Dancer's Lament: Path to Ascendancy Book 1 Read online

  The Dal Hon flinched away, sniffed. ‘Just trying to help.’

  ‘Jis trya alp,’ the nacht chattered.

  The young mage tried to slap the creature away but it was far too quick for him, and it bounded off mouthing something that sounded entirely too similar to laughter. The youth now stalked the beast, his walking stick cocked like a club.

  ‘What is to become of us?’ Dorin asked.

  The Jag had returned to massaging his forehead. ‘A welcome diversion, I thought,’ he said from behind his hands. ‘Make the time pass more quickly. Already I regret it.’

  Somewhere in the dark a hissing squalling fight had broken out.

  The Jag lunged to his feet, gesturing. ‘I’m trying to think!’ A wave of power pounded through the chamber, slamming Dorin to the wall and squeezing the breath from him. The entire structure groaned and shifted. Dust flew up in a storm, obscuring everything. Dorin squinted into the haze, coughing and gasping. He held his aching chest, unable to straighten. Ye gods! A mere fit of pique almost crushes me!

  Off in the dark, a wet coughing eased into a laboured bubbling moaning that faded into a last gasping death-rattle. The little nacht emerged from the swirling dust. It gave an almost human shrug. The Jag turned to Dorin and raised a finger. ‘Excuse me one moment.’ The huge creature stood, almost hunched double, his head brushing the shadowed stonework of the ceiling, and lumbered off. Dorin and the nacht watched him disappear. After a time came a gruff bemused growl: ‘He’s not here . . .’

  A stab of anger, and envy, lanced through Dorin. Damn the fellow! Playing with us all along! I’ll have his head. No one does this to Dorin Rav. The nacht happened to be standing just in front of him then, and in an instant he decided what he’d do. And why not? I’m as good as dead anyway . . .

  He snatched up the beast by its neck and pressed a blade under its chin. ‘Come out!’ he shouted. ‘I have your familiar, or pet, or whatever it is!’

  The animal froze for an instant, perhaps in surprise, or disbelief. Then it went limp. It hung in his arms as if dead already and Dorin had to hitch it up to steady it. Damned heavy bastard.

  The Jag stepped out of the gloom. ‘You have my what?’

  ‘Let me out or I’ll slit its throat.’

  The same strange unreadable smile climbed the Jag’s features and he cocked his head. ‘You . . . kill . . . it?’ He laughed soundlessly. Returning to the sarcophagus, he set his elbows upon it then rested his chin on his fists. ‘Very well. I will make you a deal. If you promise to take that thing with you, I will let you go.’

  Dorin stared, utterly surprised. What in the name of Hood . . . ?

  ‘We accept,’ came the Dal Hon’s voice from the darkness at his elbow, and Dorin flinched. The nacht came to life, wriggling and twisting, easily breaking his grip. It plucked the wooden box from his belt and launched itself upon the young mage.

  The Jag studied them anew, his expression calculating. His bright amber gaze slid from Dorin to his companion, and he shook a finger at the Dal Hon. ‘You – you move in ways I have not seen in a long time.’ The blazing eyes shifted to Dorin. ‘Is there nothing you fear? Nothing you would not dare?’ And he laughed again, waving them off. ‘By all means. Good riddance! At least now I shall have some peace and quiet. Though I predict that those without these walls will not!’

  Dorin began edging backwards. ‘The door,’ he hissed to his— what . . . accomplice?

  ‘Not an impediment, I expect,’ the youth answered. The nacht rode his shoulders, a maniac’s grin at its dagger-toothed mouth. Dorin leaned away. Gods, what is this thing?

  The door was as before, the opening just manageable. The nacht scampered through first. It chattered and waved as if urging them on. Dorin squatted on his haunches, suspicious. Large, then small, then large once more? The Jag must have let them in. Must have been bored beyond reason.

  The dark-skinned youth slid through. Dorin cast one last narrowed glance to the rear, as if expecting a quick attack after the lull, but saw nothing. Very well. Back to your frigid gloom and brooding silence. Good riddance to you, I say.

  Outside it was dark – not the dimness of a coming dawn but that of gathering twilight. Much more murky as they were at the bottom of a narrow gorge. Dorin faced the youth who now stood waiting, his walking stick planted before him. He held the nacht curled up in one arm for all the world like a sleeping baby – the ugliest one in existence. ‘So . . .’ Dorin began, clearing his throat. ‘What is your name, then?’

