The Inquisitives [4] The Darkwood Mask (43 page)

Halix gave the chest-shaped creature a final look of disgust then looked around.

“Where
is
this?” he said, gesturing with the blade at the chamber around them. The aristocratic Brelish accent was unmistakable.

Soneste dropped to one knee again. Aegis followed suit. Here in these filthy catacombs, Tallis found the sight almost comedic. “My prince, we are beneath the estate of Lord Charoth Arkenen, whom we have reason to believe is a traitor to Karrnath.”

“And you are …?”

Soneste’s eyes widened. “My apologies, Highness. I am Soneste Otänsin, inquisitive of Sharn and Thuranne d’Velderan’s
Investigative Services, now in Korth by request of the Citadel. This is Aegis, formerly in service to the ir’Daresh family, now sworn to service directly to the crown. This …”

Soneste looked over to Tallis, who shrugged. “This is … Tallis.”

“Major
Tallis?” the prince asked, eyes widening ever so sleightly.

As he heard his name spoken by the young prince, the enormity of Charoth’s stratagem sank into his gut like an anchor. Even Lenrik’s death, while egregiously painful to Tallis, would go unnoticed to the rest of Khorvaire, but the demise of a Galifar royal like Halix ir’Wynarn? That could unmake the tenuous peace of the remaining nations. Was Charoth aiming to renew war? What did he stand to gain?

No, the prince was still alive. In fact, Halix was still in pretty good shape.

Tallis thought of Crownhome and King Kaius, whose interest in peace had earned him even the disfavor of many of his own warlords. The Conqueror’s Host were probably combing the streets above for sign of the Brelish royals, while court wizards employed magic to locate them. Other agents of the king would be working to keep the crisis quiet. If word got out that the royals had vanished under the king’s own nose, Karrnathi diplomacy would suffer a crippling setback.

Here in Charoth’s dungeon, would Korth’s finest have found Halix at all if they hadn’t? Tallis looked at the inquisitive, the warforged bodyguard, and their prince. Was Tallis the only Karrn with a modicum of loyalty to Kaius III involved in this situation? The irony defeated him.

“I am,” was all he could reply.

“Your Highness,” Soneste said, rising to her feet. “We must get you out of here. There is a maze of corridors behind us, but we can see you through it to the streets above.”

Halix combed a hand through his unkempt brown hair. “No. Those bastards have my sister. She’s alive, so I’m not leaving here
without here.” His handsome features were resolute.

“What happened?” Tallis asked, needing facts.

The prince’s face flushed with shame. “I was grabbed by men at the Lyrandar docking tower when I landed. After that, I don’t remember. I suppose I was secreted down here. I can’t remember clearly.

“Borina is here, I know it!” Halix said. “They’re … going to do something to her. I heard some discussion between a man and a woman.”

“Charoth and Mova,” Tallis said.

“The woman said she’d be coming back to collect me when their business with Borina was concluded.” Halix fumed, kicking at the scattered bones of a skeleton warrior. “We have to find her!”

“I
will
do so … Highness.” Tallis felt a constricting sense of guilt. Would he let Kaius take the blame for this, for allowing Boranel’s children to be taken? “I assure you, my king will want you safe … every bit as much as your own father. Trust me on that.” He looked to the inquisitive. “Soneste, take the prince out of here, back the way we came. Aegis and I will find Borina.” He pointed to the door in the far wall—the only way forward.

Halix rounded on him. “I said no, Karrn. I am
not
leaving my sister to mad wizards and walking corpses.”

Tallis approached the boy, who stood eye to eye with him. “Will you raise a weapon against an army of foes, people who don’t observe national boundaries, who don’t respect the honorable strategies taught to you at Rekkenmark? They murdered innocent people just to get to you and your sister, including a Brelish ambassador and two of my dearest friends.”

Halix sneered in defiance. “I didn’t go to your academy for politics, Major. I went to learn skill at arms from the finest teachers in Khorvaire, to see if you Karrns really
did
know anything about war, after all.”

Tallis held the prince’s stare, unflinching.

“Prince Halix,” Soneste said, her voice exasperated, “Please. I cannot allow you to endanger yourself further. We will find—”

“I appreciate your concern, Soneste,” the prince interrupted, his expression dark, “but I am choosing to save my sister. I require your assistance in this.”

