The Binding Stone (The Dragon Below, Book 1) (8 page)

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Authors: Don Bassingthwaite

BOOK: The Binding Stone (The Dragon Below, Book 1)
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Something lurked in the trees overhead, peering down out of the darkness. Singe prayed that it wasn't Geth. Half blind from the light that shone from his rapier, he could see little enough, but in the course of more than a decade of serving with the Blademarks, he had learned to recognize the feeling of being watched. He continued along the path that he had finally stumbled onto a short while earlier. The strange bellows still rolled out across the valley from somewhere ahead. If whatever was in the trees made any sound, the bellow drowned it out.
Singe kept his eyes on the ground or on the shadows ahead, anywhere but up. With every step, awareness of the thing in the trees
prickled across the back of his neck. He forced himself to remain calm, to stay relaxed as he moved closer to the thing. It didn't seem to move, but he could feel it still watching him. Closer ...
Directly underneath it, he stopped sharply, glanced up, and, flinging an arm over his eyes, snapped out a brittle word.
Up among the leaves, light burst in dazzling flash. There was a harsh croak and something crashed through the branches toward a clear patch of sky. Even with his eyes shaded against the flare, Singe only caught a glimpse of a big, ungainly bird flapping away. Scraggly legs trailed through the air behind it and a long neck curved back on itself. Singe's eyes widened slightly.
A heron, he thought. Twelve moons, what's a heron doing in the forest?
There was a soft rustle behind him.
Singe's heart leaped into his throat as he whirled around, sword outstretched, another spell smoldering on his lips and at his fingertips.
At the edge of the path, as if emerging from a hiding place, a woman crouched in a virtually identical pose. Her right hand held a short, pale spear at the ready. Her left was pointed at him in a gesture very much like a wizard prepared to unleash a spell. Her feet, he realized, didn't touch the ground. Instead, she hovered with no apparent effort.
For a long moment, neither of them moved. Singe studied the woman--he was certain she was doing the same to him--without moving his eyes. To judge by her sharp features and exotic clothing, she was a kalashtar.
And a kalashtar deep in the Eldeen was even stranger than a heron in the forest.
Very slowly, the woman uncoiled. Spear and hand both remained pointing at him as she drifted out onto the path and slid the length of a pace along it in the same direction Singe had been heading. He turned with her, keeping her boxed between the edge of his rapier and his own waiting spell. The woman slid another pace, spear and hand still rock steady--
The tension between them shattered as a lean figure leaped screaming out of the darkness. Singe didn't understand a word
that it uttered, if they were words, and caught only a glimpse of the crude axe that it swung. He simply snapped around and spat the word of his spell.
The kalashtar woman's pointing fingers shifted at the same moment. A droning chorus of sound beat against Singe's ears, the sound of her race's weird power.
Twin blasts of churning energy caught the screaming figure and wrapped it in flame--red-orange from Singe's hand, white from the woman's. Its battle cry changed into a shriek of pain, then broke sharply as the figure spun around and fell to the ground. For a moment, the only sound in the forest was the soft crackle of fire.
Singe edged closer and peered through the burning brilliance. Their attacker had been a man dressed in rough, worn clothing, his hair strung with beads, his ears and his nose pierced through with lengths of wood and bone. The wizard turned to look at the kalashtar with respect.
"Singe," he said simply.
"Dandra," she replied. Her voice was rich like spices, but strained. "There will be more of them. We have to run."
The dull rhythm of feet pounding on dry earth pulled on Singe's ears. "Too late!" he hissed, and took two fast steps backward to stand at Dandra's side.
They appeared from the shadows at a run--three more men and a hard, thin woman whose head had been shaved and marked with tattoos. They didn't even glance at the flaming corpse of the first attacker, but at the sight of Singe and Dandra, they broke into the same weird war cry the dead man had uttered. If it was meant to frighten their victims, Singe thought, it was very effective. His hand clenched on the hilt of his rapier. "You strike left!" he gasped to Dandra.
