 
Tales of Dark Fantasy

### by Robert E. Keller

Smart Goblin Publishing 2011

This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are products of the author's imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events or locales or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

*The cover art for this book was created using paid, licensed, modified

stock images from Bigstock in an original interpretation.

Copyright © 2011 Robert E. Keller

Content Notice:

A collection of fantasy short stories.

About the Author:

Robert E. Keller is a fantasy writer who has had more than 30 stories published in online and print magazines, and he is the author of several epic fantasy novels. You can find more information on his projects at www.robertekeller.net

**Other books by Robert E. Keller** :

Novels:

Knights: The Eye of Divinity

Knights: The Hand of Tharnin

Knights: The Heart of Shadows

Knights: The Blood of Kings

Knights: Defenders of Ollanhar

Knights: Legends of Ollanhar

Knights: Shadows of Ollanhar

***

The Curse of Credesar

***

A Knight of Tharnin, Book I

### Table of Contents:

Spirit Wolves

Breathing Space

Cancelled

Dream Spinner

The Pipes are Calling

A Christmas Frost

The Weeping Well

The Burning Strands of Daylight

Blue Electron Moon

Minds Burned White

### Bonus Dark Fantasy:

The Elder Root

Wood Axe

The Necromancer's Burden

Tower of Dread

Brock Strangebeard and the Skulls of Callaharn

Spirit Wolves

(Originally published in Wanderings magazine, and in Golden Visions as a reprint. Revised for this collection.)

"You won't take my dog, you devils," I snarled into the blinding snow that swirled through the pines. I slammed the cabin door shut and turned, shotgun in hand. My faithful hound Lammie was gazing up at me with his big round eyes.

"Easy, boy," I said. "Your master's just shouting at ghosts." I patted him on the head, and he went and curled up in front of the fireplace.

Lammie was all I had, and he wasn't going anywhere.

Wincing from a dozen aches, I limped over to my rocking chair and put my bare feet on the hearth. Lammie gently licked my toes, and as always, I pulled my foot back. "Don't do that," I said. "You know I don't like it. Toenails all crusty and yellow. Why would you want to get your tongue anywhere near those smelly old toes?"

Lammie gazed up at me, confusion in his big eyes.

I glanced toward the door. I knew the wolves would come this night, for once they caught scent of a dog, they wouldn't rest until they claimed him. Or so legend said.

"They won't take you, Lammie," I muttered, patting the shotgun. Was I being selfish? My old, worn-out heart couldn't last much longer, and if I passed on, Lammie would starve. Should I just let him go? I shook my head, knowing I couldn't do that. I loved him too much. He'd been my only companion since my last dog took ill and died several years before, and the old forest was a lonely place--especially during the cold winters. I didn't want to die alone.

I patted Lammie on the head. "I won't let you starve, boy. If my heart looks like it's going to give up, I'll turn you loose and you can run free. Deal?"

Lammie lowered his head, his dark eyes shining with sadness. I didn't know if he could understand me, but sometimes it sure seemed that way. He didn't want to lose me any more than I wanted to lose him. But time was running out on us.

I bit into a stale biscuit and washed it down with some coffee. I was using up the last of my provisions, but I was too sick to walk the ten miles to town to get more. I hadn't checked my traps in weeks, and had no furs to trade anyway. My only hope was that my brother Jack would make the long trek out to my cabin before I starved to death. Jack was usually dependable, but lately he'd been drinking himself silly and ranting about his ex-wife. Also, his horse had been stolen, and so he would have to come on snowshoes--a long walk for an old man. But Jack had to show up soon, or I'd be in rough shape. I was too sick to risk hunting.

I rubbed my chest, and gazed at a drawing of a beautiful Indian maiden that hung near the fireplace. Her face looked so soft and lovely in the glow of lantern and fire. I'd never had a wife, so I supposed that meant when I died I would have to be single in heaven--if I actually made it to heaven. If I ended up down below in the flames, lack of a wife would probably be the least of my worries. I'd never set foot in a church, so I really didn't know how any of that stuff worked. Hopefully, the Lord would take pity on an old fool.

I smiled, pretending the Indian maiden was my woman waiting for me in heaven. I named her Abigail. It wasn't a very Indian sounding name, but I was an old man with no imagination. "Won't be long now, darling," I said. "Meet me at the pearly gates."

Lammie whined.

I closed my eyes and started to doze, when a scratch at the door jolted me awake and sent my heart into a flutter. With a low growl, Lammie stood up, the fur rising on his back.

The wolves had come again.

Shaking with fear and anger, I got up and limped to the door. "You go away, you wretched devils," I cried. "I'll shoot you dead." It was an absurd statement, since bullets were useless against ghosts. But what else could I do?

Again, the quiet scratch at the door greeted my ears. Lammie crept up beside me, sniffing the air and looking puzzled.

"Get back," I said. But he didn't move.

Howls erupted outside my cabin, sending a flood of chills down my spine. "I'll never let you in," I howled back. "Be gone with you."

I waited, wondering if the wolves could enter a home uninvited. My memory was foggy these days, but it seemed like one of my old friends had told me that ghosts couldn't come in unless you let them. Or had he been talking about vampires? I wasn't sure, but the wolves had been sniffing around my door for two nights now and still hadn't tried to enter.

But this time they didn't go away, and their howls seemed more frantic and determined. Moments later, the door bolt unlatched and the door blew open violently, snow flying into my cabin. I fired my shotgun into the blizzard, and the kickback left me groaning in pain and rubbing my poor old shoulder.

"Curse you!" I shouted. I reloaded with shaking hands and fired again, snow clinging to my face and getting in my eyes. I leaned on the gun and used my other hand to wipe snow from my face. Peering out into the storm, I saw nothing.

I slammed the door shut and bolted it. My heart was pounding hard, sending waves of pain through my chest. My head was swimming with dizziness. I stroked Lammie's fur. "I showed those devils. I'll bet they're scared and running for their lives." But I knew better. And by the look in Lammie's eyes, so did he.

Lammie stalked to the door and sniffed at it again. "Get away from there," I said, grabbing his collar and leading him back to the fireplace. I was about to sit down again when I heard a crash of glass come from upstairs.

The wolves were breaking in.

Groaning in misery, I grabbed my shotgun and, using it like a crutch, limped upstairs to my bedroom. I threw open the door and aimed my gun, panting hard. But the window was still intact, and I knew the wolves had somehow tricked me--making me hear things that weren't real. "Wiley critters, aren't they?" I said, glancing down.

But Lammie wasn't next to me. He'd always followed me before when I went upstairs, but not this time. My hands shook as I held the shotgun.

I limped back downstairs and saw the door was partly open again, and a long white snout was poking through. Lammie was creeping toward the door. I pointed my gun in a panic and pulled the trigger--and lucky for Lammie, I'd forgotten to load it. Otherwise, he might have been hit by some stray lead.

"Lammie, get away from there. Please, boy!"

The snout drew back, and again the door blew wide open, revealing only the blizzard that raged through the pines.

Lammie turned to look at me with his sad gaze. Then he glanced at the open door.

"Don't do it," I groaned. "Come back to your master."

Again Lammie fixed his big eyes on me, and he whimpered. Then he turned and bolted out into the snowstorm. With a cry, I ran after him, but I stumbled and fell in the doorway. Snow began to quickly blanket me.

Tears streaming down my face, I staggered to my feet and called Lammie's name repeatedly, but he didn't show himself. He'd gone off with the spirit wolves. He'd betrayed his master to run forever with the dead.

At last I gave up and pulled the door shut. I struggled to my rocking chair and slumped down, utterly defeated. Now I had nothing. Brother Jack might come, or he might not. I didn't care anymore. I was a stubborn old fool who'd chosen to live miles from nowhere, and now I'd lost my only true friend.

Lammie had chosen the wolves over his master, and that hurt me more than anything. To the depths of my heart, I regretted taking him on that last hunt. I'd been too sick to be out wandering the forest in the winter, but Lammie loved to hunt; so I'd chosen to take him one last time. We'd trekked deep into the woods, into sacred Indian territory where a white man wasn't supposed to go. And the spirit wolves had spotted us, and just like legend said, they would claim a dog for their pack if they laid eyes on one.

We'd thought we'd escaped, but the wolves had followed, patiently stalking us through the pines. For three straight nights they had gathered outside my cabin, while I grew sicker, and the snows piled up. This was the third night, and the wolves had finally completed their goal.

"Lammie, how could you?" I whispered. "A dog should never betray his master." My fingers numb, I tried to lift my coffee mug but it slipped from my hand. I leaned back in my rocking chair and closed my eyes. My chest also had gone numb.

"I had a dog once," I mumbled. "He was the best dog a man could ask for. One night, he ran off into the woods and never returned, and I thought less of him. That's my story." I might have kept right on talking. I'm not really sure, because like my body, my mind was failing. Everything was sinking into darkness.

My eyelids grew heavy, but the impending slumber didn't feel natural. My body was betraying me, just as Lammie had betrayed me. Brother Jack would find me dead in my chair, some frozen biscuits and spilled coffee at my feet. I was an old man, nearing eighty. I'd lived long enough, and my heart was too heavy with pain to go on.

As I began to drift into my final sleep, I was jolted awake by a scratch at the door. Had Lammie returned, or had the wolves come back to mock me? Most likely, the wolves were seeking to torment me in my final moments.

But somehow, I stayed awake, and I was able to rise from my chair. My body was numb, but I could walk better than ever. I strode to the door and threw it open.

Lammie looked up at me mournfully. I realized he felt profoundly guilty for having left me. My faithful dog had returned forever more!

Laughing with delight, I patted his head. "I knew you'd come back," I lied, overcome with happiness. "Come inside and lay by the fire. You can even have the rest of those nasty old biscuits. I don't feel sick anymore, and I can take good care of you."

But Lammie lowered his head.

"What's the matter, boy?" I asked. "You're home now. You never have to leave me again. Come on inside."

Suddenly, from out of the swirling snow emerged several white wolves with long snouts, their luminous bodies becoming visible through the blizzard. I opened my mouth to yell at them, but then I realized the truth.

Kneeling, I stroked Lammie's fur. "Okay, boy. I understand now. You're the most loyal dog a man could ever have." For a moment I was overcome with gratitude.

Then I nodded to the wolves, and they whined.

It was time to go.

I left the cabin door open so Brother Jack would I know I'd begun my final journey and was never coming home. I grabbed my shotgun. Then I followed Lammie and the wolves out on the hunt, my steps full of vigor as I whistled a merry tune. Soon we were lost amid the pines, leaving no tracks to follow.

End.
Breathing Space

(Originally published in _Golden Visions_ magazine.

Revised for this collection.)

I stood with my eyes closed, hoping it would stop. The walls were breathing--no doubt about it. They bowed outward, the wooden panels making cracking noises with each shuddering breath. This was my dream house, a chance for a retired New York lawyer to live quietly in Northern Michigan along a lakeshore, to go fishing and make furniture in my basement workshop. But it had turned into a wheezing nightmare.

I shored up some courage and shouted at it to stop. In response, the house seemed to lurch and I fell into the wall. The wood bloated out repulsively against my cheek. I jumped away from it and grabbed the telephone. I hesitated, hating the thought of calling that psychic again that I'd contacted earlier. I believed all psychics were charlatans and liars--not so different from us lawyers. But I'd already tried a priest. He'd blessed the house, and when that hadn't worked and I called him back, he accused me of being a sinner who'd brought the evil unto myself. Maybe he was right.

Reluctantly, I dialed James Marston's number.

"Hello?" a tired voice responded.

"Hi, James," I said, sighing. "It's Mike Richards. I talked to you earlier today, remember? The situation's getting worse. I can't even sleep. Can you come over right now?"

James hesitated. It was just past 2:00 a.m. "Um, sure Mike. I have to get dressed and grab some coffee. I'll be there in about a half hour. Since this is an emergency, I kind of have to charge you one-hundred dollars right off the bat."

My lips tightened. "I see."

"Or you could schedule an appointment," James added.

I glanced at the heaving walls. "Just get over here as quick as you can, James. I'll make the coffee."

I hung up and stumbled downstairs, falling against the walls again in my haste. I got a pot brewing. The lights were flickering wildly and the shadows seemed alive. I kept thinking I was hearing mumbling voices and moaning noises, but I wasn't sure.

I grabbed a beer from the fridge, sat at the table, and put my head in my hands, wondering why things had to be this way. If the divorce wasn't bad enough, now I'd escaped my disaster of a life in the city only to end up in a haunted house. I held the bottle against my forehead as if to sooth my own burning madness. But I wasn't crazy. The evidence was strong to the contrary. I had a sharp lawyer's mind, and I knew fact from fantasy.

As I sipped my beer, the walls grew still. By the time James' headlights shone through the window, everything was back to normal. But I knew I wouldn't have to convince James, that he'd be all too willing to believe anything as long as there was payment involved.

I pulled the door open, and my heart sank. James looked poor and scruffy. He wore faded jeans and a dirty jean jacket. His gray-streaked hair was pulled back in a ponytail. He smelled like gasoline. Parked in my driveway was a rusted pickup truck, with a hood that didn't match the rest of it and was tied down with a cord.

We shook hands. "You got that hundred?" he asked, his breath frosty in the chill spring air.

I grimaced. It wasn't that he was poor, and it certainly wasn't that he was Native American--considering I had a trace of Indian blood in me. It was the psychic charade that made my flesh crawl. I cleared my throat, unable to prevent a snobby tone from creeping into my voice. "Not right on me, James. But I assure you I'm good for it."

He raised his hands. "No problem, chief. Just need it before I leave. The plant's got me laid off right now, so I'm not exactly rolling in dough."

"Right," I said, turning away so he wouldn't see me wince. How was I going to get rid of him? He'd already cost me a hundred dollars.

I turned back to him. "Look, James, I--"

"Good God!" he exclaimed. "What's that aura? Whoa, you got a real problem here, chief." He sniffed the air. "I smell...death."

I swallowed. The lawyer in me said he was full of it, but my pounding heart told the real story. I needed someone to talk to about this, and if nothing else, this fellow seemed laid back. "Come on in, James. The coffee's done."

"Great," he said, rubbing his hands together. "Coffee gets the channels open, gets the spirits talking to me. And that's no lie."

"Sure," I said, heading back inside with James in tow. "Cream or sugar?"

"A lot of both," said James, plopping down at the table and looking around. "Beautiful house you got here, Mike. I wish I could afford something like this. Got your own lake to fish and everything. What a deal, huh?"

I passed him his coffee. "Not exactly. Not when the walls seem alive. I'm already thinking of selling it off."

"Don't give up," said James. "This house has stood here since the 1800s. It's had a lot of owners. I did a little research after you called me earlier."

"So what's the story?" I said. "Wait--let me guess. A lot of folks moving in, getting scared, and moving back out? Then the real estate company keeps it covered up?"

"No, nothing like that," said James. "No reports of this place being haunted that I could find. Looks like this is something new."

Now he had my interest. "So what do you think is going on?"

He frowned. "Maybe it was built on sacred Indian burial grounds."

"You think so?" I asked.

He laughed. "No, I don't think so." And he wouldn't tell me why.

Moments later, the breathing started up again. James leapt from his chair and glanced wildly about. Then he raised his coffee and said something in Indian.

"What are you saying?" I asked.

"I asked the spirits for guidance," he said. "They told me the secret to these disturbances lies upstairs in the attic."

"I don't have an attic," I said, my eyes narrowing. "Just an upstairs bedroom with a roof over it."

He cleared his throat. "Right, I heard wrong. They meant the secret is in the basement, so I think we should head down there and have a look." James appeared scared, and he sipped his coffee with a trembling hand. "Maybe we should do it in the morning."

"You charged me a hundred bucks!" I snarled. "We're doing it now or you get nothing." James was obviously a fake, and a poor one at that. But I was going to make damn sure I got my money's worth out of him. We were going to the basement, and he was going to be the one looking for clues while I stood back and watched.

He guzzled his coffee and slapped the mug down. "Alright, chief. It's your call."

I clicked on the basement lights and we headed down there. The basement was full furniture-making equipment. A fresh rocking chair stood near a pile of wood shavings, and I half expected it to start rocking on its own; but it didn't. However, the dim lights flickered vigorously, leaving shadows in the corners.

James ran his hand over the concrete walls. "No breathing down here. Wait...I feel something. Pain--pain and death." He clutched his chest.

I grabbed his shoulder. "Are you okay? I knew psychics did this stuff, and I figured it was all for show. But this house was out of control, and maybe James was feeling something.

James pointed at the floor. "The secret lies under there."

"Under the concrete?" I said. "How do you propose we get to it?"

"Got a jackhammer?" he asked.

"No," I said, "and you're not tearing up my basement floor. I suggest you come up with another idea." I was losing patience, and my terror was growing by the moment. Things seemed to move in the shadows like darting, winged devils. But when I tried to look at them directly, I saw nothing.

James lay down and pressed his ear to the floor. "The spirits are speaking to me," he whispered. "I think this house is built on an old cemetery. The graves lie under this floor. The dead are angered, and they're trying to tell you they want the house torn down or moved."

"But that doesn't make sense," I said. "If this house was built in the 1800s, surely the ghosts would have made their presence known sooner."

