Dirge for a Necromancer (12 page)

“No one’s going to give you a sword,” Raettonus told him. “You’re already dead.”

“They’re so close,” said the ghost, not hearing Raettonus. “I can hear them. They’re chanting in that demon’s tongue of theirs! Gods protect me—why won’t someone give me a sword? Place it in my hand! Better yet, place it through my throat! A sword—gods protect me—a sword! They’ll tear me apart!”

“They already have, you stupid fool,” Raettonus said. There was pity in his voice, beneath the hard and cynical tones—genuine pity, without any barbs.

Vormekk reached out one colorless, translucent hand toward Raettonus’ shoulder. “Gods protect me—please, I beg you as a humble man,” he said, his face wet with tears. “I am a servant of the king and no more. Please, give me your sword. I could protect us both and the citadel too, if I only had a sword!”

Raettonus gave the apparition no answer, but only went and sat with his back to the wall, watching the ghost fret. The long-dead General Vormekk continued to cry for his sword and, eventually, Raettonus drifted off to sleep, his muddled dreams colored by the centaur’s pleas.

He was awoken quite a time a later by the sound of hooves as Dohrleht and Maeleht entered the room with Ebha walking quietly behind them. Raettonus rose to meet them in the center of the room. The young centaurs greeted Raettonus, and they walked together toward the sarcophagus and sat down before it. With little pomp, Raettonus got down to their lesson.

Raettonus knew well how things would go for them. The first time he had reached the point where he was able to see ghosts was still so vivid to him that it might as well have been no more than a day ago, much less centuries and centuries. It wasn’t the sort of thing which one easily forgot.

They would be able to hear the ghost before they could really see him. It started out as a dim murmuring, impossible to make out. As Raettonus instructed and corrected them, the words would become clearer and seem less to come from all around them. After several hours, Maeleht was the first of the brothers to be able to make out the ghost’s form, with Dohrleht following soon after. The ghost noticed them watching him and wheeled on them. “A sword! Please—my sword!” he cried.

Maeleht shuddered and inched himself back, gripping the tattered sleeve of Raettonus’ tunic with one frail hand. “He can’t hurt you,” Raettonus assured him.

“Please,” said Vormekk. “Please, give me my sword!”

“Isn’t there anything we can do to help him?” asked Dohrleht. “He’s so frightened.”

Raettonus let out a sigh and stood, putting his hand on the hilt of his rapier. “I suppose you ought to understand, boys, that the cure is usually worse than the disease,” he said as he walked toward the ghost. He drew his blade and offered it to Vormekk’s ghost, hilt-first. The ghost looked at him with wide, disbelieving eyes before reaching out toward it.

“May the gods protect you, sir!” he said, closing his incorporeal fingers around the hilt. He pulled his hand away, and with it came a ghostly broadsword. Raettonus slid his own blade back into his belt and stepped back.

Vormekk turned away from them and raised his spectral blade, taking a stance which planted his hooves. A pounding sound filled the chamber. “Don’t look away,” Raettonus told his students. “This is important for you to see.”

The ghost screamed out in pain, and his sword shattered and turned to smoke. Gashes began to appear all over Vormekk, welling up with black blood that dripped upon the stone ground. The ghost cried out as more and more wounds appeared and swung his arms at foes only he could see. Raettonus heard Dohrleht gasp, and Maeleht begin to cry and cough. Blood leaked from all over the ghostly general, falling in great, dark puddles on the cold, stone floor. For almost half an hour Vormekk screamed and wrenched his body about as more and more wounds appeared across his form. Finally, he collapsed to his knees and dissolved into smoke. The young centaurs stared forward in horror.

“That’s what it’s like, when you help them,” Raettonus said. “I don’t know where they go, but I know what happens to them before they go there. You’re going to see them for the rest of your life. They’ll beg your help. Most times, there won’t be anything you can do for them. On the occasions you can do something for them, however, this is how it ends.”

Maeleht began to sob, his chest rattling. He grabbed a hold of Raettonus’ tunic and buried his face in it. Hesitantly, Raettonus put his arm around the boy’s shoulders, but he didn’t know what to say to comfort him. The first time Raettonus had seen a ghost depart like that, he had been a child in Sir Slade’s care, and it had terrified him awfully. Slade had pulled him up onto his lap and brushed his hair back behind his ear.

“It’s all right, Raettonus,” Sir Slade had told him and kissed his forehead. “The ghost is all right. It looked painful—it might’ve been very painful—but he’s in a better place now. He’s in heaven, Raettonus. It’s a good, beautiful place. He’s not in pain anymore. He’s in heaven.”