Soneste merely stared at him for a moment. She’d probably never seen him before today, but he represented the Brelish crown. She had no choice but to obey.

And now we’re going to rescue a princess, Tallis thought. If it weren’t so bloody serious, he would have laughed.

“Of course, Your Highness,” Soneste said firmly.

“Something is coming,” Aegis announced, pointing to the doorway where they’d entered. The stench of death rolled out from the dark passage like a living force, stronger than that which already pervaded the charnel pit.

“Get the other door open, now!” Tallis ordered the warforged, readying his own weapon for the coming enemies.

A figure shuffled into the room, stumbling over the wreckage of the door, followed by another.

And another. A total of six men, clad in the tailored leather suits of Charoth’s sentries—the very ones Tallis had put down outside the wizard’s estate. Each man moved with the preternatural strength of the animate dead, the wounds that had killed them all too prominent, yet their skin was loose and discolored, as if advanced in the grave by weeks of exposure. Where bones jutted through ripped flesh, Tallis noted a metallic sheen. Mova’s work. The atrocity in the lead met his gaze with raw malignance—a gift from its creator’s magic.

Tallis heard the door open behind him. “Get them out, Aegis.
Now
.”

He’d faced many zombies before, but these were not the intelligent, sinister visages of Karrnath’s elite dead—alchemically preserved and fused with the aggressive spirit of their nation. His instincts told him these had been bolstered by various necromantic spells. For one brief moment he thought he saw Valna’s face again, grinning in the madness of foul magic.

Tallis fell into a deadly, insensate calm and advanced.

H
e’d been moved. No longer in his private room, the man now sat within a new chair of hard, smooth glass. It was less comfortable, but he didn’t notice. Sweat beaded ever so sleightly at his brow, his heart racing within him. The man’s mind was terrified.

Lord Charoth’s face darkens—he doesn’t abide threats—but I notice he lowers his wand. The schema in my assistant’s hand is a priceless artifact entrusted to the director by Baron Starrin himself. As patriarch of the house, there can be no greater honor or responsibility
.

“If you seek leverage, you have erred,” Lord Charoth says coldly
.

“I do not,” Sverak answers. His sapphire eyes stare back without fear. Have I misjudged him? My own creation?

My superior steps closer, ready with his wand. I fear that if he does strike, the schema will be damaged. He knows the risk
.

Sverak tosses the golden rod into the air near the railing. Lord Charoth rushes forward, faster than I would have thought him capable. He reaches for the schema with desperate fingers—

“Now,” Sverak says in a loud, instructive voice
.

The titan’s raised arm comes down
.

I watch, horrified, as Lord Charoth catches hold of the schema in both hands, letting his wand drop. A half-moment later, the granite slab of the titan’s hand strikes him from above
.

I hear the crack of bone as the weight hammers him to the ground
.

I hear his cry of agony, the gasp of the workers nearby
.

“Again,” Sverak says
.

The granite hammer lifts and comes down again
.

Reflections of Undeath
Wir, the 11th of Sypheros, 998 YK

I
n her mind, Soneste could still see the madness that had overtaken him when the undead had surged into the charnel room. Tallis had insisted they go on without him, had insisted on taking the undead on alone. She’d lingered in the threshold of the door, ready to help yet repulsed by the foul creatures. She’d watched Tallis with a mixture of concern and awe as he battled them alone. Despite their enhanced speed and preternatural resilience, he’d struck them all down in short order. He’d cut them apart and set fire to the corpses that remained, kicking them into the pit. Tallis had rejoined them then, his eyes wet. She’d said nothing then.

Tallis slipped a ring on his finger, discreetly, but Soneste noticed. It was the black opal ring of the Order of Rekkenmark. Evidently he always carried it with him, but she felt he hadn’t worn it for a very long time. There was a crisis of identity raging within this man. Soneste wanted to help.

“Tallis,” Soneste said at last, the first to break the silence after many long minutes.

After a long silence, he glanced back at her.

“What happened back there?” she asked. When he didn’t answer, she spoke again, “Tallis?”

