

‘We thought you were dead; we were told you were dead,’ her mam said. Corban just looked at her with his sad, tear-filled eyes.

‘Why are you here?’ Cywen asked then.

‘For you, Cy. We came to get you,’ Corban said.

She felt hot tears flood her eyes again at that and she hugged them both, so tight, squeezing as if she’d never let them go.

‘No!’ a voice screamed, shrill above the deep reverberations.

Cywen looked up and saw Calidus close to the cauldron. His eyes were wide, rage twisting his features.

Something was changing in the room; the throbbing hum was dying. The black lances of non-light were shrinking, folding back upon themselves towards the cloud above the cauldron. The cloud boiled, expanding then contracting, streaks of lightning sparking inside it. Then with an ear-splitting crack it burst apart, shreds of dark vapour exploding outwards, slamming those about it onto their backs. The constant droning hum was gone, replaced with a sudden silence, leaving an emptiness falling in its place. The sense of fear that she had felt earlier returned.

Something bad is about to happen.

‘We need to get out of here,’ Cywen said.