But Raettonus couldn’t lie to the child and claim there was a heaven when he was certain there was not.

Chapter Eight

It was a year and two months into the siege.

Food was running out. They’d begun to hunt the mice and rats living in the walls. Raettonus would eat the mice but not the rats, he told them.

There was still some grain and pickled vegetables, but they weren’t going to last. Not very long.

General Tykkleht had suddenly taken ill and was confined to his bed. When Raettonus went to his room to see him—at the general’s request—he found him a sad, saggy shell of the man he’d been. His face was pale and covered in sweat, and his bulging eyes were cloudy with illness. His skin sagged, and dark veins showed against his colorless flesh. He would die soon, Raettonus was certain.

“Ah, Magician,” said Tykkleht weakly as he entered. “Excuse me for not getting up. Here, come closer. I can barely see you.”

Raettonus walked to his bedside. “You don’t look well, General,” he remarked.

“I don’t feel well, Magician,” answered Tykkleht. His breathing was ragged as he lay on his side, his upper body twisted upward to look at Raettonus. Flies were gathering on his hindquarters, and he didn’t seem to notice. “We’re in a bad way, Magician. A very, very bad way. The Tahlehsons are wearing us down, and we’re going to have to fight them sooner or later.”

“Yes, I imagine so.”

“They outnumber us at least fifty to one,” continued the general, his breathing becoming more and more labored. “When they attack…it’s going to be a bloodbath.”

“Men are born to die,” Raettonus told him evenly.

“Even so, I’d rather my men die years and years from now, safe and warm in their homes,” Tykkleht told him. “You’re not interested in our plight. I can see that clearly. But please—you have a heart, don’t you, Magician? If you love Zylekkha, even a little, fight for us. You’re a powerful mage—everyone says so. You could easily turn their army away. We wouldn’t need to spill any of our blood here.”

“It’s your fortress to defend, Tykkleht,” Raettonus said, “not mine.”

He started away, but Tykkleht caught his arm with one clammy hand. His grip was not as tight as it once might’ve been. “Why are you so callous?” asked Tykkleht. His chest wheezed sadly as the words tumbled up from his coarse throat. “Every man in here will die when we fight that army if you don’t help us. My sons will die! Gods above, man—are you so cruel as to just let the Tahlehsons take us, and Zylekkha, when you could prevent it?”

“I can live in an annex of Tahlehsohr just as easily as I can live in Zylekkha,” Raettonus told him. “Besides, the way I see it, either the Tahlehsons have already crippled your precious kingdom or else they haven’t, and you’ll be seeing reinforcements soon.”

“I doubt we’ll see them soon enough,” Tykkleht said, and he began to cough. There was a knock at the door just as Tykkleht’s coughing fit died down. “Enter!”

The door opened and a young soldier stepped in, covered in sweat and breathing hard, his equine portions all in a lather. “General,” he said. “An unarmed elf has approached from the Tahlehson host under a peace banner. He wants to talk to you.”

Tykkleht said, “I’ll see him. But first bring Captain Daeblau to me and send in Byrekk to help me get into my armor. Show the Tahlehson to my study.”

“Yes, General,” said the soldier with a bow, before retreating.

“I suppose I’ll leave you to your meeting,” said Raettonus, as he started toward the door.

“No—stay,” said Tykkleht. “Even if you refuse to defend us, at the very least they don’t have to know that. I’d rather they, instead, see that we have a powerful magician within our walls. They don’t need to know you don’t have any loyalty. So, stay and attend the meeting with us.”

Raettonus sighed and crossed his arms. “As you wish, General.”

An older soldier entered and helped Tykkleht up from his bed before buckling on his armor—elegant full plate armor that had been carefully polished, with gold inlays in various designs running across its gleaming surface. At some point while Tykkleht was being helped into his armor, Daeblau entered and came to stand beside Raettonus. “How’s he doing?” the centaur asked the magician in a quiet voice, nodding toward Tykkleht.

“Not well,” Raettonus told him. “But I suppose you already knew that?”

Daeblau smiled slightly and turned away as Tykkleht walked uncertainly toward them. When the younger centaur offered his arm to steady the general, he was waved away. “I can walk on my own four hooves,” Tykkleht said. “I’m just a little out of practice, that’s all. But never mind. My study’s not far. Magician, if you’d please, this way.”

