Eyes of stone and golden haunted
Truth and terror now are cornered.
The lantern flickered one final time… and went out. Grisket cursed in the darkness. It was only a small emergency lamp, not designed for extended periods of use. The candle wick had burnt itself out.
He straightened, buffeted by the wind, which was slowly dwindling into erratic bursts. Freezing showers of droplets rained down on him from the trees above. He squinted around himself. There was no hope in trying to strike a flame to any of the loose sticks or drenched foliage; he'd be there all night.
He had lost his only source of light.
Essentially, he had lost the trail.
"Dammit!" he cursed again. "Damn the Gods, dammit!" He peered into the darkness, watching, listening for anything that might give him a clue as to where the Muron might be, but could make out only vague, shifting shadows.
Any of them could have been the black beast.
"Ferrian!" he called again.
No response.
Grisket stood for a long moment, considering what to do. With a light to see by, he had been tracking the Muron easily, its prints were clear and the crushed undergrowth left a conspicuous trail. It wound about avoiding trees, but was heading generally eastwards, away from the highway. He wondered if he should continue in that direction, trusting that the Muron would keep on its selected course, but then quickly dismissed the idea. Without stars or moon to navigate and barely able to see his hand in front of his face, he would almost certainly lose his bearings. Worse, it was entirely possible the Muron might stop to rest and he could stumble right past it in the darkness, oblivious.
He sighed in frustration. His only other choices then were to wait the night out here, or turn around and retrace his steps. At least then he would be certain he would eventually come out on the main road. Dawn was still several hours away. He could go back to the city and fetch some supplies, weapons and help, and return as quickly as possible to continue the search.
The latter option seemed the most practical one but somehow, Grisket could not bring himself to abandon Ferrian to his fate, even for a short while.
Their last conversation replayed itself painfully in his mind. Aari had of course been right: an annoying but heartening trait of his. Grisket should have been completely open with Ferrian from the beginning, should have told him the truth while they were back in Forthwhite in comfortable surroundings, when he was in a more reasonable state of mind. Instead, he had waited until the boy was cold, tired, wet and hungry, uncertain about his past and even less of his future. Any wonder he had reacted the way he did.
Staring into the restless shadows, eyes hard and dark as the night, he decided that he would rescue Ferrian if he had to follow the blasted Muron to the door of the Dark World. He owed the boy that much, at least.
As he crouched in the dubious shelter of a damp bush, pulling his collar up and hugging himself against the chill, a small, lonely thought wandered through his tired mind: I can do nothing more for poor Aari, but Ferrian is not yet beyond my reach.
I will not lose him.
* * *
Although it had been only an illusion, the memory of it flew after Sirannor like a murderous bird, attacking his skull until he thought it would shatter. Pain built inside him until it finally broke free of his body in a wrenching cry of anguish.
Reining in his horse sharply, he dropped from the saddle, staggered a few steps and came up against the remains of a building; one hand resting on the wall, the other still clutching Hawk's sword. He sagged back against the dusty stone, panting with the weight of his grief.
His hands curled tightly into fists and his teeth gritted. Fight it! he screamed at himself. Fight it! Do not let it tear you apart!
Closing his eyes, he sank within himself, deeper and deeper until he wavered on the very edge of consciousness, where no intruding senses could reach him. He found there the still, silent place that he had trained himself to retreat to before entering any battle.
There was a magnolia tree, huge and quiet, powerful and beautiful. The perfume of its giant blossoms soothed his chaotic emotions, roots spread down through his limbs, twining around his bones, lending him its strength. A child's voice, sweet and sad, singing through the ancient grey branches washed Aari's blood away and the Angel's accusatory voice diminished into the silence of the sun.
When Sirannor opened his eyes again, his thoughts were focused once more, clear and sharp as his blade. He returned to his horse, leapt astride and continued on.
No wings, real or imaginary, followed after.
A short while later, he rounded a corner, passed beneath a broken arch and found himself in a large, circular open space, filled with bright moonlight. A figure lay slumped on the white carpet of sand a dozen yards away.
It was Hawk.
Sirannor stopped and stared at the body for a moment, then dismounted cautiously, wary of further tricks. He walked towards Hawk slowly.
Upon drawing closer, he saw that his friend was not injured or dead, as he had feared; but crying, sobbing his heart out into the sand.
At once, the Captain knew, though he couldn't explain why, that this was not an illusion.
Quickly, he went to Hawk's side and shook him. "Hawk!" he said.
The soldier did not respond.
"Hawk, get up!" he ordered.
"C-Carmine…" Hawk wept.
"She is not here!" Sirannor replied. "She was never here! Whatever you think you have experienced, it is not real! Look up."
Hawk lifted his head, sand stuck to his face with tears, and looked hesitantly over his shoulder.
The courtyard was empty, save for the Captain and himself.