James was quiet for several minutes, his ear to the floor and his eyes rolled back in his head. "The house has sunk deeper over the years," he finally said, "crushing the graves. The spirits are gasping for breath symbolically, and they're trying to make you realize it."

I scratched my head. His explanation was intriguing. "What can I do?"

"Move the house," said James.

"I can't do that!" I cried. "It's just not going to happen. I like it where it is."

James stood up. "Sorry, but that's all I can suggest."

I looked around. "Wait, there's a crawlspace over there, with a dirt floor. I'm not sure why it's there, or why it wasn't sealed with concrete, but maybe you can find out something in there." The lights had dimmed even further, so I clicked on a flashlight and shone it at the small, square hole cut in the wall. "You could fit through that."

James shook his head. "I'm not going into no weird crawlspace. Not with a bunch of angry spirits creeping around."

I swallowed. "I'll pay you..." I cringed. "I'll pay you...another hundred. Just go in there and see what you can find. I need a better answer!"

James took the flashlight and shone it in the hole. Then, drawing a deep breath, he crawled through. Then came silence.

"James!" I yelled. No response. "James, answer me!"

"I see some bones," he finally called back, "sticking out of the dirt. Oh my God! There's a whole bunch of bones in here. They look human."

"Are you sure?" I asked, my terror reaching new heights.

"Pretty damn sure," said James. "I think I finally understand. A serial killer must have lived here. He probably strangled his victims. Their suffering seeped into the house, and now the walls seem to gasp for breath."

"What...what can we do?" I asked.

"We have to dig them up," said James, "and give them a proper burial. Get a couple of shovels and bring them in. I'm not doing this alone. We'll do this here and now and relieve these ghosts of their suffering. Otherwise, I'm going home."

I got the shovels and crawled in. James had already dug out a pile of bones by hand. We put them in a garbage bag. It wasn't easy digging when we couldn't stand up, but we managed to go down several feet, pulling up more bones.

"Do you really think this will work?" I asked.

"It should," said James. "Wait--I see a skull. He yanked something out of the dirt. "Whoops. I think my imagination got the best of me. These are deer bones." He held up a deer's skull to confirm his statement. "Sorry. I don't hunt much, and I don't like venison--otherwise I might have realized the truth right away. Love to fish, though."

I was actually relieved. "But what are deer bones doing in here?"

"How the hell should I know?" he said. "I didn't put them here. Hey--what's that?" He pointed at an ugly and gnarled thing in the dirt. He dug around it and pulled it up. "It's like a big nasty tree root, Mike! Must have broke in through the concrete."

James dug the root up, all the way to the wall. Ancient, crumbling stone was revealed. "This basement rests on another foundation," he said. "One that's very old." The root had broken in through the ancient wall.

I sighed. "Who cares? I just want to know why my house is haunted. Since there's only deer bones down here, we need another explanation."

"Yeah, but that root is weird," he said. "It doesn't look like any tree root I've ever seen." He laid hands on it and closed his eyes. "It's some evil, powerful thing. Old magic, from thousands of years ago. There's magic in the stone walls, and something wicked is trying to crush them. It's been trying to crush them for centuries, and now--at last--they're in danger of collapse. They're crying out for help, Mike, trying to get your attention. Get a chainsaw!"

"My saw is broke," I said. "I need to take it to a shop."

"What about axes?" he said.

"I've got an axe and a hatchet," I replied. "But do we have to do this now?"

"You bet," he said. "These walls could go anytime, and your house might cave in. Not only that, but some old magical barrier would break, which could lead to evil being born into the world." He clutched my shoulder. "It's now or never, Mike!"

Seeing real desperation in his eyes, I grabbed the tools. We dug around the walls and found more roots. We chopped through them, and black fluid poured out like blood. The roots began to wraith around like snakes.

I tried to run, but Mike grabbed my shirt. "We have to fight on." He held his hatchet up, his eyes burning fiercely. "Come on, chief. You with me?"

I nodded. We dug some more, and found a large hole in the wall, with a tree-trunk sized root poking through it. We chopped into it, but it fought back, smashing us aside. It swung at my head, and I barely managed to duck or it might have decapitated me. Together, we hacked away at it until our arms went numb. At last, we severed it.

Black blood sprayed out in gallons, and then all the roots went limp. The entire house seemed to sigh with relief. The lights stopped flickering in the basement, and a positive feeling hung in the air.

James sighed and sat down on the edge of the pit. "I need some coffee," he said. "Anyway, I think we killed it."

I nodded. "So it wasn't squashed graves or serial killers after all."

"Nope," said James. "Sometimes the spirits get it wrong."

"What if the evil returns?" I said.

"Evil always does," said James. He shrugged. "Actually, damned if I know. It might be as dead as a doornail. Either way, I've had enough digging and hacking."

"Let's go have some coffee, James," I said, smiling.

"You got that hundred?" he asked. "Actually, it's two now."

"How's two-fifty sound?" I asked. "Do you like sports? Final Four basketball is on tomorrow night. I'll supply the beer and chips."

"I like those sour cream and onion ones," he said.

End.
Cancelled

(Originally published in Murky Depths magazine.

Revised for this collection.)

My head was certainly going to be torn from my neck, and there was no stopping it now. They'd already locked down the steel restraints to keep me in my chair. This was the ultimate in reality television, and I was one of the biggest stars. Not many people had the guts to let themselves be decapitated by a giant spider robot, which was why I made the big bucks in Hollywood and why I was one of the most sought after actors.

But I was only human, and I had my moments of doubt. In fact, I was feeling it stronger than ever now. Suddenly I wanted to retire. I had enough money to be set for life, so why was I doing this again? What if they couldn't bring me back this time?

"Wait a minute, Jake," I said to the producer. "I'm not ready for this."

Jake turned to his assistant, Lisa, and gave a knowing smile. "Sorry, Don. You know the rules. Once we're in position, the shoot has to proceed. We've been over this before."

"I realize that," I said, trying to sound calm. "But I'm willing to take zero pay. I don't think I want to do this anymore."

Jake nodded. "I understand. But you signed a contract, and this is going to be a live shoot. Just try to relax, Don. It'll be over soon enough."

"I want out of this!" I shouted. "Are you going to kill a man against his will? That's murder, Jake. Cold-blooded murder."

Jake turned to his camera men and signaled for them to start the shoot. He adjusted his tie and smoothed back his hair. "Welcome to Death Blow, the show where you get to watch a real person die on the set. And we have a great show for you today, as Don Masters will be facing a military Crusher Bot. Don's not doing so well right about now." He turned toward me and frowned. "Are you afraid, Don? Feeling a little neck tension?"

I squirmed in my restraints. I'd never done a death scene this extreme. My head was going to be torn slowly from my neck. How had I let myself get in this situation? Jake couldn't tell if I was acting or if I was terrified--and it wouldn't have mattered to him either way. He knew I was a professional. He'd worked with me several times. Sometimes I'd scream at him, and sometimes I'd moan, beg, and cry. But the result was always the same--the death scene played out regardless.

But this time it was different, and I really wanted to stop the shoot. I was sick to my stomach with dread. How could I convince him this wasn't an act?

"Jake, you've got to listen to me," I said, keeping my voice down in the hope that it would make him realize I was serious. "I've lost my nerve, buddy. I really have. I'll cover all your losses, Jake. Just let me out of these restraints and we can talk it over."

Jake winked at the camera. "Well, folks, it looks like Don is trying to worm out of his contract. Have you ever seen him look so afraid? I certainly haven't. And who can blame him?" Jake rubbed his neck and sighed. "Back after these commercials."

He gave me the thumbs up. "Great stuff, Don. Very convincing!'

"It's not an act," I said. "Not this time." I wondered how much I should tell him--how my soul seemed to be losing ground to the demon that kept trying to capture it. But he'd just think I was nuts. "I'm totally freaking out here, Jake."

"So what?" said Jake. "You've freaked out before. Trust me--when this is all over and you get that fat paycheck, you won't regret it. And need I remind you the contract states that once the equipment is set up and the shoot is ready, there's no backing out."

"But it's murder," I said. "And murder is against the law, last I checked."

"It's not murder," Jake said, looking away. "You signed the contract. That means it's suicide, and suicide is legal in this day and age."

"I don't care what it is!" I shouted. "Let me out of this chair."

Jake glanced at a technician and seemed to be considering my demand. But then the commercials ended and he turned back to the camera. "Welcome back, folks. Don is getting a wee bit upset here--to the point where he's even challenging the validity of his contract. Our lawyers know better and are standing by to remind Don of his legal obligations if need be. Either way, this is a first from one of the most steel-nerved pros in the business. I kid you not, ladies and gentlemen--this man is terrified! And why shouldn't he be? In about thirty seconds, we're going to clear away from Don while the Crusher Bot comes out and does what it's been programmed to do. I'll remind everyone that this is going to be a very graphic and very real death scene. But I'll also remind you that it's not permanent, that Don will wake up a few hours later just fine--pending the success of his operation, of course."

"You bastard!" I shouted. My body shook as I launched into a tirade of curses. All Jake cared about was ratings and money.

Jake patted me on the shoulder. "You hate me now, buddy. But you'll love me later when I hand you that check." He winked at the camera. "We're ready to get underway. Anyone out there who can't handle blood and gore--or has moral or religious issues concerning extreme death stunts--should temporarily avoid watching. Just don't change the channel or you'll miss the operation to reattach Don's head!"

Everyone moved away from me, and the cameras focused on a steel door. We were in a huge warehouse on a military base, on a freezing January day. It was cold on the set, and I shivered, feeling thin-skinned and vulnerable. Knowing the shoot was going to proceed no matter what, I tried to relax, adopting the professional attitude that had gotten me through so many of these takes.

With a screech of metal, the steel door raised and the Crusher Bot stepped through. It made hissing and grinding noises as its eight legs propelled it forward. It was army green in color and made of steel studded with rivets, the legs sticking out from a central sphere. It was a thickly armored monstrosity that could squash a tank or deflect a missile--possessing far more power than what was needed to end my puny life, but it was all for show.

I kept my eyes open as it approached. I never closed my eyes during death shoots, no matter how bad things got. I preferred to see what was coming. The robot stopped in front of me, and one of its legs came up to reveal a crab-pincer protrusion. It seized my head and slowly began to pull upward.

I tried not to scream so Jake wouldn't have the satisfaction, but I couldn't help myself. The pain was explosive, and I howled like a wounded dog as my neck was stretched. I could feel muscles and tendons rip, and hear the popping of bone. I had never felt agony on that level before. Mercifully, I blacked out.

And then I was floating in the air, free of my restraints. I watched as the Crusher Bot held up my detached head for the camera to view. There was an amazing amount of blood--more than I'd ever imagined there would be. It was such a gruesome scene it almost looked deliberately staged for some horror movie. I was sure the audience would love it (which, one might argue, was a sad indication of what the world had come to). Moments later, a medical crew wheeled out a preservation container for my body parts, and I watched while they packed me in.

One of the crew members slipped in the blood and hit his head on the floor. He made a big deal out of it, which struck me as ironic considering the state I was in. He had to go sit down like a little baby, while medics checked his blood pressure and fussed over him. Another crew member got sick and left the set, obviously not cut out for the job.

Then I was slipping away and I found myself in the place where I'd most feared ending up--the long dark tunnel. This was why I'd wanted to cancel the shoot--because I wasn't sure I could make it back to my body. I could see a pale glow at one end of the tunnel, and I moved toward it. But I was slower this time. I could feel the thing closing in on me from behind--some sort of demon or spirit come to take me to hell, perhaps. I fought to move faster, using all the will I could summon, but still the light seemed so far away. A cold whisper warned me to stop, that there was no escape, but as usual I ignored it.

But I was getting so slow, and I had no idea why. The first few times I'd died, I had easily outdistanced whatever was chasing me. Yet each time my speed had been reduced a little bit, and now I was certain the demon was going to catch me.

The tunnel was like black smoke around me, shimmering and rolling. I felt that if I touched the walls something terrible would happen, so I tried to stay away from them. A force was tugging at me from behind, pulling little pieces of me away--as if taking apart my soul. This was what weakened me and made me slow.

I screamed to God to save me, and then I was snared--as something closed around me in an unbreakable grasp. Dark and terrible energy pulsed against me. "Don't fight me," my captor whispered. "I haven't come to destroy you--but to give you a warning. You must stop toying with death."

"I'll do anything you ask of me!" I said. "Just let me go."

"You think I'm the devil," the thing said. "Or perhaps a demon or an evil spirit. I'm none of those beings. I'm a creature as old as life itself. You have mocked me. Science has mocked me. Your television show has mocked me! If you humans want death, then I'll be more than happy to deliver it in person. I'll let you return once more to the world of the living. And you will give them a message from me--that I'm going to cancel the show, starting with the producer. I'll hunt them down and bring them to my world, and they won't be going back."

"What about me?" I asked.

"I'll let you live," the thing said, "as long as you deliver my warning. Tell them the show will not go on, compliments of the Grim Reaper!"

End.
Dream Spinner

(Originally published in _Niteblade_ magazine.

Revised for this collection.)

1Crimson eyes glowered down at me from a stone ceiling. I glimpsed a bulbous, black form with yellow spots. A faint, flickering glow, perhaps from torchlight, would not allow me to make out many details--but what I saw was enough to drive a whimper from my lips and freeze my blood. I struggled to tear free, but whatever unseen forces locked me in place would not give way.

The gleaming eyes cut into me like razors, promising an agony-filled death. The huge bulk shifted, a ripple running along it--perhaps legs uncoiling. Then a pale mist shot down into my face and I was choking.

I lurched forward in my rocking chair, gasping for breath. The nightmare had been so vivid that my old heart fluttered and my hands shook.

My wife Geldra strode from the kitchen and approached me with an annoyed look. "Dreaming again, you old fool?" Her sagging face twisted with contempt. "You're like a little boy. Why don't you grow a backbone, Mouse?"

"My name's not Mouse. Don't call me that."

Hands on her hips, Geldra leaned over me, her face smug. "What's your name, then?"

It seemed I could almost recall a name from long ago when I was young. But my memory was worn out now, battered and foggy from years of Geldra's revisionist belittling. "Mouse is what _you_ call me," I said. "But I wasn't always named that. I had a real name once."

She threw back her head, her laugher reeking with mockery. "You were a Mouse then, you're a Mouse now, and you'll be a Mouse on your death bed."

I forced my mouth open to protest, but it dropped shut, the will oozing out of me. "If you say so, dear. I guess one name's as good as another."

"So what's going on with those dreams?"

I shrugged. "Don't know. I keep dreaming about a monster. Every time I fall asleep lately--the same nightmare. Can't shake it."

Geldra waved me away. "Just a scared little Mouse. Well, don't go wetting yourself over a dream, or I'll give you something to be scared of."

"Yes, dear."

"And furthermore, if you weren't so lazy, you wouldn't be sleeping all the time, having bad dreams."

"Yes, dear."

"You trying to rile me up, Mouse?"

"No, dear. Sorry."

"You've never been a man, and I can prove it. Why don't we have any children?"

I winced. "I don't know. They just never--"

"They just never what? It's because you're useless to the core. You don't have a bone in your body a real man would recognize."

A bit of fire flared up in my belly. My voice dropped to a growl. "I'm a man. Don't you say I'm not!"

"I'll say what I want," she said, pressing her face near mine. Geldra's breath stank like rotten sauerkraut, but I dared not turn away. I breathed shallowly.

"All right," I said, the fire dying into ash. "Whatever you say." I just wanted her to go away, foul breath and all.

She slapped my face and stomped back into the kitchen. My fists clenched as if locked onto her flabby neck. But a weak will and a lame body kept me in my chair like the cowardly rodent she always said I was. And truthfully, I was terrified. The nightmares were getting the best of me. I dreaded falling asleep, but I was growing so tired I could hardly stay awake most of the time. I needed to talk to Geldra about the dreams when she was in a better mood. She was a strong, clear-minded woman, and sometimes she could offer sound advice--when she wasn't biting off my head, so to speak.

I was an old man, my body worn out from years of working in a mine. My memory was slipping, and I spent my days sitting in my rocking chair struggling to recall the past, while Geldra took care of me. I needed her desperately, and she responded by always making sure I had enough to eat, my clothes were washed, and I took the medicine that reduced the pain in my joints. I had no one else in life.

I groaned, my eyelids growing heavy. I couldn't fight it anymore.

My eyes sprang open, and I found myself gazing up at the cave-like stone ceiling again covered in flickering shadows as if from firelight. I could hear something dragging and scraping below me, some heavy bulk that I couldn't turn my head to look at. I was lying on my back and could feel nothing supporting me, as if I were suspended in the air. Vibrations shook me, and I knew the monster was closing in on me. I tried to cry out, but even my throat muscles were paralyzed. I wanted to grab a weapon to defend myself (an axe came to mind), but all I could do was lay there and await my doom.

What did this creature want from me? I could almost remember some great truth that was struggling to surface. I closed my eyes, and I could smell a disgusting stench like sauerkraut gone bad. When I at last dared to look, I found myself gazing into some twisted, writhing maw. Pale mist shot out to once again choke off my air.

With a cry, I snapped awake--and bumped heads with Geldra. I gagged at the smell of her breath, and contemplated why the monster's stench had been similar. Was the beast in my nightmares a reflection of how I truly viewed my wife?