The Tahlehson was already seated in the study when they entered and stood to greet them. The soldier had called him an elf, but it was obvious that had only been half right. He had the large, teardrop ears of an elf, but also the tall build and brown hair of a werewolf. His eyes were a light blue, and he had a genial face, though there was an arrogance about his expression. He was a handsome man with a strong chin and jaw and a straight nose. The Tahlehson soldier was clad in bronze scale mail with the coat of arms of his king enameled on his silver breastplate—a green lion striking with both paws on a field of yellow and blue. About his shoulders hung a well-groomed wolf pelt, worn in the fashion of a cape. “Ah, General Tykkleht,” he said in common Zylekkhan with only the hint of an accent. He offered his hand to the general. “Well met. My name is General Diahsis of Fybuk, Councilor of Shadows to King Saemohr of Tahlehsohr.”

Tykkleht took his hand and gripped it as hard as he could manage so as not to appear weak. “Well met, indeed,” said Tykkleht. “This is my Captain of the Garrison, Daeblau of Bribarrah. And this is Magician Raettonus—who, I am sure, you’ve heard of?”

“I have,” affirmed Diahsis, turning his light blue eyes on Raettonus and looking him up and down. His eyes were the same color as Sir Slade’s, though they held none of the melancholy. As he examined Raettonus, he cocked one eyebrow and smiled crookedly. “It’s an honor to meet you, Magician. And you as well, Captain.”

“Shall we sit?” suggested Tykkleht, motioning to some sofas crafted in the fashion of most centaurian furniture—large and low to the ground.

Diahsis nodded and they took their seats, with Tykkleht and Daeblau each taking up one of the sofas and Raettonus and Diahsis side-by-side on the third. Diahsis smiled kindly at Raettonus as they sat down and did not seem at all dismayed to receive only an icy scowl in return. “Well, gentlemen,” he said when the centaurs had settled into their sofas. “I’m sure you’ve noticed my army camped a few miles down your mountain?”

“We have,” said Tykkleht.

“We intend to have this fort,” Diahsis told him. “I’m not a hard man, General. I’d be more than happy to let you surrender.”

“Zylekkhans do not surrender,” said Tykkleht calmly.

“But if you don’t want to give in,” Diahsis continued, as though the old general had not said a word, “we are more than ready to breach you. You don’t have the numbers to stand up to us or else you would have already tried. I know why you’re hiding behind your walls, General Tykkleht. Your walls cannot protect you.”

“My walls are solid stone,” Tykkleht told him.

“Even stone can be worn away, supposing one has the patience—and I am nothing if not patient, General,” replied the half-elf Tahlehson. He continued to smile pleasantly, as if this conversation were something of little consequence. “If, however, you should choose to surrender, we will not harm any of your soldiers and even offer them a place in Tahlehsohr’s army. Those who do not want to pledge their allegiance to our king will be confined, but no further harm will come to them.”

“We will not budge on this,” said Tykkleht firmly. “If you attempt to invade this citadel, blood will be shed.”

“And it will all be yours,” said Diahsis. He crossed his legs and folded his hands in his lap. “Please, think of your men and not of your pride, hm? I mean, what good will your pride do you if you force me to breach your walls? Can you use your pride to staunch your men’s wounds, General Tykkleht? Can your pride raise the dead?”

“It is not pride that rejects your terms, but loyalty,” Tykkleht told him flatly. “I serve Zylekkha until the day I die.”

Diahsis chuckled softly, his gaze locked onto the older general’s pale face and the fever sweat glistening there on his nose and beneath his eyes. “That doesn’t look very far away,” he said. “Seriously, though, you should at least consider my generous, merciful offer instead of condemning your men to death from the get-go, shouldn’t you?”

“There is nothing to consider,” replied Tykkleht. “Tell me, General Diahsis, if our situations were reversed, would you surrender? Would you abandon Tahlehsohr just like that?”

Diahsis continued to smile. “Our situations wouldn’t be reversed,” he said. “I make it a point never to let surrender be my only option.”

“And what makes you certain it’s my only option?”

Again, Diahsis chuckled. “I know what you see when you look at me. You see an elf. ‘This is only an elf,’ you must think to yourself, looking at me,” he said. “You must think of me that, ‘this is an elf, and he is not as clever as a centaur.’ But that would be wrong. I am every bit as clever as a centaur. More clever than many of them, really, I’d be willing to bet.”