“We’re somewhere below the Commerce Ward. Far below.” He looked back at her for a moment, shaking his head. “It’s nothing. Just another war story. We all have them.”

“Tell me.”

Soneste could sense Halix paying close attention. The prince remained quiet, his thoughts no doubt consumed by their predicament and concern for his sister. She could hardly digest the fact that King Boranel’s youngest son was in her charge.

At the end of the corridor, they found a stone staircase spiraling up into the dark. Tallis stared up. “I led a mission into Thrane, but you know that already, don’t you? I was court-martialed for turning on my own men.

“Well, I
didn’t
. At least, not living men. My unit was five good soldiers, the finest I’d ever known, but by some cruel joke, Warlord Dehjdan had insisted a rot squad be assigned to us.”

Soneste shook her head. “I don’t know what that is.”

“The animate dead,” he said. “Sons and daughters of Karrnath, given the ‘glory’ to fight for their nation again. The undead legions kept us alive early in the war, and we all owe Kaius the First and his cursed arrangement with the Blood of Vol for saving us. I hate it, but it’s true. I’ve never denied that much.

“Most undead companies consist of the mindless sort, fit only for following basic orders—like those who were guarding Prince Halix—not as adaptable in combat, but much easier for necromancers to raise. Those, in turn, are led by more intelligent commanders, skeletons and zombies augmented with stronger magic and alchemical compounds. I couldn’t tell you how they do it.

“We called units of the intelligent dead rot squads. I had one of them assigned to me on this mission, and I had my orders to complete. When I lost every
living
man and woman under my command to a Thrane’s fireball, aborting the mission was not an option. It was too important, so I continued on. My days and
nights were spent in the company of Marshal Serror, an undead officer, and his rot squad.”

Soneste imagined herself traversing a battle-scarred terrain, looking right and left, seeing figures of armor and bone marching tirelessly behind her, and each one lusted for bloodshed, sought it out like rats seek food.

“I kept my distance as much as I was able. I spoke to Serror only when I had no other choice. I did not address his … subordinates. I despised them. One night his group captured some Thranes, a soldier and his family, refugees.”

Tallis grew quiet again.

“What happened?” she asked.

“Until that night, I’d never seen what the undead were capable of when unchaperoned by the living. I was the mission commander, but I had no authority over the specific actions of Serror and his squad unless it pertained directly to the mission—and I tested those limits. That night, I watched as they tortured the Thranes for ‘information.’ When they’d learned what they needed, they … just didn’t stop. They enjoyed it.”

“Gods,” Soneste muttered.

“I tried to get away, tried to pretend it wasn’t happening. I needed them to complete my mission. One man alone couldn’t hope to survive where we were going, but I couldn’t stand by and just watch. At last I returned, commanded the marshal to relent, to end the Thranes’ torment. He refused. I looked,
really
looked, at them … the zombies of Serror’s squad, standing there in the regalia of my nation, flaying the skin from their living victims. Out of sheer … entertainment.

“I lost it. I turned on them,
all
of them. My mission ended there, with the destruction of Marshal Serror, his subordinates, and the Thrane captives. I’d do it again.”

Soneste could not find the words to follow this. She wanted to reach out her hand, offer some comfort, but this wasn’t the time. She remained silent for a moment, leaving him to his memory, though a question had been gnawing at her for some time.

“Tallis,” she asked, her voice low, “when I was searching the Ministry’s archives, I found the record of a Captain Tallis, slain in a battle near Scion’s Sound.” She fished through her pockets and pulled out the faded
Sentinel
article. “This battle. Were you—”

“Recruit number 966-5-1372,” the Karrn answered softly without glancing at the clipping. “My sister. Captain Valna Tallis.”

Tallis smiled sadly and looked back at Soneste. “I worshipped her. She was the only true flying arrow in my family. Good in a team, dreamed of becoming an oathbound. Said she even would someday join the Conquering Fist or the Iron Band, but she died in 974, five years before I joined the army myself.”

Tallis’s eyes drifted. There was a darkness there, of deep-rooted fury barely held in check. “I saw her again, Soneste. She was one of those serving under Marshal Serror on my mission, an elite daughter of Karrnath given the … ‘honor’ of reanimation.”