He hoped that she understood, but didn't wait to see. He spoke a new word of magic and the fingers of his free hand flicked a trio of bright sparks at one of the men on the right. The man's war cry broke and he staggered--but kept coming. Singe saw Dandra point left and again he heard a choral drone. White fire lanced from Dandra's fingertips but this time the man she had chosen
as her target ducked and rolled beneath the blast. Behind him, green leaves and twigs burst into flame like dry tinder.
Singe had the time to mutter a curse, then their attackers were on them.
He slid to the side as the man he had targeted with his magic swung with a thick club. His rapier darted out but the man flinched back, bringing the club around in a weak counter. Singe rocked back to avoid the blow--and almost lost a good portion of his head to a wild strike from an axe wielded by the tattooed woman. He staggered to the side, found his balance, and settled back into a fighting stance just in time to ward off the woman as she pressed her attack.
A glance showed that Dandra was having trouble as well. The two men facing her were armed with long knives, and while Dandra's spear gave her a greater reach, she was hard-pressed to keep both men back. As she thrust at one man, the other lunged at her. She moved with tremendous grace, spinning and shifting as if she only needed to think about moving. It still wasn't enough. She caught one with a crack of the spear shaft across his forehead--blood welled up and began to drip into his eyes--but the second slipped past her guard and got around on her other side.
And in the moment that Singe watched her, the man with the club got past his rapier long enough to swing a crushing blow at his sword arm. Singe twisted around and caught the blow on his left shoulder instead. His arm went numb and he staggered. The tattooed woman darted in again. Desperately, Singe turned his stagger into a low lunge.
The blade of his rapier sank into her thigh. She shrieked and fell back as he whipped the weapon free. Swaying to the side, he barely managed to avoid another punishing blow from the man's club. Dandra yelped and he shot a fast glance toward her. One of her attackers had managed to grab the butt of her spear. The kalashtar spun and kicked out with a sandaled foot but the move left her open. The second man dove in--
--and was tackled by a massive, growling form that seemed to explode out of the night. Singe caught only a glimpse of flashing
teeth and thick muscles, but the man was swept off his feet and slammed back into the shadows. Over the noise of combat, he heard the wet crunch of a blade penetrating flesh and bone.
The sudden, ferocious attack gave him and Dandra the moment's chance that they needed. As the man with the club turned to meet this half-glimpsed new threat, Singe thrust his rapier under his momentarily upraised arm. Blood burst from his mouth in a sudden spray and the club tumbled to the ground as he fell. Dandra yielded to the pull of the man who grasped her spear; a hard push shoved him off balance. As he fought to regain his balance, she wrenched her weapon from his hand, reversed it, and, with a grim expression, jabbed the glittering head deep into his chest.
Her last ally dead, the tattooed woman flung herself away, limping for the safety of the forest.
A short, heavy sword--already slick with blood--whirled around and chopped deep into her torso. She slumped forward, her body seeming to fold over the blade.
Geth stepped back into the circle of Singe's light, sliding his weapon free and allowing the woman's corpse to collapse onto the ground. He raised his eyes and met the wizard's gaze with a simple, brutal directness.
Abruptly, Singe felt as though he had fallen through time nine years into the past. The backcountry hunter he had confronted on the common of Bull Hollow had barely seemed like the warrior he remembered. That warrior stood before him now. Geth still wore the clothes he had before, but in his left hand, he held his sword, a product of the smoke-belching war forges of Karrnath.
His right hand and arm were covered in an armor sleeve of blackened, magewrought steel. Flat spikes protruded from the knuckles of the great gauntlet and three low, hooked blades swept forward from the back. More spikes lined the ridge of his forearm. Interlocking strips of metal bulged around his upper arm, running all the way up to the plates of the wide, heavy shoulder guard.
Slowly, Singe lifted his rapier once more and braced himself for the shifter's attack.
"Stop."
From the direction that Geth had come, another man moved into the light. His only weapon was a spear with a cluster of dried leaves bound to its shaft and his only armor a jerkin of heavy, paint-daubed hide, but he carried himself with authority. A druid, guessed Singe--he had seen men and women with a similar look throughout the Eldeen Reaches. He had never, however, seen one with such a clear confidence and sense of purpose as this man. Under the weight of the nature-priest's gaze, he let his rapier drop. The druid gave him a measured look as he paced closer.