He pushed himself up into a sitting position. "W-what?" he stammered in bewilderment. He pointed to the bare stone dais in the centre of the courtyard. "There was… there was…" He swallowed, decided that finishing the sentence was pointless and said instead: "She was here, she was real… she kissed me! I felt her!"
Sirannor shook his head. "You felt her because you wanted to," he explained softly. "Let me guess: you saw her die?"
Enjoying this book? Seek out the original to ensure the author gets credit.
"Oh… Gods…" Hawk dropped his head into his gauntleted hands, shuddering. Sirannor placed a hand gently on his friend's shoulder. "Carmine is safe," he reassured him.
"What... what the hell is going on here?" Hawk asked when he finally lifted his head.
The Captain stood up, his grey eyes slowly scanning their surroundings. "Something is playing with our minds," he replied quietly. "It reaches into our souls, tears out the darkest thoughts it can find and attacks us with them."
"Why would…" Hawk began, then stopped as yet another figure came running frantically into the courtyard. It tripped and fell over in the sand, scrambled to its feet, then caught sight of Hawk and Sirannor and froze.
Cimmeran.
There was a split second in which the Captain and the servant's eyes met, and then…
Hawk leapt to his feet as quickly as he could, but the old man was frighteningly fast. Cimmeran let out a shrieking wail and tore off across the courtyard, but Sirannor was on him in seconds.
"Captain, no!" Hawk cried desperately, running after them, but to his stunned relief, the servant was not yet dead. Sirannor had pinned him to the ground with his blade pressed hard against his throat.
"Why?" Sirannor hissed. "WHY?!" His scream echoed off the silent shattered buildings.
Hawk stopped and kept his distance, a chill passing through him at the sound.
Cimmeran began to cry.
"ANSWER ME!"
"He…" Cimmeran choked, "he was d-dying a-any-way…"
Blood appeared on Cimmeran's neck as Sirannor's sword cut into him. "You expect me to believe it was a mercy killing?" he spat. "Is that how you are justifying it to yourself, YOU PATHETIC LITTLE…?"
"I… no!" Cimmeran cried, tears streaming down his face. "I just… I j-just wanted to be f-free!"
"Free?!" Sirannor's eyes burned with barely controlled rage. "How could you possibly hope to achieve such a goal by murdering my young companion in cold blood? What kind of foul, twisted logic dictates that?!"
"I thought… I thought," Cimmeran sobbed, "that you w-wouldn't need me any more if the Angel was g-gone…"
"What are you talking about?"
Cimmeran closed his eyes wretchedly. "You… wanted me to lead you to the… to the Sorcerer's Valley, but I can't go back there, I can't! I can't! Lord A-Arzath will find me…"
"What has the sorcerer got to do with…" Sirannor stopped suddenly, staring at the scrawny, frightened little man before him. Then, slowly, his expression began to change. The energy and rage seemed to drain out of him. He sank back on his haunches and his sword arm slackened, the blade slipping from the servant's throat.
"No…" he whispered in disbelief.
Hawk watched them, puzzled. "I don't understand…" he said.
Sirannor seemed oblivious of his presence. He was still staring at Cimmeran, albeit now with a haunted expression. "The other sorcerer you told us of," he said slowly in a quiet, dark voice. "Lord Requar. He is a healer?"
Cimmeran nodded his head jerkily.
The Captain closed his eyes, despair etching deeper lines across his rocky features. "And you assumed," he continued, "we were so intent on finding him because we were in need of his skills. That is true, but not for the reason you think. It was not for Aari."
When Sirannor opened his eyes, they were cold steel. "We are looking for Lord Requar to help Ferrian, for he is cursed. You killed the wrong person, servant."
Horror filled Cimmeran's eyes. "No!" he wailed. "You didn't tell me the truth!"
“And what,” Sirannor replied in a low, furious voice, “would have happened if we had? Would you have killed Ferrian instead?”
Slowly, the Captain stood up and looked down at the cowering man, disgusted. "You loathe Lord Arzath," he said, "yet you are no less heartless, Cimmeran. You do not deserve truth. You do not deserve freedom. You do not deserve to breathe." And with that, he flipped his sword so that it pointed downwards and stabbed it at Cimmeran's head.
Hawk gasped and Cimmeran screamed, but the blade stuck in the sand, an inch from his pale face. Still holding onto the sword, Sirannor leaned over until the servant was staring directly up into his eyes and could not fail to see the hatred glimmering there. "You killed one of my dearest friends, you bastard," he whispered. "But your death will not come by my hands." He straightened, reached into the pocket of his long coat and pulled out a length of cord. Then he kicked Cimmeran onto his stomach, yanked his hands behind his back and bound them.
"W-what are you going to do with me?" Cimmeran whimpered.
"I'm sure your master will be pleased to see you," Sirannor replied icily, tightening the cords with a vicious jerk.
Immediately, Cimmeran began to struggle and scream, and when that proved ineffective, dissolved into pleading sobs. Sirannor ignored him, dragged him to his feet and retrieved Hawk's sword, which he handed back to its owner.