He leaned forward, all the humor gone from his expression though he was still smiling. “I’ve been observing your fortress for the year I’ve been camped beneath it,” he said. “I’ve watched your patrols on the walls, and I’ve sent scouts around to count them—yes, scouts, and you never caught them, did you? I’ve trained my men exceptionally well. It’s obvious what kind of force you have here, General. That is, what kind of force you don’t have here. Of course surrender’s not your only option—but your other option amounts to suicide. Certainly, if you’d rather die than surrender, that’s one thing—but what about your men? Would you kill every man here when I have already offered to absorb them into my army, or to simply hold them prisoner until the war is over?”

“Zylekkhans do not surrender,” Tykkleht said again. “Your assessment of the danger your attack may pose to my men is completely wrong-headed. Here in my employ is the Magician Raettonus—why should I fear you?”

“Ah, yes, the Magician Raettonus,” said Diahsis. He grinned and turned to look at Raettonus. “Even in Tahlehsohr they tell stories about you. I must admit you are…shorter than I expected. More handsome, as well. Tell me, Magician, how much does Zylekkha mean to you?”

Tykkleht gave Raettonus a desperate look. With his eyes, he begged the man to tell a lie. Raettonus look from him back to General Diahsis’ smiling face. “Not much,” he said coolly.

“So I expected,” said Diahsis. He looked back to Tykkleht. “Well, there you have it, General. Those are my terms—you need only surrender, and no harm comes to you or your men. I won’t hurt a hair on their flanks, so long as you surrender Kaeba to me.”

Pulling himself up as straight and tall as he could, Tykkleht repeated his same mantra of decline. “Zylekkhans do not surrender.”

“Well, then, I hope that Zylekkhans are happy to abide by that when they have death in their mouths,” said Diahsis with a gentle shrug. He rose from the low sofa and smoothed the wrinkles from his silken kilt. “I’m sorry to find you so set about this. It’s a shame. I’d heard from my contacts that you really were a bright military mind once. Perhaps age has softened your head? Though, you’d be the first man I ever met who got more idealistic with age. Good day, General, and believe me when I say that I really am sorry we could not see eye to eye on this. I apologize for the briefness of my visit, but I wanted to be certain you would not budge. I really am disappointed, and you have my condolences on the losses you’ll receive.”

“Good day,” Tykkleht said. His voice was stony.

“I’ll show you to the door, if you’d please, General Diahsis,” said Daeblau. He stood and offered his arm to the foreigner. Diahsis thanked him and took it and, with one last glance at Raettonus and a roguish smile, allowed himself to be led away.

Once Diahsis and Daeblau had left, Tykkleht let out a long sigh. “Just who does that elven cur think he is? Telling us to surrender,” muttered the general. “He was so blunt about it all, as if it were an absolute certainty that this fort could not withstand him.”

“You probably should’ve taken him up on the offer,” Raettonus said. “For your sons’ sakes.”

Tykkleht looked at Raettonus and then looked away. “I love my sons very much, Magician, you must understand that,” he said. “But I swore to serve the Zylekkhan crown. I have to do what’s best for the kingdom, not what’s best for me. I’d love to see Dohry and Mae safe and happy. I’d love to see that more than anything… But when it comes at the cost of betraying the crown, it’s something I cannot do. I… It’s the hardest thing in the world, but there it is. I cannot betray Zylekkha. Not even for their sake.”

Raettonus had to help Tykkleht to his feet and back into his room, where he was quickly received by a soldier who undressed him. Excusing himself, Raettonus left the ill general.

He hadn’t gone very far down the hall before he met Dohrleht. “Raettonus!” called Dohrleht, waving to him and limping over on his crutch. “I just saw Daeblau talking to an elf. Is that the Tahlehson everyone was talking about?”

“It was,” Raettonus said, not easing his pace. Dohrleht limped after him.

“What did he talk about?”

“Surrender.”

“His?”

“Ours.”

“We’re not surrendering, though, are we?” asked Dohrleht, looking scandalized. “Zylekkhans don’t surrender.”

“So your father said, when asked,” Raettonus said curtly. That seemed to please Dohrleht, and he increased his pace to keep up with the magician.

“I’m worried about Maeleht,” said Dohrleht, after he had closed the gap between himself and Raettonus. “He found a ghost on the battlements, and now he spends so much time up there… He misses meals. It’s not good for him. He’s frail enough without missing his meals because he was talking to a ghost.”

“He hasn’t been missing lessons,” Raettonus said.

“Well, no, but—”

“If he hasn’t been missing lessons, I don’t have a reason to care what Maeleht does in his spare time,” said Raettonus. “I’m not his mother. I suppose the person you might want to tell about any habits of his that might worry you is your father.”