"You must be Singe," he said. "My name is Adolan." He turned and glanced at Dandra. To Singe's surprise, the kalashtar shrank back slightly and her feet settled to the ground. Adolan knelt to examine one of the fallen warriors. "Human," he muttered. He looked back up at Dandra. "I have the feeling you know who these people are."
Tension passed over Dandra's face, as if she was struggling with her response. Then she drew a breath and met Adolan's eyes. "They're the hunters of a clan called
Drumasaz,"
she said. "In their language, it means 'the Bonetree.' They come from deep in the Shadow Marches."
"The Shadow Marches?" the druid said sharply. His eyes narrowed. "What gods do they follow?" he demanded. "Do you know?"
"No gods," Dandra whispered so quietly Singe could barely hear her. "They worship the dark powers of Khyber."
Singe couldn't hold back a nervous chuckle. "A cult of the Dragon Below? Are you serious?"
Adolan gave him unnerving stare. "The Shadow Marches breed many foul things--degenerate ideas and desperate beliefs among them." He prodded one of the bodies with the toe of his boot and rose slowly. "What would a Marcher clan be doing--"
Singe felt a prickling across the back of his neck. His eyes darted up into the darkness overhead. Geth must have felt something, too, because he hissed, "In the trees, Ado!"
The druid glanced up, then folded his lower lip under his teeth and gave an ear-splitting whistle.
A hunting bird's screech cut the night. Branches and leaves crashed above them as something struck from out of the sky--and something else sought to escape. Singe flinched instinctively. Wings cracked through the air, then the hunting bird screeched again.
A moment later, a big eagle with red-gold plumage settled onto the path. Clutched in its talons was a massive black heron. The eagle spread its wings and screeched once more, then waddled awkwardly back as Adolan approached and bent down. "Well done, Breek," he said. "Singe, your light?"
Stunned, the wizard stepped closer and raised his shining rapier high. Over Adolan's shoulder, he got a better look at the dead bird. Its long neck had been broken by the eagle's attack, but it looked almost as if the heron had been on the verge of death already: it was thin and its black feathers seemed strangely oily. The eyes that stared blankly into the night were an eerily bright acid green.
Singe swallowed. "I didn't know herons perched in trees," he said awkwardly, trying to fill the silence.
"The tops of trees," Geth said, "yes. The thick of a forest canopy? No. Ado?"
"It's tainted. But not enough to have triggered the Bull Hole. I've never seen anything quite like it." The druid stood. "We--"
"We need to go," said Dandra.
Singe, Adolan, and Geth swung around as one to stare at her. The woman's hands were clenched tight around her spear. There was a terror on her face, Singe saw, that hadn't been there when they were fighting the hunters.
"They'll be coming." She trembled. "They follow the birds."
Singe darted forward and steadied her. He glanced at Geth and Adolan. "There was a bird watching me before we were attacked."
"More hunters coming then?" asked Geth.
"Or worse," said Adolan softly. "Either way, we shouldn't stay here." He looked to Geth. The shifter nodded and spun around to lope away along the path, his gaze swinging right to left and back. Scouting the way. Singe felt another twinge of familiarity.
Nine years before, the shifter had done the same thing in service to the Frostbrand and House Deneith.
He turned back, however, to find Adolan staring at him. "Put your fight with Geth aside," the druid said. "You're in danger." He looked at Dandra. "Are you going to attack me again?"
She shook her head urgently. Adolan nodded. "Then come with us, both of you. Quickly." He made a clicking noise with his tongue and the eagle croaked in response, vaulting back into the air and flapping furiously to gain the sky. Adolan gestured with his spear, then turned and ran after Geth with long, confident strides. Dandra pulled out of Singe's arms and raced off in his wake. Her first few paces were on the ground, then she was floating again, moving as quickly as Adolan--faster even. Abruptly, Singe was all but alone, left to stare at the retreating figures of the druid and the kalashtar and at the bodies lying along the path.

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