"Ow!" Geldra bellowed, clutching her forehead. She slapped my face. "I've had just about enough of you and those silly dreams."

"But it was so real," I said, rubbing my stinging cheek. "I've never felt fear like that. Please, dear. What can I do?"

Geldra sighed and shook her head, her face softening. "I don't know. I can talk to the healer and see if he's got any medicine that might help. But dreams are just dreams. They can't hurt you. So quit crying about it."

"But something is after me," I said, almost believing it. "A monster is waiting for me to fall asleep. It's stalking me, and I feel like it's plotting something horrible."

Her face flushing with anger, Geldra reached out as if she were going to seize my beard, but then she pulled her hand back. "Enough with your whining. Dream monsters aren't real. And why haven't you shaved off that beard like I've been telling you? What a rat's nest that thing is!"

I clamped my hand over my beard. Geldra hated beards, and she was always trying to persuade me to get rid of mine. It was the one command of hers that I refused. My beard was the last symbol of my independence from her. It was a scraggly, downright ugly old thing. But I felt if I shaved it off, I would truly be worth nothing.

"I'm keeping it," I said, looking away.

"It's grotesque, Mouse. Not only that, but every time I touch it, my hand itches. It's like you've got something crawling around in there. Creeps me out."

"There's nothing in my heard," I said. But I wondered if she was right. Now that she mentioned it, it did feel like tiny things were moving around in there. Or was that just my imagination? I scratched my beard.

"See, it itches! I knew it. You've got lice in there, or something worse." She shuddered.

I shrugged. "But I'm still keeping it. And that's final."

"We'll see," Geldra said. "Anyway, I'll visit the healer today and see what I can get for those dreams of yours. And I'm going to ask him about that beard, too, and see if he has something that will kill whatever might be crawling around in there. For now, just try to stay awake. Maybe if you get up and move around a bit, it would help. And here's your medicine."

She pushed a tin cup full of some dark liquid to my lips. I hated the medicine, which tasted like bitter syrup, but it did make me feel better and allowed me to walk. Finally, I forced my mouth open and allowed her to pour the stuff down my throat. I coughed and gagged.

"I'll be back in an hour or so," Geldra said, frowning. "Stay awake, Mouse. I don't want you dying of fright." With that, she shuffled out of the house.

Groaning, I stood up. The medicine hadn't yet taken affect, but I wasn't going to sit in that chair and risk another nightmare. I paced around the house, looking things over and trying to remember my past. I had been a miner most of my life, and had been married to Geldra for more than forty years. I'd never really done anything exciting. My life had been nothing but backbreaking work and a sullen, nagging wife. Was it any wonder my spirit was all but broken?

My house was a bland reflection of my life--simple and plain, just how Geldra liked it. Nothing really stood out, and most of the yellow walls were bare. If I would have had a say in anything, I would have livened up the place a bit. But my opinion was worthless.

I scratched my beard and gazed out a window along the road that wound down the mountain, watching for Geldra and praying she would bring me something to end the nightmares. I couldn't understand how, if my life had been so boring, I was now having strange dreams that seemed completely unconnected to anything from my past. The nightmares had popped out of nowhere, for no apparent reason.

At last Geldra returned empty handed, slamming the door shut behind her. She glared at me with an I-told-you-so look. "The healer says you've been infected by a weird type of mite. It gets in a man's beard and causes him to have terrible dreams where he can actually see the creature attacking him."

"That's not possible," I protested. "I've caught enough glimpses of the monster to know it's huge--bigger than a man."

Geldra rolled her eyes impatiently. "Yes, yes, I know. That's how you see the mite in your dreams--much bigger than it actually is. Anyway, this ailment has been going around among men with beards. The mites probably got on my clothes when I was in town, and I brought them back to you."

"How can I get rid of them?" I asked, already suspecting what her answer would be.

"The healer said there's only one way," she explained. "You have to lop off that beard and keep it off for a while."

I clutched my beard, my hand trembling. "I won't do it."

"It's only temporary, Mouse. Then you can grow it back. Although why you'd want to is beyond me!"

She grabbed a pair of scissors and a straight razor and approached me. "Won't take me long, and then you'll be free of those nightmares."

"Get back!" I cried. "Don't you touch my beard!" For some reason, rage was building inside me.

Her eyes widened. "Don't give me orders, Mouse. I'm the one that runs this household, remember?"

I lowered my gaze, my spirit weakening.

Seeing that I was faltering, Geldra pressed on. "I take care of your sorry hide. What kind of shape would you be in if it wasn't for me? You'd be homeless or dead. Not only am I the brains of this marriage, but I also do all the work."

"I used to work," I said. "Pretty hard, too. Harder than you do."

She grabbed my shoulder and shook me, glowering down at me. I was a short man--not even five feet tall, and she outweighed me by a hundred pounds. "You've never worked harder than me, you little scab. And you never will. And anyway, you're damaged goods now. You can't even stand up without that medicine I make you drink each night."

Again, I lowered my gaze. "Nevertheless, I worked hard."

"I don't care," Geldra said. "The point I'm making is that you're nothing without me. You've led a pathetic life, and you'll die a poor excuse for a man. The only thing you have to boast about is that you have a wonderful wife who takes care of you. Got it?"

I nodded. "Yes, dear."

"Say it louder!" she bellowed.

"Yes, dear."

She slapped my face. "Better never backtalk me again, or I'll knock you silly. Now let's get that ugly beard off your face so you can get some decent sleep for a change and quit whining about your scary nightmares."

I started to nod, then shook my head. Rage began to build again. "You won't take my beard," I said, my hands shaking. "Before you do that, I'll..."

"You'll do what?" she snarled. "You dare make threats against me? Some type of nasty mite is crawling around in there, you old fool. That gnarled bush needs to come off." She moved the scissors toward my beard.

My rage burning out of control, I slapped the scissors from Geldra's hand. She gasped. "Those mites are controlling your mind! They're making you do crazy things!"

"Maybe they are," I said. "And maybe that's a good thing."

"What are you saying?" Geldra cried. "Challenging my authority is not a good thing. Without me, you'd be done for. You couldn't even keep yourself fed."

"That might well be," I said. "But at least I'd be a free man and not a slave."

She raised her hand to slap me, then lowered it. "I'm done arguing. That beard has to come off, right now."

Again, the rage erupted. "Try it and you'll be sorry!"

Geldra laughed. "We'll see who's sorry, little man." She bent to pick up the scissors but I kicked them away.

"Scum!" she shouted. She seized my beard and yanked it.

My rage boiled over. My blood was boiling too. I could feel something awaken inside me. "I'll kill you for that!" I seethed.

My vision darkened, and the room began to waver. A sense of unreality washed over me. I tried to move, but something was holding me fast. I could feel thin strands like ropes all over me, binding me tightly.

With a roar, I tore myself free of the invisible bonds. I lunged forward and seized Geldra's throat. I was suddenly strong, like the roots of the mountains. A fire raged within me, and in my mind old memories sprang to life. I could hear hammers falling on stone, and smell iron from the forge. Battle lust gripped me, and I squeezed her throat with the single-minded desire of choking her head right off of her neck.

Making hideous gargling noises, she fought back in a panic. Two more arms sprouted from her sides, and four new, crimson eyes opened in her forehead. She continued changing until she became the creature from my nightmares, as my vision darkened until it finally went black.

My eyesight cleared, and I found myself standing in a torch-lit stone cavern draped with thick webs. I stood on a web above the cave floor, and a chest full of shining treasure caught my eye from below. But my focus was on the giant spider I was strangling. Her eight legs were wrapped around me, trying to crush me before I could throttle her. But my back was protected by stout armor, and she couldn't break it.

At last her legs grew limp around me, and I shoved the dead spider away. My hands were covered in her black blood, and I wiped them on my trousers. The stench would remind me of my victory in the hours ahead.

"You wanted my beard," I said, kicking the bloated carcass. "You knew if you took that away in my dreams, I was beaten in life and you could have finished me off easily. But you underestimated me."

Ripping the last of the webbing free from my legs, I grabbed my axe--which was hanging suspended nearby--tore it free, and jumped down to the cavern floor. The treasure chest still stood open, the gold and jewels sparkling in the glow of the torch I had dropped when the spider descended on me.

How long had I been snared in her web? How long had she kept me prisoner in that dream? Considering the torch still burned, it couldn't have been very long. Yet it seemed like I had lived a lifetime trapped in that nightmare as a spineless man married to an overbearing nag. I struggled to remember, but already the dream was growing foggy in my mind, being replaced with memories of battle and adventure.

Chills crept down my spine, as I realized how thin the line between reality and fantasy could become. For a moment I lost focus, feeling vulnerable. But then I shrugged it off, my eyes lighting up at the sight of the treasure. I was a stout fellow, not given to dwelling on strange fears or doubts. Rather, this was a moment of celebration. I had slain a mighty foe, found my fortune, and my beard was still intact.

What more could a dwarf ask for in life?

End.
The Pipes are Calling

(Originally published in _Sorcerous Signals_ magazine.

Revised for this collection.)

1Father was digging for pipes again, and I punched the wall in frustration, skinning my knuckles. I was so sick of it that I wanted to run away and never come back. Dirt flew from the garden as he shoveled, some of it thudding against the house. I couldn't pretend to ignore it any longer, and I ran outside. "What are you doing?" I said. "Stop it!"

Father had already dug up several carrots and tomato plants. He paused and leaned on his shovel, his leathery skin beaded with sweat. He was getting sunburned and looked breathless in the heat, his eyes distant. His clothes were covered in dirt stains.

"Go in and rest, Father," I said.

He shook his head. "Got to keep digging, son. I think there's a pipe down here. I got a strong twitch in my leg when I was watering the crops."

I sighed. "You always get twitches, but you never find any pipes except for old rusted ones. I don't understand why you bother."

His eyes narrowed. "You don't, huh? Didn't I tell you that the Iron Smiths once ruled this land? They built a system of pipes underground to move water through. It was downright ingenious. Some of the pipes were fused with magic and could turn water into a powerful potion."

"I've heard the story, Father," I said, rolling my eyes. "You've told it to me a thousand times. Nobody has ever found a single one of those magic pipes. In fact, you're the only one who bothers searching, the only one who still believes. I just don't see why..." I faltered, too overcome with frustration to continue. As a boy of fourteen with no other family, I was stuck with this pathetic old lunatic. The days blurred into one another, a mix of struggling to put food on the table while watching my father dig his sanity away.

"Why don't you grab a shovel, son?" he said, wiping sweat from his brow. "Help me dig. When we find the pipe, it will be like finding heaven."

I slumped down on the porch, crushed by a hopeless feeling. Our property was full of holes, leading to the woods over fifty yards away.

Father went on digging for a while, and then let out a yelp. "I hit metal!"

I didn't react. I'd seen this many times before.

He dug frantically. "Yeah, it's a pipe, son! A big, fat one."

I waited, knowing what would come next.

"It's definitely a pipe," he went on. "It's...ah...rusted. Shoot. It's just a rusty iron pipe. I don't see any special markings on it."

I wondered if I should make potato soup for supper.

Father threw down his shovel and staggered to the porch. He sat down and shook his head. "You know, I really thought this would be the one."

"I know you did," I said. "But you always think that."

He uncorked a flask of whiskey and took a swig, his haggard face twisted with bitterness. "I guess I'm too much of an optimist. Ever since your mom took ill and died, life's been so dang hard. The king has taxed us nearly to death. It doesn't matter that we're dirt poor and we mostly live off the land. His tax collector still comes and demands the same ungodly amount of coin. I'd like to strangle that tax collector and bury him in one of these holes."

I nodded. That at least made sense.

"If only we could find one of those special pipes," he said, sighing.

"But how would that solve our problems?" I said, still trying to reason with him after all these years. "Are you thinking you could sell it or something?" I'd asked this question before, but he'd never given a straight answer. I didn't expect one now.

He scratched his head. "We couldn't sell something so rare and wondrous. Instead, we'd unlock its secrets, drink its water. We'd gain knowledge and become like wizards. Then we'd live the good life, son. I could quit selling whiskey and be a respectable man. And I could pay for you to get an education and maybe learn a trade."

"Father, you're out of your mind," I said, putting my head in my hands. "We're not going to find some stupid pipe and become wizards."

"I saw it in a dream," he said. "And it wasn't me who found the pipe--it was you. But if you won't dig for it, then I have to."

"A dream is just nonsense," I said. "I'm not digging for anything. There are holes all over our yard. Thank goodness we don't have any neighbors!"

"There are not enough holes," he said. "Obviously."

I groaned. "Please, Father. Just give it up."

"We should go to the last Iron Smith," he said. "It's not that far. He had nothing to say to me the five times I visited him, but he might talk to you."

"I'm not going," I said. "How many times have I told you that? Why can't you just be normal? We need to worry about winter and stuff like that. And the next tax day!"

"We will," he said, standing up. "But this is a good day for digging."

My despair boiled over and I grabbed his leg. The old man was getting worse, and my desperation was reaching new heights. "Father, if I go to the Iron Smith, and he doesn't tell me anything, will you give up on this crazy stuff?"

He hesitated, his face tense. Finally he nodded. "It's a deal, son. If you go with me to the forge, and he doesn't speak, I'm done with it all. Yes, done with it forever."

I rose, determined to save his sanity. "Then let's get it over with."

***

When, after a day of travel through rugged forest lands, we reached the forge in the mountains, the Iron Smith stared right through us. The smell of oil and leather filled the cave, and shadows congealed beyond the torchlight. The Iron Smith was covered in oozing sores, his sickly gray flesh wrapped partially in dirty bandages. He was tall and bony, with a bald, misshapen head and eyes that seemed to hold a tint of yellow.

"We're poor folks," my father said. "We barely can pay our taxes or find enough to eat. We have nothing to offer you other than our thanks, but we need your help!"

The Iron Smith rubbed oil into leather. His workbench was covered in tools and unfinished yet impressively crafted items such as kettles, knives, and pieces of armor. The heat from a nearby fire pit was intense. Sweat dripped from my face.

I stepped forward. "My father is looking for pipes left by your people. Special ones. Do you know where they might exist?"

The Iron Smith went on with his task.

I picked up a device and examined it. It looked like a claw, and I couldn't imagine what it might be used for. "I haven't seen one of these in quite some time," I said, in an effort to catch his interest.

He looked up, his eyes narrowing. "Have you molded iron?"

I nodded. I was here to save my father's sanity, and I felt no shame for lying. We'd come a long way, and the least this fellow could do was speak to us. "So what about those pipes?"

My father started to open his mouth, but I seized his arm.

"There are pipes all over in the earth," said the Iron Smith. "Dig around and I'm sure you'll find some. My people created a vast system to refine and enhance water in this area. But when they moved from these lands, they left many of the pipes underground."

"Why didn't you go with them?" I asked.

"I am diseased," he said. "My people exclude those like me."

"We want to know about the special pipes!" my father blurted out. "The ones that legend speaks of. The ones that can give us knowledge and power."

"My people left only iron," he said, sneering disdainfully. "I suggest you adopt a different goal, old man."

"Then there's nothing but rusty pipes left in these lands?" I asked.

He hesitated, gazing into my eyes. I held his gaze.

"I know nothing of rust," he finally said. "Our iron does not succumb to the elements."

"But we've seen them," I said. "Rusty pipes in the earth."

He smiled, showing yellow, pointed teeth, and goose bumps erupted on my flesh. "Are you sure you can see, boy? You seem blind to me."

"I see just fine," I said. "What do you mean?"

"Look in the mirror," the Iron Smith said. "You might be surprised at what you glimpse staring back at you. Let the light be your guide. It will open your eyes."

"I don't understand," I said, sighing with frustration. "We didn't come here to learn about mirrors. We want to know about magic pipes."

"Do you think you deserve such knowledge?" he said. "What do you know of feeding the earth? All you can think of is feeding yourselves. I was like that too. That is the disease I bear, brought on by my own selfish yearnings. My people call it vanity. On humans, it doesn't show outwardly, but as you can see, that's not the case with my kind."

"So you can't help us?" I asked. "Is that what you're saying?"

My father knelt down. "I beg you! We're a couple of sorry peasants. I sell whiskey just to pay my taxes. Is there nothing you can do for us?"

"There is nothing you need from me," he said.

My face reddened with anger. "If you're so wise, why are you an outcast?"

"I was an outcast," he said. "Now I'm an example."

"You're useless!" I snarled at him. "Come on, Father. Let's go home."

The Iron Smith seemed oblivious to my insult and continued his work.

My father hung his head and wept.

***

When the tax collector came, we had no money to pay. He warned us that the next time he returned we'd have to pay double, along with a fine, or the king would take possession of our house and land. I was miserable and shaking with anxiety, but Father had other things on his mind. He'd succeeded in pulling a short pipe from the yard and laying it on the porch. He spent hours scraping rust from it--only to find more rust underneath.

"I don't understand it," he said. "The Iron Smith said their metal never rusts. Yet look at this pipe. And why is it cut so short?"

"We're going to lose our house and land, Father," I said. "Do you realize that? I don't care about that stupid pipe. You promised me you'd give up on that stuff. You lied!"

The old man's mouth fell open, pain in his eyes. I realized he felt terrible but couldn't help himself. Lonely chills crept over me.