  The Dal Hon’s brows rose as if he was completely startled by the question. ‘My name?’ His eyes darted about the rocks. ‘Ah . . . my name.’ He smiled and raised a finger. ‘Ah! Wu! My name is . . . Wu. Yes, Wu . . . and you?’

  Dorin felt his lips tightening to a slit. If you’re going to use a fake name at least make it up beforehand! He thought of a possible pseudonym for himself – his nickname from his youth? But Beanpole wasn’t exactly the image he wished to project. No other name suggested itself and so he fell back on his own: ‘Dorin.’

  The Dal Hon – Dorin couldn’t bring himself to think of the youth as Wu – gave a thoughtful nod. ‘Good, good. Well . . . it has been amusing, but I must be going. Quite busy, you know. Much in demand.’

  Now Dorin’s gaze narrowed. He brought his hands up close to his baldric. ‘Go? We have to decide how to split . . .’ But the damned fellow was somehow fading away. Blasted mages! How he hated them! His hands flicked out and two blades darted to fly through the mage’s dissolving form.

  The Dal Hon’s expression registered shocked surprise as he disappeared. ‘Amazing! Those would have got me . . . had I been standing there in the first place . . .’

  Mages! Blasted warren-rats! Dorin retrieved his knives, checked their edges. Only mages had ever escaped him. He scanned the dark cliff-sides. And yet . . . they were a long way from anywhere. Time remained. He’d find him. There was really only one place the fellow could possibly be heading for. Li Heng.

  If he didn’t track him down before then he’d find the Hood-damned thief there. Eventually.

  *

  Within the chamber, the Jaghut waved a hand and stone grated and shifted as the entrance sealed itself once again. He returned to studying the ancient pattern of the slats before him – one set out thousands of years ago. His tangled brows rose then, and he sat back, stroking his chin. ‘Well, well . . . You would send two more upon your hopeless fool’s errand.’ He studied the darkness about him as if awaiting an answer. ‘Why should these two fare any better than all those you have sent to their deaths before?’ He waited again, head cocked, listening for a time; then his shoulders slumped and he hung his head. ‘Oh – very well.’ Grumbling, he rose and shambled off into the darkness beyond the lamp’s glow.

  The clank and clatter of rummaging echoed about the chamber before he returned to set an enormous battered full helm upon the stone slab, its grille facing him, and sat once more, sighing. He eyed the helm. ‘So?’ he demanded.

  ‘Your problem, Gothos,’ came a weak, breathless voice from within the bronze helm, ‘is that you give up too easily.’

  Gothos snorted his scorn. ‘And what of you, Azathani?’

  After a long silence the helm answered, sounding almost sad. ‘Our problem is that we cannot.’

  Chapter 1

  DORIN RAV WALKED the dusty beaten earth of Quon’s storied Trunk Road. It was an ancient traders’ way that crossed the midsection of Quon like a narrow belt. From great Quon and Tali in the west, it stretched to the proverbial midsection clasp of Li Heng, and from there onward to the rich vineyards and orchards of wealthy Unta in the east.

  Over thousands of years countless armies had trodden this route. They came marching out of both the east and the west: Bloor and Gris nobles convening to subdue the plains and the populace to the west of them; Tali and Quon kings emptying their treasuries to assemble vast infantry hordes, and eventually succeeding in subjugating the far eastern lands beneath their Iron Legions. Mean
while, across the central plains, generation after generation of the Seti Wolf, Eagle, and Ferret clans raided all points indifferently.

  He walked at a leisurely pace. He was not worried that his quarry might have struck out in any direction other than east. To the west and north lay the vast central grasslands of the Seti. To the south it was many days to any Dal Hon settlement or coastal Kanese confederacy. No, only to the east lay any nearby haven of civilization: the greatest of the independent city states, Li Heng itself.

  The Trunk Road might be storied, he reflected as he walked, but these days it certainly wasn’t busy. Pedestrians such as himself consisted almost entirely of local farmers. Long distance travellers tended to band together into large caravans for protection against Seti raids – and to discourage the attentions of the great man-beast, Ryllandaras.