Hawk took it with a sombre nod of thanks. "Any idea how to get out of this bloody place?" he asked, re-sheathing the weapon at his side. "I rode for ages and couldn't get anywhere. Except… here, of course." Despite the Captain's reassurance, he cast another anxious glance at the dais.
"It should only be a matter of…"
Hawk turned back. "Only a matter of what?"
Sirannor did not reply.
"Captain?"
The Captain held his hand up quickly for silence, and hissed at Cimmeran to shut up. They all went still, listening.
There was a sound, distant but unsettling, a strange crashing, clinking roar, like an avalanche of shattering glassware. It was continuous and getting steadily louder.
Hawk spun, scything the courtyard with his gaze, but it was a frozen panorama. Nothing moved except Sirannor's horse, which bolted into the ruins, spooked by the sound.
Hawk fought a strong desire to do the same. "What the hell is that?" he said fearfully.
Sirannor frowned, seemingly undecided, but said nothing. Cimmeran hung his head with a defeated look on his face, as though he didn't care what was approaching, as long as it wasn't a green-eyed, black-clad sorcerer.
Then Hawk caught a glimpse of movement on the edge of the plaza. Something odd was happening to the ground. It was changing, becoming reflective – the sand was melting into a solid, smooth surface, like a mirror…
"Uh," Hawk said, taking an uneasy step backwards as the glassy stain flowed around the buildings and began to spread towards them, accompanied by the bizarre and now very loud shattering sound, "is this a good thing or a bad thing?"
The Captain watched the night sky painting itself across the ground and muttered: "I don't imagine anything that happens here is a good thing." He turned, searching, and his eyes fell upon the abandoned dais. "The dais," he said suddenly. "Now."
Sweeping around, he strode quickly towards the centre of the plaza, pulling an unresisting Cimmeran with him. Hawk hesitated, still rattled by the memory of the Dragon, but after taking another glance at the advancing mirror-stain, he swallowed back his fear and hurried after. "But… it's just an illusion, right?" he said as he caught up to Sirannor, trying to ignore his thundering heart. "It can't hurt us, right? Y-you said nothing was real…"
"That was what I believed, up until this point," Sirannor replied. "Now, I am not so certain…"
Hawk's heart took a frightening leap. "You're not certain?!"
"This does not appear to be a direct manifestation of our fears, as the previous visions were," Sirannor explained, raising his voice slightly over the crashing sound, "unless any of us have a particular fear of mirrors?"
When no one responded to that, he shook his head. "This is something different," he said darkly.
"Thanks," Hawk said loudly. "That's extremely reassuring, I'm glad I asked!" He glanced nervously over his shoulder, then quickened his pace to a jog. "It's catching up!" he cried.
"Do not run!" Sirannor barked in warning.
The strange sound increased to a deafening roar, the glassy stain sweeping towards their feet like an incoming tide…
... the sound passed over them in a crash, and the glass slid beneath them…
… and the mirror-stain continued towards the dais, eating up every last grain of white sand until the entire floor of the courtyard had been transformed into a great silver plain.
The roar faded gradually and the Old Quarter once again watched and waited in deep silence.
Sirannor, Hawk and Cimmeran had stopped, finding themselves seemingly suspended in the middle of an infinite starry expanse.
"Well," Hawk said hesitantly as they all stared down at their reflections, "that… that wasn't so bad…"
Sirannor's expression, however, remained troubled. "Hmm…"
The effect of the mirrored ground, if not outright terrifying, was certainly disconcerting. Hawk found that he was beginning to experience vertigo and looked up quickly, taking deep breaths. Cimmeran gazed at it deploringly as though hoping they would all fall into the heavens.
"Alright," Hawk said after a moment, mentally steadying himself. "Let's go. It's only glass." He set out determinedly.
Crack.
He froze, and looked down.
A thin, dark line was creeping outwards from his boot, cutting a jagged mark across his reflection. As he watched, more splinters appeared, branching out with small snapping sounds.
"I think," Sirannor said quietly as cracks began to form beneath his own feet, "that we should get onto the dais, right now."
No one needed any encouragement. Slowly and carefully, trying to tread as lightly as possible, they resumed walking towards the dais. The glass creaked ominously, each step sending a spider web of cracks crawling across the smooth mirrored surface.
Then suddenly there came another distant roar, deeper pitched than the first and advancing much more quickly. The ground quivered with its approach, quickening the spread of the cracks.
"Oh no… " Hawk moaned. "I can't handle any more of–"
CRASH.
One of the buildings on the perimeter of the plaza simply exploded. Bits of masonry flew outwards in all directions, smashing into the glass, glittering shards raining everywhere. Something massive came hurtling out of the dust cloud, bowling across the courtyard towards the three men, crushing the mirror to pieces in its wake.
It was a gigantic stone ball.
Travelling extremely fast.