"I can't give up," he said weakly, and he went back to scraping the pipe.

"I have an idea," I said, the tax collector's disapproving face burned into my mind. "We could dig up a bunch of those pipes and sell them for scrap metal to a blacksmith."

"That wouldn't work," he said. "The metal is cheap and plentiful in these lands thanks to all the mines that the Iron Smiths dug. We'd have to gather a mountain of it just to make a handful of coin. It would take us weeks of digging and backbreaking labor just to get enough to pay the taxes. No, I'll brew a lot of whiskey instead. I promise. But first I've got to keep searching for our salvation!"

I considered running away. But I had nowhere to go, and I couldn't bring myself to abandon him. He was like a seventy-year-old baby who needed constant care. I had to make sure he ate and slept, otherwise he might waste away.

In desperation, I tried to remember what the Iron Smith had said--something about looking in a mirror and learning to see. I got Mother's mirror from Father's bedroom and gazed into it. My face was young and smooth--yet somehow it looked old and cynical. I widened my eyes, struggling to _see._ But I saw nothing different.

When I stepped outside, Father was shaking his head. "I wore a hole right through it, son. Rust all the way through."

I tilted the mirror so I could see the pipe's reflection. It looked the same.

"Maybe I should scrape near the other end," said Father, hope springing back into his eyes. "Maybe that's the magical end."

I walked into the garden and examined the large pipe Father had dug down to just before we visited the Iron Smith. I looked into the mirror, and the pipe's appearance changed. It was now black and engraved with runes, and water dripped from one end of it. When I moved the mirror away, the pipe was rusty with no sign of water.

My heart sped into a flutter, and I jumped down into the hole. With a shaking hand, I let some water drip into my palm. I lapped it up.

The blood rushed to my head and I nearly passed out. Then the feeling subsided, and I could sense the network of pipes beneath the ground. The Iron Smiths' system was still intact, feeding the earth and keeping it free of rot and disease. I could feel miles of pipes calling to me, and I was flooded with a sense that anything could be accomplished. I was confident I could do whatever I wanted in life, that knowledge and wisdom would be my guide.

This was the transformation that Father had dreamed of. But there was a dark side. The world wasn't ready for such knowledge, and it could upset a precious balance and lead to massive suffering. Humans were still too petty and thoughtless to be given such gifts. The Iron Smiths had known this, and they'd concealed their network with magic to keep people from gaining power from it. They'd further hidden the pipes by planting decoys in the ground that were easy to remove--like the short one Father had dug up.

I could see the pipes as they really were because I had compassion and wisdom--the reflection of my true self. Caring for my father had given me strengths and qualities I wasn't even aware of. The Iron Smith had seen that in me.

I climbed out of the hole and shoveled it full of dirt. It would take me days to fill in the rest of them. I walked back to the porch.

I sat down next to Father and patted him on the back. "No luck, huh?" I asked.

He bowed his head. "No luck, son. It's just a rusty hunk of metal. I'm a crazy old man who's wasted a lot of time. I hope you can forgive me."

I smiled. Father didn't realize we had everything we needed. He didn't know my knowledge had expanded to dizzying heights. And he wouldn't know, because I could never tell him or anyone else. But things would change for us soon enough.

End.
A Christmas Frost

(Originally published in Daily Science Fiction magazine.

Revised for this collection.)

When I was a young boy, I used to climb in Dad's rusty pickup truck and we'd head out to find the perfect tree. He always brought ropes to help subdue it, because the wretch pines usually put up one heck of a fight. One time, I got nailed with a flailing branch and it ripped my cheek open so badly that Mom had to stitch it up. I still bear the scar. With pride, I should add.

As I grew older, Dad let me swing Fungbrom's Axe while he stood by and watched. I chopped down my first wretch pine. My arms were torn and bloody, but once the wretches are free of their roots you can wrestle them onto a truck pretty easily if you've got some thick clothing on. Dad was so proud of me he gave me a big sip of mountain whiskey, and I managed to keep it down.

Those joyful days are long gone. Now I sit on my back porch, out of work and luck, watching the snow pile up in silver rolls that look so creamy you could eat them with a tablespoon. The wretch pine is already propped up in the living room, and I keep her nourished on skunk water from hollow trees. In spite of being cut off from her precious roots, she's still plenty mean. My boy James is standing in his dirty red snowsuit punching snow off the porch rail. Some cheap canned soup simmers on the stove.

"Dad, when can I play with Fungbrom's Axe?" James says, flinging snow into the air and letting it fall onto his face in some strange child's ceremony.

"You don't play with it, son," I explain patiently. "It's a tool, not a toy. Actually, it's a weapon." I take a sip of whiskey.

Linda lets out a yelp. "Brian, your stupid wretch tree has fallen over on top of Bixby!"

"Shoot," I mutter, taking another sip. If the wretch actually fell on Bixby, our Siamese cat, he was probably fur patches and blood pudding by now.

"Brian!" comes the second, inevitable yell.

I stick my whiskey jug in a snowdrift and slowly head inside. The wretch tree is lying on its side, the tip near the stove. The tip is curling away from the heat. I consider shoving it against the hot cast iron just to teach it a lesson, like my daddy would have, but I'm not that mean.

I pull out the faded couch. Sure enough, Bixby is hiding behind it. He leaps out and jumps into the TV cabinet, knocking down some of my Incredible Hulk VCR tapes. Cats obviously have no respect for great television.

I stick on a welder's glove and seize the wretch tree. The bluish branches flail around at my touch, trying to pierce the thick rubber. I carefully stand it up. Those damn tree holders never work right. I call in James and together we adjust the tree stand.

Beyond the windows, puffs of glittering, windblown flakes block my view of the woods. The feeling of a harsh frost hangs in the air, three days before Christmas. I glance at my wife and realize it can't get any colder around here, frost or not. But we have one perfect wretch tree and some canned ham, and my TV is picking up two grainy channels. I click it on to see a mountain man getting chased by a bear. I adjust the rabbit ears and the picture comes in a little less grainy. The wretch tree's branches seem drawn to it.

Linda gazes at me with eyes full of blame as she stirs the bland soup, and I tense up, certain she's going to start talking about our lack of money. That issue always becomes especially dire issue around Christmas, which is why I live in dread of the holiday. But there's nothing to say beyond the old blame game, and both of us are burned out on that. There's just no work out here.

I turn back to the wretch tree, admiring it, with James beside me. I put my hand on his shoulder. "Isn't she a beauty, son?"

He nods. "But what am I getting for Christmas?"

My instinct is to respond with a stern tone and remind him of what he already has--a roof over his head and two loving parents. But I know he's too smart to buy into that. "We can't really afford anything, James. Truth is, we can barely afford to eat."

Linda glares at me accusingly.

I look away, waiting for her to resume her stirring.

We sit down and have a quiet dinner of thin soup and homemade bread. It's not the worst I've eaten. The snow goes on piling up outside.

After dinner, I smoke my pipe while Linda watches TV. The picture has darkened a bit so she hits the side of the set. She's still pretty, but way too thin. All bones and skin, and murky underneath. That murkiness drives me crazy, leaves me feeling shut out. Luckily, the picture brightens again. I wonder how many times smacking it will do the job before it finally gives up the ghost.

I glance at my VCR tape collection, wondering if I should take it to town and try to sell it along with the player. Might get enough for it to buy James something decent. He's too old for simple toys, so I'd be cutting it close. Some old, beat up Hulk recordings? I'd sold off everything else that wasn't nailed down, but I manage to convince myself no one would buy them. It might be a lie, but I'm quick to believe it for the sake my collection. And, I remind myself, James loves that show. If only the logging company hadn't shut down. If only I had learned to live off what the mountain provided, like my daddy used to do, instead of relying on a job. If only this, if only that. I was tired of such useless speculation.

A stomping noise causes me to whirl around. James strides out of my bedroom carrying Fungbrom's axe. His eyes burn like two angry match heads. He's focused on the wretch pine.

"James!" I yell. "Put that back."

He keeps walking toward the tree, his shoulders hunched with purpose.

Linda leaps up from the couch. "James, do as your father tells you!"

I step in front of him and extend my hand. "Give me the axe, son."

"I'll chop that stupid tree into bits!" James promises. "I don't care about it. I want something for Christmas. It's not fair."

"No, it's not," I say, hanging my head. "But if you chop up the wretch, we'll have no protection from the dark gnome. He'll bring you toys that pinch, poke, bite, and possess. Is that what you want?"

"Some toys are better than none," says James. But his body has gone limp with defeat, the fire dying in his eyes.

"Fungbrom bred the wretch pines to ward off the dark gnome," I remind James. "And he showed the mountain people how to make special axes to cut them down. My great, great, great grandfather forged that axe."

Tears slide down James' cheeks. He hands me the axe.

I hesitate, and then hand it back. "It's yours now, son."

His eyes light up. "Mine? But I thought I was too young!"

I shrug and smile. "It looked steady enough in your hands. I thought that wretch was a goner." I glance at my jug of whiskey, consider giving James a sip, and then reject the idea. Some traditions are better off forgotten.

Linda gives me a hard, fearful stare and then looks away, perhaps dreaming of a land beyond the mountains, like New York or Los Angeles--where I could never live. I'm a mountain man through and through, and now so is James. We're stubborn folk who make do.

That night, I sit on the couch with James, and he keeps tracing his fingers over the oak handle and dark iron head of Fungbrom's Axe. Finally, Linda joins us, and somehow I know she won't be leaving. I had been wrong about her. I usually was. The wretch pine leans toward the stove, as if to warm itself and escape the strange pale-blue mountain frost that covers a nearby window. The TV is showing a clear, bright picture of some Santa on a city street, a world away.

End.
The Weeping Well

(Originally published in Mirror Dance magazine.

Revised for this collection.)

Elleese touched the bruise on her cheek, which was still tender from last night's beating, and gazed into the well, wondering if this was the day she'd throw herself in and end her life. It was a lonely old well, made of crumbling, vine-covered stone blocks, lost in a deep valley amidst grassy hills miles from town. It was the perfect place for a quiet death.

"My weeping well," Elleese said aloud. How many tears of hers had it tasted?

A blanket of grey hung in the sky, with darker, angry-looking clouds to the west, and a light rain that was more like a mist caressed her skin. How many days had she come here with bruises on her face and arms? Once, she'd even showed up with burn blisters on the backs of her hands from a hot poker. She still bore the scars.

How many times had she thought about leaping into the well and ending her misery? In this land, where women were all but slaves and the laws worked against them, there was no escape from her husband other than death. The laws of marriage were strict, and any woman who broke them was considered the scum of the earth and could be punished by torture or execution. She had nowhere to go and no one who would help her. Even her own relatives would have turned her away.

"I'll leave all of them to wonder what became of me," Elleese whispered, climbing up onto the rim of the well. The water below was lost in shadow. Her husband would never find her body here. He didn't deserve to find her. Let him keep searching and searching, wasting his time and feeling miserable. Meanwhile, she'd be sleeping peacefully in the darkness below.

Yet according to the religion that was widely practiced throughout the land, she would be suffering eternal torment at the hands of demons in some forgotten hell. It seemed unfair that a soul who was already suffering should then be punished by more suffering, but that's what her people believed.

"I don't believe it," Elleese said. "It's just a lie invented to scare people."

Elleese prepared to let go and fall, but her body refused to cooperate. What if it was true? What if she would end up at the mercy of demons?

"I don't believe it!" she cried. She was tired of the constant fear and torture. She saw no future for her other than misery, and she wasn't going to let religious fears stop her from ending her life.

She begged her god to have mercy on her soul, and she leaned farther out over the well, relaxing her grip. Still, she didn't fall.

"I can't do it," she moaned. "Not yet."

Elleese was about to climb down and return home, when the weeping well itself decided the issue for her. The stone block she was sitting on finally crumbled and gave way. With a cry, she toppled into the darkness.

Elleese tried to grab something but fell too quickly, splashing into the murky water and going under. She flailed around and swam to the surface, gasping for breath, her chest tight with panic. Even though she'd been contemplating suicide, it hadn't been her decision to fall, and instinct and panic now commanded her to fight for her life.

She swam to the stone blocks and tried to climb up. It was a shallow well--only about thirty feet deep; but the bricks were covered in a thick coating of slime, and she could find no toe hold even after she kicked off her shoes.

"Help me, someone!" she screamed again and again. But she was miles from town or from any road, and she doubted anyone would hear her.

Now that death was staring her in the face, Elleese realized she wanted to live. She suddenly knew her destiny, as she gazed up through the tunnel of stone blocks at the grey sky above. She would champion the cause of justice for women and lead a revolution. Or she would die trying. If she was strong enough and clever enough, she could do it. Many others felt the way she did, and they could meet in secret and plot change.

Why hadn't she thought of this before? Why now, when she was trapped in the well? Regardless, Elleese had received her true purpose in life, and she wanted desperately to live to see it fulfilled. Fate was mocking her and it wasn't fair. Her destiny had been revealed--but only when it was too late. Already she was growing tired of swimming, as she wasn't particularly skilled at it and she was expending way too much energy flailing about. She began to sob in frustration, her tears dripping into the water.

Something slimy rubbed against her skin and she screamed. Something huge and alive was moving in the dark water--a serpent that rose from the depths and coiled around her. Its head was twice as big as that of a horse, and it was the ugliest thing she'd ever seen. It was a wart-covered mass of uneven, grey scales, with crooked fangs hanging from its jaws. Everything about the serpent was twisted, slimy, and ugly--except for its eyes. They were sapphire blue and sparkled hypnotically as they met her own.

Elleese screamed and fought to escape, but the serpent's tree-trunk thick body was coiled tightly around her. "Let me go!" she pleaded. She wondered if she was already dead, if this was a demon come to torment her. It certainly looked like a demon. Actually, it looked far more ugly and monstrous than any demon she'd ever imagined.

"But you wanted to die," the serpent hissed. "I've been watching you for some time now. You wanted to drown yourself in these waters. Don't deny it. I've tasted your tears and I know the pain in your heart."

"Yes, I wanted to die," she sobbed. "But not now. I just want to live and be free! Let me go. I've suffered enough by my husband's cruelty."

The serpent's jaws split into a grin. "Have you, now? I like pain and suffering--mental, physical...and the suffering of the soul. Despair and bitterness are treats for me to savor. I like cold-blooded murder." He let out a hissing laugh. "I could murder you right here and now. I could eat your heart and absorb energy from it, to grow stronger."

"Please, let me go!" Elleese cried.

"Why should I?" the serpent said in its low, rumbling hiss. "What will you do for me in return? Will you murder for me and bring me a fresh heart?"

Elleese shook her head. "I can't."

"What about that cruel husband you spoke of?" said the serpent. "Will you murder him, and bring me his heart? If you will, I shall free you from this well and give you an instrument that will kill him quickly. You would be free of this prison--and free from him forever."

Elleese considered it. She'd thought about murdering her husband many times, but she'd always feared being found out and punished. And the punishment for a wife slaying her husband would be a long, slow death in a reeking dungeon. Regardless, could she really bring herself to kill him? She doubted it.

"I'll do anything else," she said. "But not that."

The serpent bellowed an angry hiss. "You waste my time. I'll take you down to my lair and devour you." With that, the monster started to drag Elleese below the surface.

"Wait!" she screamed, and the serpent paused. "I'll do it."

"I figured you would change your mind," said the serpent. "I've lived in this well for more than a thousand years. Most of the time I lay sleeping, dreaming of suffering and death. I'm as old as the world itself--a creature beyond good and evil. The agony of humans pleases me, and their hearts contain a type of energy that makes my power grow. But I haven't been able to feed since being imprisoned down here by a witch's curse. I've grown weak, but so has the spell that binds me here. A single heart--especially one full of malice--can give me the strength to break the curse and enter the world again."

"But you'll hurt people," Elleese said. "Demons like you always do. That's probably why you were trapped down here in the first place."

The serpent grinned. "Perhaps. But I don't want to feed off humans anymore--except for the one heart I need to free me from this well. Once I've escaped, I'll return to the mountains, to ancient caverns far beneath stone where I was born, and I'll never be seen again. You have my word on that, and a snake's word is golden!"

Elleese hesitated, and then nodded. She knew she was taking a huge gamble in bargaining with a devil, but what else could she do?

The serpent opened its jaws wider. "My back teeth are small and soft. Break one off and take it to your husband. Wait until he's asleep, and prick his skin with it. He'll be dead in moments. His eyes will turn blue like mine and he'll move and groan as if he still lives--but rest assured, he will be dead. Cut out his heart and bring it back to me. He may cry out, but he won't resist--because as I said, he will already be a corpse. His body will then disintegrate into smoke, never to be found. And with no body, people will just assume he ran away for some unknown reason."

Wanting only to escape the abomination that was coiled around her, Elleese reached into the serpent's mouth with a trembling hand.

"Don't prick your skin!" the serpent warned.

She carefully broke off a small tooth and held it up for him to see. "Now let me go."

The serpent rose out of the water, and she realized it was much larger than she'd assumed. It shot up fifty feet, carrying her in its coils, and dumped her out of the well. She lay dripping in the grass, as the beast hovered above her.