  When he’d come down out of Tali lands, he’d hired on as a guard with just such a band of traders, religious pilgrims and wanderers. Unfortunately for him, after more than a week without a sighting of the feared Seti, the caravan-mistress had let half her guards go. And so he’d found himself unemployed and cast adrift in the empty, dusty middle of nowhere.

  Unlike his brother guards, he’d not been concerned for his safety. Being mostly of Tali extraction, they’d ganged together to strike back west. He’d continued on, quickly outstripping the caravan’s rather disorganized, laborious pace. He did not fear any attack from the tribesmen, nor did he expect any attention from the legendary man-beast. Alone, he knew he could hide his presence. His opinion differed from his fellow travellers’ regarding strength in numbers: the great clattering mass of banging copperware, shouting drivers, bawling donkeys, and rattling bric-a-brac was to his mind nothing less than an attracter of raiders and unwanted attention.

  And so now he neared Li Heng, and somewhere nearby, ahead or behind, lay his quarry. A fellow who had dared to cheat him . . . Or, perhaps more to the point, had succeeded in cheating him. That was not to be borne. Not by Dorin Rav. Who had been beaten by no one.

  The second day of travel revealed smoke over the prairie to the north, not so far off the trader road. He altered his path to investigate. After pushing through the tall-grass for a few leagues, he came to a wide swath of trampled and broken stalks. The first thing he found was a man’s boot. When he picked it up, he found that it still held a foot.

  It was a caravan, attacked and massacred in the night. By Seti tribesmen, probably. Old treaties existed – once enforced by the Tali Legions – that forbade predation on the road, but they were hardly honoured any longer. And there were always renegades and outlaws. Still, this was awfully close to Hengan lands.

  Walking farther, he realized that it hadn’t been the Seti at all, whether war-party or outlaws. Wagons and carts lay torn apart. Loot glittered among the trampled grass: ironware, clothes, broken chests. Corpses still wore their personal possessions. He paused and knelt at one body. A single swipe of massive claws had torn the woman across the front as deep as her spine. She had twisted as she fell, her hips no longer in line with her shoulders; her viscera lay tossed about, congealing in the dirt. The only reason the organs and intestines remained was that – for the moment – the wild dogs, jackals, and carrion crows had more than enough to eat.

  Her wristlet, he noted, was of gold. This he unlatched and tucked away. Brushing his hands, he continued on. It seemed his earlier instincts regarding the curse of Li Heng, the man-eater’s presence, were well founded. Ryllandaras had rampaged through this caravan like the predator of humans he was. Some named him a giant wolf, others a hyena, or a jackal. Such distinctions were meaningless as far as Dorin was concerned. Ryllandaras was a beast who ate people . . . what more need one know?

  He kicked his way through the wreckage. At one point he stepped over a child’s severed arm. The noise of movement brought him round and his hands went to his baldric. One of the presumed corpses, a man – soldier or caravan guard – was levering himself erect from where he had lain propped up against an overturned wagon. Dorin coolly watched him do so.

  Weaving, stoop-shouldered, the fellow – dark, clothes and armour rent and bloodied – staggered towards him. He was a young man, muscular, half Dal Hon perhaps. His long wavy black hair hung like a curtain of night and Dorin felt a twinge of envy – this one the girls must fawn over. ‘Ryllandaras?’ he called to him.

  The man gave a curt nod.

  Something in that casual acknowledgement irked Dorin – too self-possessed by far. On a chance he asked, ‘You didn’t see anyone else come by, did you?’

  The youth nodded again. ‘Someone passed but I did not see him.’

  Now Dorin frowned. ‘You speak in riddles.’

  ‘I speak the truth. I saw no one go by but someone did. He was humming.’

  That’s him. Humming! Fits all too well. Li Heng for certain. He gave an answering nod. ‘My thanks.’

  The young soldier lurched forward, suddenly animated. Something like a cross between disbelief and disgust twisted his mahogany features. ‘You are not walking away, are you?’

  ‘Yes.’

  The youth opened his arms to gesture all about. ‘But the dead . . . they must be seen to.’

  ‘See to them, then. I’ll not stop you.’

  Another lurched step, the lad’s face hardening. A hand settled on the longsword’s bloodied grip. ‘You’ll stay and help, or greet Hood.’