"Do not fail me," the serpent warned. "If you plan on simply going away and never coming back, that tooth will transform into a tiny, winged demon that will suck the blood from the living--starting with you and everyone you know. And don't think you can discard it somewhere, either. You've touched it, and it knows your scent."

"What if I can't do what you ask of me?" Elleese said, knowing it was a real and likely possibility.

"Then you must return here for punishment," said the serpent. "I may devour you, or I may spare your life--depending on my mood. But regardless, I want my tooth back, as it contains powerful magic." With that, the monster sank into the well.

***

Elleese halfway hoped her husband Huen would beat and humiliate her like usual to make the murder easier for her to commit. She almost preyed he'd pull her hair and shove her against the wall while telling her she was worthless--one of his favorite pastimes. But Huen didn't assault her every night. Rather, it depended on his mood and whether or not he was drinking. Sometimes he could even be kind and gentle.

On this night, Huen was in a gentle mood. He apologized for hurting her the night before and told her he loved her. He promised never to beat her again. He was tired from work, and went to bed early.

Elleese stood in their home, the serpent's tooth pinched between her fingers, wondering what she should do. At last she walked upstairs and into their bedroom. Huen lay sleeping peacefully on the bed. He looked so innocent, a tall, lanky man with dark hair and a thin, young face. It was all too easy to forget how that boyish face could become contorted with rage, how those big, calloused hands could squeeze her throat.

Tears rolled down Elleese's cheeks. She couldn't deny that she loved him, even after all the misery he'd inflicted upon her. If only he could change and lose that terrible temper, they could have a happy life together. Sometimes he could treat her like a princess (usually when he was trying to win her affections back after beating her senseless). She knew he was capable of being a sensitive, loving man.

"I can't do this!" Elleese whispered.

Huen groaned and rolled onto his side. For an instant he scowled in his sleep, and the memories of years of cruelty flooded her mind. She raised the tooth, rage boiling inside her. One tiny poke from that tooth and he'd get what he deserved. And she would be forever free of him.

Elleese moved to the bedside and positioned the tooth an inch above his cheek. She was seconds away from freeing herself from a monster's grasp--or rather, two monsters' grasps. But still she hesitated, unable to force her hand to move.

For several minutes, she fought an internal battle with herself. The tooth she held poised above his flesh was the key to her salvation. Or was it? She'd never hurt or killed anyone before, and she knew if she did so now, it would make her no better than her husband. He deserved to punished, but not like this--not as he lay sleeping.

Elleese knew she was doomed. She couldn't sacrifice her honor and do what the serpent wished. But if the creature spoke true, she'd have to return its tooth or it would bring destruction to her and her family.

Regardless, she was no murderer. And even though she knew must return to the well and probably be devoured, she could take some solace knowing she was a better person than the sorry wretch whose life she'd just spared.

She turned away from her husband, believing she'd never have justice--that he'd never be punished for all the misery he'd inflicted on her.

Was she a complete fool? She leaned against the wall, groaning. Was she giving up a great opportunity in favor of more suffering? She wished she'd simply drowned in that well--like she'd wanted to for weeks and weeks.

***

The next day, the rain had stopped but purple storm clouds hung in sky. The sun's rays poked through, and a huge rainbow stretched over the land. The hills around Elleese were bathed in a golden glow. She stood before the well, gazing into its depths, wondering if the serpent would show itself.

At last she saw a pair of sapphire blue eyes peering up at her. "So, Elleese," the serpent said. "Have you killed your husband and brought me his heart?"

"No," Elleese said, hanging her head in defeat. "I've come to return your tooth."

With a hiss of rage, the serpent rose from the well and glowered down at her, its jaws splitting open. "So you've failed me?"

She nodded. "I am no murderer."

"Then prepare yourself," the serpent said. "You shall now see me as I truly am."

The creature disappeared back down into the well.

Elleese waited, her body shaking. She could scarcely imagine what dastardly fate awaited her. Was her honor worth this? But that question had already been answered when she made the decision to spare her husband's life.

Moments later, the serpent rose again, but it had changed. Instead of a warty grey covering, its scales were now like the finest silver and shimmered with a touch of crimson. Its head had become proud, stately, and dragon-like, with three magnificent gleaming horns jutting forth. The creature had transformed from the ugliest monster imaginable to a beast of breathtaking beauty. From its jaws, it dropped a golden chest into the grass.

"Look upon me as I truly am," the serpent said. "I've removed the magic that concealed my true appearance. I was the defender of this land, and the woman who once rode on my back brought justice and peace to all. But she departed from this world, and since the day she left, I've waited centuries for a new master. I knew that one day a woman with a noble heart would come to me, led by the hand of fate. At last, it has happened."

Elleese gazed up at the serpent in shock, unsure of what to do. Was this really happening? "But you wanted me to murder for you," she said.

"No, I didn't," said the serpent. "It was a test. I wanted to see if you were truly worthy to command me. Had you murdered your husband, you would have come to this well and found only the dark water below. I would never have appeared to you again."

"Worthy to command you?" Elleese said, her disbelief growing.

"Look in that chest," the serpent said.

With trembling hands, Elleese pressed a button and the chest popped open. Inside was a golden breastplate, a winged helm, and a silver bow and quiver of arrows. All were covered in elegant runes and shone with a magical glow, beautiful beyond anything she'd ever seen.

"Put on your armor," said the serpent. "It will fit."

Elleese did, and it fit perfectly. She slung the quiver of arrows over her shoulder and grabbed her bow, a deep change settling over her. Her eyes became sapphire blue, her will strong with purpose. The woman she'd always been deep inside had awakened at last.

The serpent lowered its head. She caressed the serpent's neck, feeling a deep bond with the creature. At last she climbed onto its back.

"Where shall we go first, my lady?" the serpent asked. "You are the Dealer of Justice, charged by an ancient goddess to purify the world in the way you see fit. By divine right, your arrows shall cleanse the land of evil. So again, where shall we start?"

Elleese smiled. "I have an idea or two."

End.
The Burning Strands of Daylight

(Originally published in Bards and Sages Quarterly magazine.

Revised for this collection.)

The world was sticky like my face.

I tried to sleep, but the darkness had settled over my face like glue. I pulled the gray and black webbing off and flung it aside, but the stickiness remained. Then the closet door popped open and I could see Monster gazing out me with his three eyes.

Poor old thing, a spawn of the darkness. He was kind of dumb and undoubtedly didn't know why he spent time in closets.

I wasn't in the mood for Monster, and I tried to shut the closet door; but he reached around it and clutched my wrist with a tentacle, awakening the singing voices. Anytime Monster touched me, the voices began their song, and it seemed as if my insides were being pulled down a tunnel to the sea.

The sea was the only good place left beneath the stars. The land was webbed over and foul, but the sea was harder to tame in its depth and anger.

I could smell salt carried on the breeze, and I smiled. Monster cocked his head to one side, his nostrils flaring. Perhaps he could smell it too.

I yanked my hand away from Monster. I could see a tunnel stretching out before me, with hazy, transparent green and blue colors forming the walls. Something within me wanted to break free and walk that tunnel, but I refused to allow it.

I belonged on star-bleached land. The earth was laced with the bones of people I'd known and loved, and I couldn't abandon them.

The singing grew louder, insistent, and the strands of darkness that hung about my room snapped and rolled up into little balls.

I gazed out the window at the stars. Why did they have to be so far away, their light too feeble to break the shadow that smothered the land? The moon was dead.

It had died when the sun turned black.

But I had hope in a jar beneath my pillow--the last speck of daylight. I'd captured it the day the shadow fell, and the voices had sung it into a frozen relic. I held the jar to the window, hoping it would call to the stars and bring them near.

Monster came out for a closer look. I showed him the jar, with the petrified daylight, and he sniffed at it. He always sniffed at it like he wanted to eat it, in spite of the fact that he didn't seem to have a mouth.

Monster had come with the shadow, countless years before, and he'd been with me ever since. I was no longer afraid of him. He was my only companion.

I never grew up and Monster never changed, which probably made the darkness happy. It liked everything nice and calm. It didn't like movement and growth.

The stars didn't respond. They never did.

I shut the window and went downstairs. Monster followed.

An old couple had owned this house. They lay in the living room like flies a spider had just finished with. The strands webbed their eyes and mouths to keep them in blind silence. That's how the darkness liked things. They weren't dead, but they couldn't be freed. No one could. So I left them that way and wandered into the city.

I walked the span of the great bridge, with all the cars and skeletons. No one was alive here, no one preserved.

Monster sniffed at the dead. Perhaps he didn't understand ordinary death. I didn't, either, but I thought it was better than being silenced.

I was tired of waiting. I wanted something to happen tonight.

The water below was black like the sun, and I never drank it or bathed in it. I hadn't eaten since people were alive and things were normal. Nor had I slept.

Monster didn't sleep, either. We were two of a kind, wandering stupidly from one place to another. We didn't even know what we were looking for.

How long had we been doing this? What had our lives been like before? I tried to remember, but everything was hazy. Maybe Monster remembered.

My shoes crunched in the ash that covered the bridge. All these people had died in an instant, when the glowing orb from the sky had crashed down. After that, the shadow had appeared, binding everything to suit its needs.

I walked in new places and had to tear through gooey webbing. I tossed some strands at Monster and he batted them aside. I wished he could speak. But he was just a mass of tentacles, those three shining eyes, and his constantly sniffing nostrils.

"Hey Monster," I said. "Let's go visit the power plant." I headed there, already knowing he'd follow.

If there was one place in the world where something could happen that was out of the ordinary, it was the power plant. The darkness formed a spinning wheel there that generated the strands. I had been there once before but had gotten scared off. I wouldn't scare easily on this night, when I was so determined to change things.

I wondered if Monster wanted to change things too. He was a spawn of the dark, but did he like things as they were? It was hard to tell because he never spoke.

The city was a baked husk, dripping with shadow webs, occupied only with the dead and the living dead all bound up snug and quiet. Nothing moved beneath the endless stars except me and Monster.

I pressed my jar to my cheek. It was always cool, as if the daylight within really was frozen. I was frozen, and Monster too. We were frozen in history, a whole lot of nothing. I knew now that the world never ended, it just hardened into a quiet shell.

I picked up a deflated basketball and tossed it to Monster. He caught it with a tentacle and sniffed at it. Why did he always sniff at stuff?

"Throw it back!" I said.

He hesitated, then dropped it.

"Stupid Monster!" I cried, kicking at him.

He gazed at me like he was a statue.

***

The power plant stood on the bank of a huge river. It took me a long time to get there, but I had nothing to do except travel. There was no good food left, so I didn't eat, and Monster never got hungry. We might have journeyed for days or weeks, but with it always being night, I didn't keep track of time.

The wheel spun endlessly, crackling with blue lightning. My hair raised as I approached it. The land was a big slope here, leading down to black water. Me and Monster were small compared to the shining towers and bloated tanks of the power plant. We were like leaves caught in a hurricane, as the wheel threatened to spin us away.

Monster handled it better than me, maybe because he understood the shadow and I didn't. I got as close as I dared, my hair now standing straight up. I could see the bones through my flesh and it made me smile. I'd forgotten how cool that was! I was glowing, and Monster too. Monster didn't have any bones, so he didn't look as cool as me.

The wheel of darkness spun faster because it didn't like me. Blue lightning speared me and made me tingle from head to toe. The sky was an angry whirlwind of smoke, blocking out the stars. I didn't like to see the stars shut out like that.

I lifted my jar of daylight, wondering if I should hurl it into the wheel. I pictured the strands of shadow burning all over the world, burning into daylight. I saw the sun break golden over the land. I smiled.

I opened my eyes--and saw darkness. A tentacle pushed against my back, and I whirled around. Was Monster trying to urge me forward?

I glared at him. Monster had been with me since the start of all this. Maybe he was the cause of it all. I imagined hurling the jar of daylight against him and setting him on fire--making everything right again.

Instead, I hugged the jar against me. The voices were singing louder than ever, and I could smell the sea again. "I want to go home, Monster," I said.

He nodded. It was the first time he'd ever communicated with me.

"Are you from the sea?" I asked. "Are you my guardian in this place?"

He stood stoically.

"I've had enough," I said. "Take me home."

For once, Monster led the way and I followed.

End.

Blue Electron Moon

(Originally published in Labyrinth Inhabitant magazine.

Revised for this collection.)

I had nothing, and I was nothing--a scab that had been torn off from the bleeding stump of humanity and cast away. I was loneliness, grime, and stench bundled in beggar's cloth. My hands trembled as I caressed the door of my cell, my wrinkled skin as cold as the metal. Intruding into my tower prison through the bars of a solitary window, the blue moon shone down on my haggard face.

To the people of the city I'd once ruled over, I was already dead and forgotten. I slammed my fist against the cell door, an unexpected impulse that tore my knuckles open. The moon had me fired up. Though the decades had been slow and filled with torment, I was not yet ready to merge with the dust at my feet. Didn't they realize that I still hungered for human companionship, for the warmth of a woman and the sweet taste of wine? But I hungered most for vengeance against my captor.

Soft laughter reached my ears and I turned to the window. The monster had come to me again, as he always did in the dead of night in his endless quest to torture me. The moonlight was blotted out by a huge shadow, and the gaze of his great eye fell upon me through the bars. I cried out in agony. My bones were stretched by an invisible force, pulled toward the creature that stood outside the tower, as if he craved to draw them forth and gnaw on them.

"Antrollis," he said, his voice a rumble. "Are you ready for the game?"

The force that tugged at my skeleton weakened, and I stood. "I'm weary, too old now to provide sport for you. There will be no game."

The giant figure stood in silence, perhaps contemplating my words. "This is your last chance," he finally said. "When the blue moon rises to its peak, your cell door will open--granting you a path to freedom and wealth."

"A path to madness," I said. "And if I couldn't find my way out of Valca Tower in my youth, what hope do I have now?"

"The hope of wisdom," said the monster.

My fists knotted in anguish. The monster knew I couldn't refuse. As much I feared what lay beyond my dungeon--madness beyond reason\--I so craved a taste of freedom that I was willing to face hades itself on the slim chance I might find the way out of the tower.

"You already knew I would play your game," I said. "So why did you come here?"

The creature didn't answer. The moments slipped past.

"You've come to torture me," I said, answering my own question, "to soften me up and make an escape that much harder on an old fool. Not that I believe you would let me escape, regardless. We both know I cannot win the game."

The great eye seemed to expand, until it filled the window. Things squirmed in its depths, blood vessels pulsating and veins crackling with energy. My head spun with dizziness and I collapsed to one knee, the room wheeling around me. The pain in my bones became unbearable and time lost meaning. I wanted it to end--for my body to be ripped apart by the pressure so I could find peace--but it wasn't allowed. I had to suffer.

I blacked out at some point, and when I awoke, the creature was gone. Once again the blue moon shone through the barred window. My body shaking, I stood up and leaned against the wall. Although I knew the monster was only toying with me, I couldn't bear to stay in that cell a moment longer. It was time to face insanity yet again.

My cell door stood open, and I walked out. The hallway I stepped into was made of stone blocks overlaid with luminous crystal tiles. I'd been in this hall before--on three other occasions in the past thirty years when the blue moon had risen and I'd had a chance to escape. I should have been prepared for the sights that awaited me, but I found my legs growing weak and my stomach churning with revulsion. Body parts, trapped in the clear wall tiles, randomly shifted about like puzzle pieces--the still-living sections of sundered men who'd been imprisoned here for time untold. Sometimes a hand would end up atop a leg, or an eye would peer out from a half-developed torso.

Somehow, most of a face had been assembled from the tiles--with one eye, a mouth, and an ear. I forced myself to approach it. It was a fat, bearded face with rosy cheeks, and the mouth hung open to reveal decayed teeth. He seemed to be trying to speak to me--some sort of warning perhaps. He kept mouthing two words, but I was no lip reader. It seemed like he was trying to say bush or brush followed by something I couldn't make out at all.

"Are you saying brush?" I asked. A slight shake of the head. "Bush? Crush?" An emphatic nod at the last one. Was this man trying to help me somehow? It seemed unlikely that he would know, or care, about my interest in escaping the tower.

"Crush what?" I asked. "Do you want me to try to crush the tile and free you? Or perhaps end your suffering?"

He shook his head.

I sighed. Time was wasting. "What should I crush?"

He seemed to gulp for air and then narrow his lips. I tried to mimic him, while muttering words. "Mute? Clue? Kill? Cube?"

The head nodded frantically.

"Cube?" I said. "Crush cube?" More nodding. "What cube should I crush?"

He faltered, his face looking stricken. Then the tiles shifted, carrying his mouth away and inserting it in a wiggling foot. I went to the mouth, but it had apparently lost its ability to form words and instead took to drooling.

I slumped against a wall, my will drained. Was there no limit to the cruelty of the gods? I didn't know what these men had done to earn a place in such a bizarre and hideous prison, but surely this was too harsh. I wanted to smash the tiles and free them, but I had no tool that would have allowed it. I'd already tried my fists, years ago when I was young and strong.

At the hall's end, the monster appeared in another window that was fortified with metal bars. I was forced to approach him, having no way to bypass the window. The sight of the great eye made my hatred smolder--a bulging, mocking orb that was a symbol of decades of seemingly pointless torment for me. How I longed to tear it out and stomp it into ruin.

"I've come to give you advice," the monster said. "To help you."

"Why would you want to help me?" I asked. "You took over my city and enslaved my people. You imprisoned me in this tower of madness, and you've tortured me for years. I don't even know your name, or what you are. I don't know why you hate me."

The creature laughed. "Soon you'll know it's not hatred that drives me. I have other motivations. The strength of youth is meaningless here. Use your wisdom, old king. Think your way through the tower. The time is right."

The eye seemed to expand once again, and I cringed, expecting the invisible force to tear at my skeleton. But nothing happened. An instant later, the creature vanished--replaced by blue moonlight. I stood still for a while, leaning against the wall and trying to gather my wits. The monster had visited me countless times over the years, yet I was still left drained and shaken from each encounter.

I rounded a corner and entered another hallway. This was where my quest had ended on three previous occasions. Pinpoints of light shone like torches throughout the passage--some white and deeply compelling, others crimson and repulsive. The walls were webbed in the charts of creation, etching upon etching detailing the history of the universe--much of it in mathematical formula far too complex for me to understand. These were the writings of the gods and no mortal was supposed to comprehend them.

Scattered about the hall were objects--a silver rod, a purple star, a hammer of light, and a golden sphere. These probably were tools that could prove helpful to me in getting through the tower, but as I'd learned before, they were nearly impossible to grab.

On my previous visits to this chamber, I'd tried to creep carefully through it with no success--so this time I ran for all I was worth, trying to dodge the torches. I made it halfway down the hall before I got too close to a torch and it sucked me to it. The white flame seeped into me, warming my stiff limbs, and the wonders of creation flooded my mind and threatened to consume me. I tore myself away and staggered into another torch--this one crimson and angry. The chaotic fires of destruction seared into me, filling my mind with images of doom--stars and planets exploding and collapsing, black holes forming and devouring. My mind seemed threatened to be torn apart by the opposing forces.

Somehow, I staggered away from that flame and rushed blindly forward, praying to the gods to guide my feet--to let me make it through just this one time. I stumbled and fell hard to the stone floor. I lay winded for a moment, and when I opened my eyes, one of the objects lay close by--the golden sphere. I seized it and found it cold to the touch.

I pressed the sphere to my forehead and prayed it would help me. I rose, the torches pulling on me frantically from all sides. With a cry, I ran forward, for there was no going back ever again. I was bounced back and forth from beauty and peace to chaos and ruin, yet somehow I held onto my sanity and reached the hall's end--only to confront a solid stone wall.

I shoved at the bricks in vain, wondering if I should have tried to get the hammer in order to smash the stone. Perhaps I needed all of the tools to escape, but the thought of entering the maze of torches again was more than I could bear.

I pressed the golden sphere to the wall, but nothing happened. The monster had said I should use my wisdom, but I didn't feel any wiser than the last time I'd tried to escape the tower. My body trembled, and I fought to calm myself and clear my mind so I could think. As I brought myself to a relaxed state, the sphere warmed in my hand and emitted a pale light. In that glow, I could see a door handle where none had seemed to exist before.

I wandered through several rooms and hallways, using the sphere to guide me. I witnessed wonders and terrors that I dared not look upon directly or try to comprehend. Light had formed in web patterns that had trapped falling stars--or so it appeared to me. The form of man had been sown into a tree in a great chamber, like a mold, and from his flesh grew abominations only the gods might have considered beautiful or meaningful. Things shuffled and scurried past me, some so hideous I was afraid I might turn to stone at the sight of them. Yet some were beautiful gold-skinned women that made me succumb to my natural urges and turn my gaze toward them--only to realize upon closer examination that they were half merged with serpents.

I clung desperately to the sphere, as if it were my sanity, and the creatures seemed to shy away from it. Whenever it grew hot, I took that as a sign pointing the way. Eventually, I ended up in a round chamber with a device at the center that looked like an enormous heart--with arteries leading to machines. It stank of blood and meat and was covered in layers of blue veins, nerves, and blood vessels. My stomach heaved from the smell, and I was overwhelmed by the power emanating from the device. In front of the heart-like monstrosity was a half-moon shaped altar that shone with a silver hue. Moonlight from yet another window shone directly onto the altar.

The creature appeared at the window. "You have done well in getting this far. I knew the time was right for you to succeed. You will now activate the machine that will create the object I've long sought. Then you will trade that object for your freedom."

"The machines of the gods are beyond me," I said. "I don't understand them, and I wasn't meant to. I'm only a mortal man." The concept of bargaining with this monster, after all the misery it had inflicted upon me, made my body twitch with rage.

"You must find a way," said the creature, "or perish in the tower. This is my only chance for a hundred and thirty more years. The blue moon itself appears frequently, but only rarely is it fully manifested like on this night. I kept you a prisoner in this tower because only you--in all the world--can do what I need done. When you thought I was torturing you, I was actually strengthening and conditioning you for my task. I released you from your cell those other times just so you would get a taste of what awaited you and be better prepared for this night."

"If you released me, then you must somehow control the tower," I said. "Why don't you just do the task yourself? Or is there some great danger involved?"

"My control is quite limited," the monster said. "And yes, it would kill me. But your body is ready to withstand the energy. Now activate the heart, or die."

I held up the golden sphere. "Can this help me?"

My words were greeted with silence. I waved the sphere around, but I realized I was too wound up for it to respond. I relaxed myself and placed my trust in the tool, letting its heat guide me as I moved from one machine to the next, clicking switches and turning dials. The heart-like thing began to pulse and quiver. I shrank back as a new, more potent stench overcame me--like that of burning flesh. I doubled over and vomited.

At last the heart stopped beating, and a blue, glowing cube sat on the altar. I approached it, but hesitated, certain it would destroy me. I remembered the face in the tiles telling me, possibly, that I should crush a cube. Was this what the man had been speaking of?

"Take it in hand!" the monster commanded. "It won't kill you. You have the blood of the gods in you. Your father came from the stars."

I didn't know whether or not to believe the monster concerning the origin of my father. I'd never known him--as my mother, a widowed queen, had never revealed who impregnated her, much to the dismay of the kingdom.

"That cube is a musical instrument," the monster said. "Valca Tower is a device designed to draw in electricity from the blue moon and stack it, layer upon layer, into the cube you see before you. You cannot understand what an amazing device sits upon that altar! It is made of electricity that has been refined, electricity that can respond to the vibrations from the deepest places of the universe--the very well from which creation sprang. The music it emits is like heaven itself, and one could get lost in its embrace forever. But aside from that, the cube is a power source that can activate a ship that will return me to the stars where I belong."

Swallowing my terror, I seized the cube. A shock ripped through me, and for a moment I thought I was going to explode. But my body held together, and the force subsided. I held up the cube. "So you will accept this in exchange for my freedom?"

"Without question," said the monster, his eye fixed on the cube.

My hatred for my captor and tormentor still burned strong. It would never die. "I could crush this. What would happen?"

"You would destroy the city," said the monster. "And you would kill yourself as well as thousands of innocent people."

I considered it, and I realized I could never do it. I'd been an honorable king, and though my people had apparently forgotten me, I hadn't forgotten them. But the creature didn't know what was in my heart. "I will crush it!" I shouted. "I will end this now."

"Stay your hand," the monster said. "I'll make a bargain."

"Your eye," I said without hesitation. "Your wretched eye! Tear it out of your forehead and give it to me. Lay it at my feet. Once it's in my possession, I'll give you the cube and you can return to wherever you came from. Once I have your eye, you will be forced to keep the bargain, lest I destroy it. I'm an old man who has already lived too long. I live for vengeance now, and I will have it--one way or another. And I will be king again!"

The creature was silent for a long time before replying.

***

I sat in a ship rowed by a dozen warriors, amongst a fleet of ships heading to the mainland. The city I'd once ruled over was gone forever. Atlantis--the City of the Gods--was revealed to be a massive chariot, or at least most of it was. It had risen into the sky on a pillar of crimson smoke. The island had been destroyed as the chariot lifted away, and the sea had erupted into a whirlpool that sucked down the stone ruins that remained.

I clutched the large, bulging sack at my feet with a shaking hand. The great eye within it still pulsed with life. Would it bring me fortune, or curse my remaining years?

"The monster's eye," said one of the warriors. "His name was Othareos. They called him the Cyclops in the old days--a creature that battled the gods and drove them away to the moon, to the palace of Diana. When the moon turns blue, Diana is forging her arrows. In her kingdom, the gods rest and seek knowledge--hoping to one day return and reclaim Atlantis. But now they never will, since the city is gone off amongst the stars. The greedy tyrant took all the divine machines with him, leaving nothing behind for us mortals."

"Maybe not," said another warrior. "I hear some of the devices were stolen before the Cyclops took the city away. Perhaps they will turn up someday."

"I don't care," I said. I kicked the sack. "I took his eye. All those years, I suffered. But now I'm the captor, and I'll make it pay dearly. Bring me a torch!"

The warrior shuddered. "Your revenge is sweet, my king." He lit a torch and handed it to me, watching with a grim expression.

I opened the sack and shoved the torch inside. The eye wiggled and pulsed beneath the flame. I laughed, savoring its agony. I noticed that a man was watching me intently--an astronomer and inventor from Atlantis, respected enough to ride on the king's ship. He gazed at me with concern and a look that might have been disgust, and I wondered why he would care about what I was doing. Why should anyone care? They were all watching me with concern--warriors, scientists, philosophers. This was the king's personal vengeance and no one else's business. They would all soon learn that.

The astronomer's hand seemed to be resting near his dagger. But then he smiled. "Make it suffer, my king. What good is the Cyclops' eye, anyway?"

"It's good for this!" I said, laughing as I again applied the torch.

End.
Minds Burned White

(Originally published in Labyrinth Inhabitant magazine.

Revised for this collection.)

We no longer beat at the walls in frustration, for we had become passive over the years. We still sought a way out, and we always would. The daily suffering we were forced to endure would never let us find peace. But there was a life to be made here as well, and plenty to do. We had become law and order in a realm of chaos, the keepers of hope and justice. We were three gods charged with the task of sustaining existence.

Unfortunately, our minds were fading into dull ruin.

I stood upon the Hub of Worlds--a circular platform with holes that led to the deepest reaches of the universe. I could gaze down upon stars and planets that were untold distances away. I was the Keeper of the Heavens. I was once a notorious thief devoid of a conscience, and I had no right to be such an important figure here--yet that's the way things were.

"There is a trapped soul east of here," said Gariana, the Keeper of Fire, who had just entered my chamber. "Fasban heard the cries. It must have fallen into the hands of the Skinless Ones. Fasban believes this newcomer must be someone important and highly intelligent. They may know how to solve the riddle of the machine."

I glanced at her and sighed. "Every time I turn my gaze from the portals, something terrible happens. A star explodes where none should, or a planet is swallowed up. It's gotten so bad lately I dare not look away. I need to find that worm!"

"You can't save everyone," Gariana said. "Worms are going to cause chaos. But right now, there is a soul in torment--a soul who might be able to help us find the way out of here or at least give us control. Fasban is waiting at the Gateway."

I glanced down at the portals. The worm was out there somewhere--a creature utterly lacking in remorse--causing massive damage to the universe. Eventually it would show itself, and I would seize it and pluck it from the depths of space. Out there it was large enough to kill a star, but in here I could crush it into oblivion in my fist. That was one of my duties, and if I failed to perform it, my nightmares would be infested with the screams of those who perished.

I stepped down from the platform. "Okay, but let's make this quick." I lacked faith that the soul could help us. I was an intelligent man, but years of seeking a way out of this prison had been in vain. Why should I trust in someone who knew nothing of the machine and its workings, even someone who might be a genius or a philosopher?

"You take your job too seriously, Hatch," said Gariana. "I think you tend to forget that we're still prisoners here. We didn't ask for any of this."

"I haven't forgotten," I said. "But I must admit, I do feel that if I ignore my duties the whole universe will collapse." I reached into my plain black robe--the same thing we all wore down here--and pulled out the small jeweled clock that had a ring of mysterious, Greek-like symbols on its face. "See, I haven't forgotten who I was. I keep this on hand to remind me that I was once a pathetic rogue--just like you were, Gariana."

I sniffed the clock. "It still bears the scent of Lady Teagan's perfume. She spilled the bottle all over it when I knocked her unconscious. How many decades ago was that?"

Gariana shook her head. "I barely remember that night, when the portal opened that brought us here. How long has it actually been, and how many times have we had this conversation? Decades might have passed since then, or longer..."

I shrugged. "We used to be vile human beings, my dear. The worst sort of company one could keep. What has happened to us? We're not a day older, but we've lost our aggression. We repeat the same conversations, the same mistakes. It's like we're becoming lost in the fog."

Gariana stood in thoughtful silence, her eyes distant. I remembered that she'd once had a cold face that was always twisted in a sneer, and that I had never thought her beautiful in spite of her fair skin and flowing blond hair. But beauty existed there now--a passive and nurturing beauty, almost motherly in its essence.

"Let us go and free the soul," said Gariana. "It hurts my head to try to remember the past. Too much suffering has burned the colors from my mind."

I smiled. "I love that expression of yours, though I'm not sure I entirely understand it. In a way, it does sort of make sense."

We walked to the tunnel mouth, making our way around the jutting bones that stuck up from the rocky cavern. It was as if the remains of giants had been melded into the stone--just one of the many mysteries of our prison--but the bones formed a distinct pattern. Everything did in this realm. The longer one existed here, the more one was led to realize that the realm functioned as a precise and terrible machine. Everything here had a purpose.

The tunnel mouth gaped open, leading into a maze of golden gears. I glanced at the clock in my hand, wondering if the gears inside it resembled those from the tunnel. How many times had I wondered this? It was hard to tell. The clock was seamless. I could move the hands around (they didn't move on their own), but apparently the only way to peer inside it was to smash it open--and I wasn't going to risk destroying a device that might somehow be connected to the machine and therefore might offer a means of escape.

I opened my mouth to say something, but Gariana shoved a finger against my lips. "Either break your damn clock open, or keep your mouth shut about what might be inside it," she said. "If I've told you once, I've told you ten thousand times."

I stuffed the clock back in my cloak pocket. We entered the tunnel, and the gears began to shift frantically. Had we bothered to run, we might have saved ourselves some agony. But we no longer bothered. The gears lost their flawless rhythm and became unbalanced, metal screeching against metal in a torturous symphony. Calmly, we placed our hands over our ears and walked through the tunnel.

At the end, three more tunnels stretched away from us--also filled with gears. We took the middle tunnel, and the gears screeched at us more fiercely than before. My hands shook and I grew dizzy. Gariana seemed to endure it better than I did, but that was nothing unusual. Since the first day we'd arrived here, she'd been more adept at dealing with the torment. I speculated that it was because she was a woman and was therefore designed to endure the pain of childbirth, but that was a feeble guess at best.

Beyond the gears was a circular stone door. Chained to it was a human skeleton, animated by some unknown force. Its jaws opened and closed, and it wiggled in its chains. A dark serpent was coiled up in its rib cage.

Fasban stood leaning against the door, his hand resting dangerously close to the skeleton's ribs. He was a tall, lean man with long hair pulled back in a ponytail, a rat-like face bearing pockmarks, and a thin, scruffy beard.

"So what do you know of this lost soul?" I asked.

"Not much," said Fasban. "The cries were too distant for me to tell if it's even a man or a woman. But it must be someone of significant mental ability. I was near the Halls of Laughter when I heard the screams coming from Skin Town. Only the most intelligent sort would wind up there, where the machine can test them thoroughly and absorb them quickly. It must perceive this person as a real threat--just the type it likes to devour."

"The machine is bound by its own laws," Gariana mused. "It must deal with people according to the turning of its gears. Thus, we are given a chance to find this person while they still have the ability to speak. We've come close before, and we know it can be done--if we hurry."

"A machine is only as good as its gears," I mumbled. It was one of my favorite and often-repeated statements. I gazed at the twitching skeleton without really seeing it, my mind still on protecting the universe. "Why don't you two go and find the lost soul? I'll meet up with you later after I get some work done."

Fasban grabbed my shoulder and shook me. "Snap out of it, Hatch. Escape remains our goal, first and foremost. Let someone else worry about the cosmos."

I shoved his hand away. "Then let someone else worry about the light as well." I glanced at Gariana. "And the fire, too."

"If we must," said Gariana. "There is no good to be found here, Hatch. This is a maze of punishment. Our duties are simply burdens we must bear. Remember how many times we considered killing ourselves just to escape our burdens?"

I shook my head. "My task is more than that. I defend lives--entire worlds. How many living creatures are perishing even as I stand here speaking?"

Gariana gently slapped my shoulder. "Let it go! Once, long ago, we constantly questioned whether our duties were real. Why do we so rarely question them now?"

I knew the machine wanted me to suffer, which was why I bore such a profound burden as protecting the whole expanse of the universe. It was an absurd charge that no mortal should be given. I knew this, yet I couldn't help myself. I viewed myself as the final hope for worlds in peril.

Fasban stepped close to me, so that I could smell his sour breath. "Do you think I'm fond of leaving the light unguarded, when the darkness is so hungry? You can't comprehend my task, old fellow--what it means in the grand scheme of things. You don't understand the battle between light and shadow, and what the stakes are. It has torn my soul to pieces in more ways than you can imagine. But still my goal remains to get out of this wretched machine. I have not forgotten wind, rain, or sunlight on my face."