  Dorin’s hands went to his hips where he carried his heaviest fighting blades. What was troubling everyone lately? Was it some sort of fog of animus carried by the man-beast? ‘Reconsider, friend. There is no need to start a feud. The dead are dead. The crows and jackals will take care of them.’

  The lad drew and Dorin flinched backwards, actually taken by surprise – so fast!

  But the youth staggered sideways, gasping his pain, one hand across his chest where the torn mail and leathers hung in tatters.

  Dorin eased his hands from his knife grips, began backing away. ‘Perhaps you should just rest – or join them yourself.’

  ‘The beast might return. He said we’d meet again.’

  ‘He said—’ Dorin froze. ‘You duelled the Curse of Quon? The man-eater?’

  The lad’s gaze was on the horizon, shadowed, as he rubbed his chest. ‘We fought all through the night.’

  Dorin laughed outright, sneering. To think he almost had me believing. ‘Learn to temper your lies, hick. No one has ever faced him and lived.’

  A sullen glance from the other. ‘I care not what you think. I know the truth of it . . . and that is enough for me.’

  The truth of it? Smacks of religion. The lad must be an adherent. Dead on his feet now, in any case. Must have been cut down by another guard while fleeing the beast and is now trying for a cover story. Dorin continued backing away. Well, he’ll have to do better than claim that he faced Ryllandaras!

  ‘I will remember you!’ the lad shouted after him. ‘And this insult to the dead!’

  Dorin had been pushing backwards through the tall-grass. His last glimpse of the guard was of him digging among the spilled cargo and raising a young girl to her feet.

  He turned away with a shake of his head. Insult? Where was this fellow from? How provincial. He faced east. Two days’ hike away lay Li Heng. Surely there, of all places, he would find a true assassins’ guild where his skills would be appreciated.

  And there also he would find this upstart Dal Hon mage and he would have his revenge for this . . . for this . . . He slowed, cast a troubled glance back to the smoking fields behind. For this insult?

  * * *

  Dorin had grown up in Tali, and so was no gawking farm-boy. Yet while that west coast city was far larger than Li Heng, it was a loose and sprawling collection of distinct precincts and quarters. It, and its neighbouring city and sister state of Quon, might have pressed their names upon the entire continent – though many still refused to acknowledge the claim – but it did not possess anything like Heng’s titanic famous fortifications. ‘Strong
as the walls of Heng’ was a saying common across the land.

  All through the final day of his approach up the trader road, those walls reared against the surrounding Seti Plains like a distant butte or outcrop of rock. Or like a wart, Dorin appended, reluctant to grant the city any unearned regard. To either side fields hung heavy with grain, and market garden plots lay ripening for harvest. Locals pulled carts burdened with produce, while sheep and hogs jostled Dorin on their way to be butchered.

  Many of the fields boasted curious stone heaps that mystified him. After noting a few, he fell in with a girl swaying beneath a burden of large wicker baskets hung from a yoke across her bare, scraped-raw shoulders. Each brimmed over with bricks of cow manure.

  ‘Those piles of field stones,’ he asked. ‘What are they?’ The girl flinched, peered up with scared deer-like eyes through dirty tangled hair. Young, startlingly young, for such an onerous chore.

  ‘The stones . . .?’ he repeated.

  ‘Not from around here, are you,’ she said, her vowels elongated in the Hengian manner.

  ‘No.’ He did not say where he was from; in fact, he was quite pleased to be hard to place, carrying a medium hue neither so dark as Dal Hon nor the olive of Tali or the Kanese confederacy, and not so burly or wavy-haired as to be Gris or Untan.

  ‘Bolt-holes,’ she said.

  He cocked his head closer, wrinkled his nose at the stink. The cow shit, one must hope. ‘Pardon?’

  The girl glanced fearfully about the surrounding fields. ‘Run there if he comes. Hide inside.’

  Ah. He. The man-beast. Ryllandaras. An entire society living under siege. Thus the walls, of course. Nothing more than one big bolt-hole. That put things into their proper perspective.

  ‘Thanks, child.’ Child? Why say that? He was barely older. ‘Pray tell, why the manure? What do they do with it, there, in the city?’

  The girl’s thick dark brows climbed in unguarded disbelief. ‘Why, they burn it a’course. Don’t see too many trees around, do you?’

  Burn it? For fuel? To cook? Ye Gods, how disgusting . . .