"Nor have I, Fasban," I said, struggling to remember. This conversation was one that had played out hundreds of times. But what else could we do?

"We're getting out of this prison," Fasban insisted. "All of us. In another place, it wouldn't be such a bad thing for us to be stuck in our thirties for all eternity. But not here. I'd rather grow old and die in the world we once knew."

Knowing it was pointless to argue with a man so determined, I reached into the skeleton's rib cage and let the serpent bite my hand. Agony mixed with hot venom erupted in my flesh, and the door slid open. The skeleton was simply part of the machinery, regardless of whether or not it had ever actually been a living man. It was just a doorknob now.

I knelt for a moment, letting the poison run its course. Like the screeching gears, it was designed to simply cause me discomfort. But there were other forces in the machine that could kill.

We stepped through into a hot breeze, our black cloaks billowing. We were the overlords of this contrived hell, the only ones who were privileged to remain human. Others were sucked in and eventually bonded into the machinery. We called them lost souls, even though they were just as alive as we were. Lost souls provided lube for the gears and made them turn. Without them to feed on, the machine would have ground to a halt.

But was our only purpose to suffer? That question had plagued our minds since day one. We suspected the machine was feeding off us somehow or using us as tools to help keep itself functioning. Perhaps it tormented us only to keep us distracted with thoughts of escape, so we couldn't learn whatever might give us an advantage over it. And then, of course, there was the question of whether or not this was a true hell--a punishment for the way we had lived.

We stood in one of our least (and most) favorite chambers--The Feeding Hall. A warm mist billowed over a stone floor, and stalactites hung like teeth from the ceiling. I led the way, with Gariana and then Fasban behind me. We walked single file because we didn't want to anger the machine, which didn't like us walking abreast in here. If we angered it, we would have a much more difficult time finding the exit from this chamber.

I made it a few yards and then a metal slab shot up from the floor beside me. Before I could react, it shoved me to one side. The speed should have thrown me into the wall and broken my bones, but an invisible force stopped my motion. In moments, the chamber became a maze of metal walls. How they emerged from the smooth stone, and what moved them, was a complete mystery like most aspects of the machine.

After being shifted around a bit, I found myself gazing at an oaken table before me laden with food, and I leapt toward it. But another slab arose and shoved me sideways. Then moving walls obscured the table from view.

A section of wall lowered to reveal feeding tubes--fleshy devices that shot from holes in the floor and burrowed into my flesh. It felt as if my insides were being sucked out and devoured. I groaned and managed to yank some of the tubes free. But more shot out and pierced me. The tubes didn't kill, and in a sense, they didn't even injure, because the wounds closed immediately once they were done. They were simply there to give the impression that they were feeding on me, just as I had wanted to eat the food on the table. It always struck me as a childish and annoying punishment, as if the machine had been designed by some clever but mean-spirited child.

I gave up and waited, my body shuddering with pain and revulsion. Once, long ago, the tubes feeding this deeply on me would have left me an emotional mess. But my mind was dulled to it now, the raw human emotions sanded smooth from the torture, and I simply waited. I had lost something over the years--we all had--but exactly what we had lost was hard to identify. Perhaps we were missing pieces of the mind or soul, or some part of us we couldn't fathom.

The tubes finished their work and the walls shoved me around some more. At one point I briefly came face to face with Gariana. She gave me a weary smile before we were thrust away from each other. And then I was standing before the food-laden table again--right next to it this time, so that I could inhale the delicious scents.

I grabbed a turkey drumstick and chewed into it, washing it down with some wine. I chuckled, my mouth full of food. The others would have been annoyed at how easily I had secured a meal. Sometimes it took an hour or more to find food in here. I stuffed down as much as I could before the walls pushed me away again.

I was used to the tricks of this chamber, and by diving through openings and pausing at the right times, I was able to work my way toward the exit. At last, the three of us stood before another round stone door. This one had six holes in it.

"Anyone find a meal?" Fasban asked. "I got nothing for my troubles."

Gariana shook her head. "Not even a crumb."

I burped. "Slim pickings today, my friends."

Fasban sniffed the air. "Is that wine on your breath? I've had nothing to drink but stale water for weeks."

I shrugged. "I managed a little taste of some wine. It wasn't very good."

Fasban seized my cloak. "Really? And why didn't you stuff the bottle in your pocket, Hatch? Or at least some of the food? Do you have any idea how hungry I am?"

"It would have cost us time," I said. "You know the machine doesn't like it when we pocket food. And we need to hurry."

Fasban shook me. "You dirty lout! I love wine."

I knocked his hand away. Years before, he might have bashed me in the face for this. But like Gariana and I, he had been worn down, and now Fasban simply shook his head, sighed, and walked away. I felt a twinge of pity for him--and for the reflection of myself that I saw in him.

Risking an electrical shock, I shoved my hand into one of the holes in the stone door. I chose one at random, for the game was that it was impossible to tell which hole held the shock and which would open the door. It was empty. I tried another, and something gently pinched my hand and shoved it out of the hole. The door slid open.

Fasban glared at me. "Looks like fortune is smiling on you today, Hatch."

I shrugged, not feeling very lucky. The worst torment for me was leaving my duties behind. Why couldn't Fasban understand that? I wanted to escape this place as badly as he did--but only after I had secured the universe from the grasp of evil.

We entered a closet.

Black cloaks hung from pegs--a new one for each of us. We took off our dirty cloaks and tossed them on the floor, where they would be removed later by some means unknown to us. The fact that for a moment our bodies were exposed was meaningless to us. I felt no attraction to Gariana, and I knew her feelings toward me were the same. Once, we had been full of passion for each other, but those urges had faded away long ago. Now I viewed her no differently than I viewed Fasban. The machine had robbed us of our human desires.

We put on the new cloaks. They always smelled like hot leather for a few days.

We entered the Hall of Sorrow. (We had invented a generic name for every hall and chamber in here.) Apparently, the only purpose this hall served was to remind us that we were leaving our duties behind so we would feel bad about it. Three wooden pedestals stood at the hall's center, a few feet apart from each other, bearing phantom images atop them. One displayed a candle that flickered weakly, another revealed a glowing orb that was partially blackened by shadow, and the remaining one showed a galaxy that had been ripped in two by some unknown force.

But there was something even more sinister in here, and it seemed directed exclusively at me--a fourth pedestal set apart from the others that displayed a jeweled clock. The clock was larger and cheaper than the one I possessed, the jewels just glass imitations. I tore my gaze away from the doomed galaxy and approached the clock. I sniffed it. As usual, I could smell the Lady Teagan's perfume--only there seemed to be something cheap or fake about it.

"Let it be, old fellow," Fasban said, yanking me away from the clock.

Meanwhile, Gariana had been drawn to the candle, and she had thrown her hands over it. "I'll put the fire out myself," she hissed. "I refuse to be mocked!"

Fasban collared her as well. "Come on, now. How many times has this chamber gotten us riled up? Clear your minds. Clear your minds. Clear your minds!"

Gariana kicked the wooden pedestal over. Fasban dragged us along the hall and through a doorway. Behind us, the pedestal righted itself with a clunk. The machine could not be altered with physical violence. Anything we could smash, shatter, or move out of position would quickly return to its previous state.

Gariana tore away from Fasban, her face flushed. "I'm fine," she said. "I just hate that hallway. For some reason, it really gets to me. I don't like this route."

We wandered through a maze of passageways that all looked the same, some of which led to dead ends. This region was never easy to navigate, and it took us more than an hour to find our way to the exit that led to Skin Town. At last we entered an enormous chamber filled with gears. Several bridges crisscrossed this room, leading to doorways.

We started across a bridge, watching above and below us for the lost soul and for pendulums that swooped down on metal arms and tried to knock us off the bridge. Most of the gears above us were covered in a grid-like blue skin that crackled like static, but the ones below were shiny and skinless. Occasionally a gear from above would dip into the mass of skinless gears below and rise with a new skin, the exact process of which was hidden to our eyes.

"Look there!" said Gariana, pointing. The lost soul was trapped by some gears below and looked to be unconscious. We all exchanged a glance of disappointment. We were expecting someone older and wiser looking.

"She appears rather young," said Fasban. "It doesn't make any sense. Why would the machine bother sending a young girl here? She can't possibly be considered a threat. Look! Her mouth isn't covered. The machine doesn't even care if she speaks to us."

"There must be sound reasons for this," said Gariana, ducking as a gear hurtled past her head. "The machine has a precise motive behind everything it does."

"Even a machine is not perfect," I said. "It looks like her arm is trapped. Let's climb down and see if we can pull her loose so I can get back to my duties."

***

When the girl awoke, she was lying on a stone table in Gariana's chamber. Several flickering torches that burned with colorful flames stood in the room, and a spicy smell of incense hung in the air. A smoldering pit lay at the center of the chamber, ringed by a bronze dragon, some of the coals blackened within.

The girl wiped sweat from her brow and said, "It's hot in here." She seemed calm considering the circumstances, though her eyes widened when she gazed at the blue, metallic skin that covered her hand and part of her arm.

"Where am I?" she asked. "And what has happened to my hand? I was out walking in the fields, and then I think I must have fallen asleep."

"You are inside a machine," said Gariana, her eyes full of pity. "It's a sort of puzzle, or maze. Sometimes it draws people in and traps them."

She sat up, her green eyes wide with fright. She looked to be in her early twenties, with curly reddish hair and pale, freckled skin. She wore a black dress and had a black ribbon in her hair, which struck me as odd--though I realized there could have been any number of reasons for that.

"Relax," Fasban said. "It won't do you any good to get all riled up."

"Who are you people?" she asked.

"No one important," said Fasban. "We got trapped here like you, and we've been trying to find a way out ever since."

"We were thieves," I said, not caring in the least what she thought of me. "We were committing a robbery when the machine drew us in."

"How long have you been away from your families?" she asked, leaning forward. Her eyes held a glint that could have meant anything.

"We were orphans," I said. "Childhood friends who ran away from terrible situations and made a living by stealing. We have no families that we know of. As to how long we've been here...We're not exactly sure. We think it has been years, or maybe even decades."

"I have a large family," she said. "And a man I am pledged to marry. I was at my grandmother's funeral when I got upset and walked into the countryside. They're waiting for me to return. In fact, they might even be out looking for me. When can I go back?"

We glanced at each other. "We don't know if it's possible," said Fasban. "As I mentioned, we're still seeking a way out of here. What can you tell us of the world you left behind?"

For a moment she seemed to be pondering, and then she held up her blue hand and wiggled the fingers. "This looks awful. Does it come off with water? Or can I just peel it away?"

I turned away, inwardly cringing.

"It won't come off," said Fasban. "The machine is trying to absorb you. Soon, it will send gears after you to add more of that skin to your body. Eventually..." He cleared his throat. "Eventually you will become a--"

"Fasban!" Gariana said sharply. She went to the girl and caressed her hair. "What's your name?"

"Brilla," she said. Then she put her face in her hands and wept.

"What a shame," I whispered. "The first soul who has ever been able to speak to us, and she knows nothing. I suppose I must return to my duties."

Brilla raised her head. "Wait! Don't leave me here! My father is a famous architect and inventor, and I've learned from him. If the three of you were only thieves...maybe I know some things about machinery you don't."

Fasban's face brightened. "That's the spirit! There's a strange apparatus not far from here. We call it the Control Room. Maybe you can figure out how to activate it."

Brilla managed a smile. "It's worth a shot. Lead the way."

***

Brilla had a charm that quickly began to grow on me. She began to feel familiar to me, like the daughter I'd never had. My eyes kept straying to her reddish hair, and some sweet memory kept trying to stir. I quickly took to feeling protective toward her. Even Fasban seemed taken in by her charm and positive attitude. I still doubted she could help us, but I focused less on my neglected duties and more on making sure she stayed safe.

Gariana clamped her hands over Brilla's ears to protect them from the screeching gears. We made our way through several tunnels filled with various torture devices. The three of us sacrificed our bodies--enduring pain and misery--to defend Brilla, until at last we stood in a chamber filled with jeweled levers, switches, and dials. The jewels were embedded in bronze.

The room was perfectly round, with only a circular tunnel mouth leading in or out. The bronze walls were flawlessly smooth. At the room's center was a cluster of jeweled levers, like a spiny growth of metal and crystal shards.

Brilla gazed at the levers in awe. "Fascinating," she said. "This might be the core of the machine, and I have no doubt this is a control panel. From what I've learned so far, I believe this is one giant timepiece--a clock, if you will." She turned and gazed at me piercingly.

My hand crept into my pocket and I withdrew the jeweled clock. "What do you make of this?"

Her eyes narrowed. "It is beautiful indeed. Extraordinary. May I hold it?"

Reluctantly, I handed her the clock. I hated to part with it for even a moment, but she seemed to know what she was doing. She caressed it and turned away. I gazed at her curly red locks, and my hand twitched. I envisioned striking her from behind and taking back what was rightfully mine. Her soft laughter reached my ears.

"Go on and strike me, Hatch," she said. "You know you want to."

"Who are you really?" I said. "How do you know my name?"

"She has been partially absorbed," said Fasban, pointing at her hand. "So the machine has given her knowledge. That may work to our advantage."

"Can you make sense of this, my dear Brilla?" Gariana asked her.

"Yes, I can," Brilla said. "The real control panel is this tiny clock. It commands the machine. These levers are simply here to give hope, to make fools believe the machine can be controlled from within." She grabbed a lever and yanked it. A rumbling sound arose in the walls. "Nice sound effect, isn't it? It really makes one believe that something just happened."

"I knew it," I said, a cold feeling gripping my heart. "That clock was the key all along. It could have freed us. Isn't that right, Brilla? If that's what your name actually is."

"That is my name," she said, "and yes, it could have. But it would have taken a genius to unlock its secrets, Hatch--which you clearly are not."

Fasban glanced at Gariana in confusion. Sweat dripped from his forehead, and his hands trembled. "That tiny clock? I can't believe it!"

"I can't either," said Gariana. "Are you sure you know what you're talking about?"

"Indeed," she said, and again she laughed. "Hatch knows the truth."

"I'm beginning to know it," I said. I stepped closer to her. One solid blow to the back of her head, and the clock would be mine again. But the violence was gone from my soul, my mind burned pale and passive from all the suffering, and I found I could not strike her.

"You've grown feeble, Hatch," she said. "What has happened to your manhood?"

"Tell me your full name," I said.

"Brilla Teagan, of course," she said. "But you already knew that."

Fasban and Gariana glanced at me in shock.

I leaned close and sniffed her, and I thought I could faintly smell her perfume. I had never seen the Lady Teagan's face, because her back had been turned to me when I struck her down. Yet I had known instinctively she was beautiful, and a thrill had warmed my belly as I drove my fist into her skull. The power of life and death over a young beauty had been mine to command.

But the thrill was gone now, replaced by dull shame. "Why have you come here, Brilla?" I asked. "What will you do to us?"

Brilla laughed. "I was always here with you. I got sucked into the machine the same moment the three of you did. I hid in the labyrinth, allowing the machine to carry out its purpose and grow stronger. The reason you were never absorbed is because you were the first to enter, and the machine used you for a different purpose. The duties you performed were designed to enhance the machine and give it the ability to mold time. It has grown into a behemoth, its reach crossing the barriers between worlds."

Brilla turned and smiled. Her eyes were round and shining like gold coins. "But the machine is just an extension of this tiny clock that came from the heavens. To destroy this is to destroy the machine. And it's such a fragile device. But who would want to shatter something so precious?"

"Destroy it!" Fasban shouted at her.

"Destroy it!" Gariana echoed.

Brilla grinned. "I think not. I was already bonding with the machine before you struck me down, Hatch. I am a goddess here. The rest of you are no longer needed. You will now be absorbed."

With a sneer, she turned her back to me. "You could end this, Hatch. Except that I know you really can't. Not anymore. It's so simple. All you have to do is--"

I drove my fist against her head, and she collapsed to the floor. I stood over her, my hands shaking. The blow had been a stout one, and Brilla was out cold.

"She didn't believe I had it in me," I said. "And neither did I."

The others stared in disbelief.

"She didn't believe," I said, lifting the clock. "She was so confident that...that the colors had all been burned away. But a seed of aggression lingered. It always does."

"All those years she waited," said Gariana, kneeling and running her fingers through Brilla's hair. "Her greatest moment was at hand, and she dared to turn her back on you. It must have been a burning need within her--to prove that you had become too weak to do what you did so long ago."

"I could not have done it," said Fasban, bowing his head.

"Yes, you could have," I said. "You just don't realize it, and neither did she." I hurled the clock against the wall and everything went dark.

***

We found ourselves standing in wet grass, surrounded by a crumbling stone foundation. We somehow knew that the Lady Teagan's mansion once stood here. It was a cool fall day, and a light rain was coming down. For a moment we stood and gazed at the cloudy sky, letting the rain hit our faces and breathing deeply to savor the fresh air.

"What shall we do now?" Fasban said, looking around. "We have no horses, no money. Are we to go back to being rogues?"

"Even if we wanted to," said Gariana, "we could not. We just don't have it in us anymore." She smiled, and it broke into a laugh. "But we're free now regardless."

"We'll find a way to get by," I said. Depression was already settling over me, as I realized my duties were finished forever. They had simply been a cleverly disguised method of feeding the machine--but nevertheless they had been my main purpose in life for so long....

"Do you think the world has changed much?" said Fasban. "Have they bred better horses, or built bigger ships? Have machines become more complex and reached the point where a human does not need to power them--like the one we were trapped in for...for such a long time?"

"We couldn't have been in there for more than a few decades," I said, struggling to remember. I laughed. "You always were imaginative, Fasban."

"I think the world has changed a little bit," said Gariana, her face pale. She pointed to where a huge, gleaming, disk-shaped object was quietly spinning across the sky.

End.
The Elder Root

From the ancient diary of a gnome

(Originally published in Necrotic Tissue magazine.

Revised for this collection.)

It grows fat with my blood, while I tug at it in misery. It remains wound tightly around my neck and rooted deep in my veins, its slimy black surface spotted as if with disease.

How many nights have I lain awake, cursing that day I dove into the river and tried to yank the gnarled old root from the sand?

I try to burn it, but I feel its pain. I try to cut it, but the blood it loses is also my own. It seems I have to make peace with it, before I go insane.

Wood Axe

Balteon staggered, groaning, his legs sagging beneath him. Then he managed to grab a tree trunk and steady himself. He trudged onward down the trail, his eyes smoldering. He ignored the disgusted look that his son, Alandair, sent his way. "I'll be fine, lad," he said. "I just need to keep moving."

The gnarled handle of a wooden battle axe, which tapered into a twisting root, was planted into Balteon's neck and was feeding off the old man's blood. Alandair watched with growing dread, wondering how he could pry the weapon from his father's clutches before it drained him dry. His father's eyes were glazed over, drool running from the corner of his mouth. His skin was growing ghastly pale.

"You're losing too much blood, Father!" Alandair said. He wanted to tear the vile axe free of his father's throat, but such an action would have killed Balteon. The axe was rooted too deeply into his flesh.

The old mercenary sneered at his son, his rugged hand caressing the axe handle. "Blood is easily replaceable, boy. It's money we need to be concerned with. We're getting closer to the phantom's haunts, and my axe must be ready. Otherwise, not only will we fail to get the bounty, but we'll be dead!"

Alandair's gaze burned into the axe, which was an ugly piece of wood that was reddish brown in hue and mottled with dark patches as if diseased. The handle tapered down to the quivering root that was concealed in the flesh of his father's throat. The axe had grown larger over the weeks his father had owned it, getting fat with his blood. It had a stretched, swollen look, though the wooden blade was still somehow sharper than a razor. It looked like a mock weapon one might use for sparring, but in reality, it could hack through the most stout armor with ease.

"That sorcerer was your enemy, Father," Alandair said. "He gave you that axe as a curse, not as a gesture of friendship." It was an old argument, but Alandair had never given up on trying to convince his father to see the truth that was so obvious to Alandair. The axe was a cruel punishment and nothing more.

"The sorcerer was weary of our feud," said Balteon. "He wanted to make peace. He gave me his most prized weapon out of kindness. How blind you are, my son, if you think this wondrous axe is a curse."

"You're the one who is blind, Father," Alandair said. "Blind and poisoned with evil. You seem lost in a fog lately."

Balteon smiled, his eyes distant. "Yes...I am indeed in a sort of fog. It shields me from mortal pain and fear, like glorious armor. I'm sorry you cannot know the pleasure of it, my son. Perhaps someday I will pass this axe on to you, and then you will understand how magnificent it really is."

"I'll see it destroyed!" Alandair promised, his hands knotted into fists. He clenched his teeth, hating the bloated weapon with all of his heart.

Balteon's eyes twinkled. "You shall come to adore it."

"Father, give up the axe," said Alandair, his eyes widening. He reached forth with his calloused hands. "Don't let it consume you."

"You just want it for yourself," snarled Balteon. "I know your tricks. In fact, I taught you all of your tricks. But you must wait your turn."

"You think I want that grotesque blade?" Alandair said, shaking his head in disbelief. "Why? So it can drain me dry of blood as well? Don't be a fool."

"Enough!" Balteon growled. "We shall speak no more of it. The bounty for the phantom will make us rich men. Bear in mind that six villages have pooled their gold in an effort to stop the phantom's murder spree. We can retire, and I'll no longer need this axe. I can sell it to the highest bidder, and we'll gain even more riches."

Alandair said nothing, wishing his father spoke true. Alandair was a grown man now and should have known better. To others, Alandair was a feared and respected bounty hunter, his face and body bearing the scars from years of combat. He was an ugly, skull-splitting nightmare that no lawbreaker wanted to meet in the dark places. But whenever he was around his father, he felt and acted like a young boy again. His gruff voice even seemed to take on a higher pitch. Alandair hated it, and he knew it wouldn't gain him his father's respect; but he couldn't help himself. The old man's aggressive personality always put Alandair on the defensive.

"I'll never touch it again," his father promised. Then he laughed, more drool running from his mouth. His voice changed to a hiss. "Yes, because I'll move on to someone of significance and be gone from this sorry old mercenary." Balteon shoved Alandair down, his unnatural strength easily overwhelming his larger, more muscular son. "I've heard enough of your whining, boy!"

Alandair lurched up, his face crimson with fury and frustration. The axe was not only sapping the old man's blood, but it was also gaining control of his mind. Alandair raised his broadsword with trembling hands, and then lowered it in shame. The axe wanted him to lash out against his father, because the cruel weapon seemed to enjoy such things. It not only fed off human blood, but human torment as well.

Wolves howled in the forest around them. Oak branches blocked out the sky, leaving the woods in shadow. The black wolves of Makmir Forest could be lurking anywhere, slipping quietly amongst the trees, preparing their ambush. Alandair knew their cunning minds were at work, plotting against them. But his father seemed unconcerned, confident his axe would protect them. Alandair wanted to smash some sense into the old fool's skull with the flat of his blade.

Balteon threw back his head and laughed. It turned into an odd, strangled sigh. "Those howls are sweet music to my ears," he whispered. "Don't you agree, my son?" He got down on all fours, the axe propping him up like a bloated stick, and licked his lips in some perverse gesture. Alandair grimaced and turned away.

Alandair caught sight of yellow eyes gleaming in the underbrush--there for a second and gone. "Pay heed, Father! They're closing in on us." The wolves of Makmir Forest were suspected of being servants of the phantom, their bodies mutated with dark sorcery. They would not fall easily in battle.

The forest reeked of a luminous green fungus that was draped over the trunks and branches. Stone ruins shaped like beasts, covered in moss and vines, were visible now and then beside the trail. These were the Wilding Lands, once the home of beast worshippers who built their dwellings in honor of their blood-soaked gods. The phantom was reputed to be an ancient king whose body had been fused with a monstrosity. This king continued his alchemy experiments within the sprawling ruins of his castle, breeding nightmare creations that he then sent forth to do his bidding. The phantom had reached legendary status throughout the land, and few dared to try to collect the massive bounty that had been placed on the monster.

Alandair was sickened to the core by the sights and smells of the forest. Everything around him was gnarled and evil looking and emanated the choking stench of the fungus. He couldn't shake the feeling of being in a wooden tomb--the place where he and his father would breathe their last. A feeling like one that lingered after a nightmare infested his mind, making him feel detached from reality.

"Do you know how old I am?" his father asked. (It was the axe speaking through the old mercenary again.) "I was forged when the earliest humans walked the earth. I've had many masters. I was once wielded by King Xantheus the Lustful, and I controlled half of the world. Half of the entire world!"

"Clear your mind, Father!" Alandair shouted, losing control and rapping his knuckles on Balteon's forehead. "Wake up in there." Swallowing his shame, Alandair smashed him again, this time staggering the old mercenary. "I'll knock some sense into that stubborn head yet, or I'll knock you out cold!"

"He cannot awaken," the axe said, using his father's mouth. "I own his thoughts now. Soon the wolves will come for you, boy. Alone, you cannot defeat them. It's up to me whether you and your father live or die. Oh, what a jolly life! If you don't know the joy of controlling the weak, you're really missing out on something grand. But how could you know of such delights? After all, you're nothing but a pathetically stupid mortal with a face that resembles a horse's arse."

"I've earned more respect in my life than you could ever know," said Alandair. "I've brought many criminals to justice, and I've kept my honor intact. In all the years that you claim you've existed, what have you ever accomplished that's worthwhile? All you've done is bring misery to people."

"I've changed the face of the land!" said the axe. "I've been responsible for the rise and doom of kingdoms. And while it's true that I've fallen on hard times lately, being stuck with a washed up old mercenary like your father, I hope to change that situation soon enough."

"What do you hope to gain?" Alandair said through gritted teeth. His hatred for the weapon was so strong it seemed his body might burst from it. But all he could do was stand by and let it suck his father's blood.

"A wee taste of the red stuff, of course" said the axe. "Oh, and I want the freedom to rule as I once did. See, that old sorcerer kept me locked away for fifty years in his tower while he used me in his wretched experiments. Some of those experiments were so disgusting I can't bring myself to speak of them. Now, in death, he expects me to carry out his revenge and drain your father's life away. But I don't care about that. I want to be prominent again. I want a lord, or even a king, to control. I'll release your father if you promise to deliver me into the hands of some important nobleman. Think quickly, now, for the wolves are soon to spring!"

Alandair shook his head. "I'm a mercenary, not a murderer. I won't inflict your doom on anyone else. Rather, I'll see to it you don't feed on the blood of any other victims. I'm going to burn you to black ash and scatter you to the west wind. You can blow down into goblin lands to cake their dirty fingers and loincloths."

"Then you and your father shall be wolf food!" snarled the axe. "Good luck fighting them all yourself. I assure you that a single man--even a man as skilled as you--with an ordinary weapon is no match for the wolves of Makmir Forest. Now watch as your father stands like a statue as the wolves tear him, and you, apart!" Balteon lowered the axe and closed his eyes.

"Father!" Alandair cried, shaking the old mercenary. But Balteon simply stood there grinning.

Alandair circled about, struggling with his sense of honor. His father had raised him to have a strong moral code, to give his life if need be to protect the innocent. Alandair had always lived proudly by that code (which put no restriction on getting drunk whenever he had the chance, warming up to any woman he didn't scare off with his gnarled countenance, and gambling away his money), but he'd never actually been faced with a choice between his honor and his death until now.

The wolves finally crept into view--at least twenty of them moving in from all sides. Alandair shook his father again, shouting at him to awaken and fight. But the old man stayed utterly motionless, prepared to let his flesh be stripped from his bones. An evil aura hung in the air, a hopeless feeling that radiated from the wolves and whispered in Alandair's mind that he should surrender, that victory was impossible.

The wolves had the stink of insects, and their spindly legs carried them like spiders over the forest floor. Their fur was crusted on them like wavy dark shells, and iron bolts had been pounded through their backs for some grim purpose Alandair couldn't fathom. The bolts ran under their spines and caused them to hunch, keeping their heads low to the ground. Their claws were oversized hooks.

"Okay, I'll do it," Alandair muttered to the axe. "I'll take you to a nobleman and you can feed off his damn blood." He could worry about the decision later. Right now survival was all that mattered.

His father's eyes popped open. He sneered. "I thought you'd agree. I always knew I'd raised a spineless dung heap for a son." It was the axe speaking, of course, but the cruel words still stung Alandair.

The wolves charged them, their muzzles split open to reveal fangs that dripped poison. Alandair smashed his broadsword down on the first one to reach him, driving it deep into its skull. The wolf staggered beneath the blow, then tore itself free and fled howling into the forest. Two more wolves struck Alandair and knocked him off his feet. They bit down on his chain mail, shaking their heads back and forth and trying to tear through it, while he held his arm protectively over his throat.

Alandair thought he was finished, and he tried to make peace with himself even as he fought to the last. But there was no peace to be found, for he'd wanted more than to die as a mercenary. His dream of leading a life as a simple blacksmith, marrying a good woman, and raising a few children was going to end in a bloody mess on a remote forest trail.

Desperation flooded through Alandair, fueling an insane effort to defeat his foes. He clutched a snarling wolf muzzle that descended toward his face, black poison from the jagged teeth dripping down to soak his beard. With a roar, Alandair shoved the creature off him and sent it tumbling into an oak tree. And then the other wolf was torn away in a shower of blood by his father's axe.

Grinning insanely, the old man leapt about, the wooden axe moving with inhuman speed and precision. He looked like a dancing goblin, drool flying from his gleeful lips as he lashed out at his foes. The blade tore horrific wounds in the wolves, their yelps of agony filling the air, and in moments several of them lay shredded. Severed limbs twitched in the dirt, and bleeding jaws shuddered as life departed. The rest of the wolves fled into the forest.

Alandair scrambled up, and the trees seemed to spin around him. Glancing down, he saw that his chain mail had been torn open and blood was pouring from his arm. It was a shallow wound and one that Alandair might have simply ignored. But he could tell by the grim, yet delighted look on Balteon's face that Alandair was only moments away from death.

"You've been bitten," the wood axe hissed through Balteon's mouth. The weapon had once again rooted itself in Balteon's neck, and it roared laughter. "Deadly poison. You won't last long without an antidote."

"Then I'm finished," Alandair said, falling to one knee and slamming his fist into the dirt. And that meant his father was doomed as well.

"I can drink your poison," the axe said. "Let me feast on your thick neck. It's your only hope. However, you must then take me to a nobleman and offer me to him as a gift so that I may lay claim to him!"

Alandair wiped the deadly fluid from his beard and stood up. He could feel the poison seeping through him, a burning flow creeping toward his heart. He nodded, cursing himself for his weaknesses. He clearly wasn't the man his father had raised him to be. It appeared his life was worth more to him than his honor.

Shuddering with revulsion, Alandair grabbed the axe, and the twisting root at the end of the handle came free of his father's neck. His hand twitched as he considered hurling it into the forest. Instead, he pressed the root against his throat. He cried out as the wood burrowed into his flesh. He could feel the blood being pulled out through his neck, and he wanted desperately to tear the thing away. But he let it drink deeply, until the burning sensation of the poison cooled into oblivion.

The axe seized control of his lips for a moment. "Now take me to a nobleman. Don't worry, I won't feed off you too much during the journey."

"What about my father?" Alandair said. The old mercenary looked dazed, and he stood shaking his head and muttering.

"He will recover completely," said the axe. "Life is indeed jolly!"

"Return my weapon to me, my son," Balteon ordered, focus returning to his gaze. He balled up his fist." Do it now, lest I be forced to break your jaw!"

"I cannot, Father," Alandair said. "I'm going to take it away, to someone else. You're free of it now. Don't you understand?"

"It was a gift for me," said Balteon. "You have no right to steal it from me. I didn't raise my son to be a rotten thief!"

Commanding Alandair's lips again, the axe whispered to his father. It spoke of the darkest places of the forest, where the trees bore the scars of a magical disease as old as life itself and their roots were like writhing worms hungry for blood. There, the gnomes crafted malicious weapons beneath the sprawling branches, willing their spite and their rage against humanity into their creations--knowing the greed of those seeking power would lead them to those weapons and that entire civilizations would crumble into ruin as a result.

Balteon bowed his head. "How could I have been so misguided? Yes, I see now that this axe is indeed a curse. It would have destroyed me."

"You're a hopeless optimist like me, Father," said Alandair. "You believe that people can change, and you accepted the sorcerer's gift based on that belief. You gave your trust too easily. The truth is, neither one of us should be mercenaries. Our hearts are not hardened enough for this profession."

"I was utterly lost," said Balteon, moaning. "I was perfectly content to let it drain me dry. How could a man like me become so weak and enslaved? I thought my will was unshakable, but the dark sorcery crushed it with ease."

"You're still alive, Father," Alandair reminded him. "You've withstood it. And we both know that some forces are too strong for any mortal to overcome."

"We must destroy the axe," said Balteon, "as it would have destroyed me. And we'll end this way of life, my son. We'll return home as new men and find a different way to make a living. Your children will not be raised as I have raised you."

Alandair hung his head. "I made a vow to deliver the axe to a nobleman, and you always taught me to keep my promises."

"My son, said Balteon, managing a smile, "that lesson was wrong. Some promises are not worth keeping. In fact, honor demands that some promises be broken." Seeing the uncertainty in Alandair's eyes, he sighed. "However, I don't want you to feel as if you're sacrificing your honor. Therefore, I will destroy the axe myself."

Alandair pulled the weapon away from his throat. "You're right, Father. We shall burn this abomination to ash." The axe quivered in his hands like a bloated slug, the squirming root probing for flesh. He threw it down in the trail. "I will honor my promise and deliver it to a nobleman--whatever remains of it, that is!"

Balteon patted him on the back. "You're a fine man, Balteon, and I'm so very proud to have you as my--"

Ghostly whispers suddenly filled the air, and a green, leafy mass shot from the forest and seized Balteon's head. Like a claw made from vines, it grabbed him from behind and lifted him into the air. The vine-fingers tightened. Balteon's skull made a cracking noise, and his eyes rolled back in his head.

"Father!" cried Alandair, as a spectral figure floated out from the trees--a transparent and ragged blue cloak from which vines hung out like twisting serpents. From the cloak's hood, where the face should have been, protruded the thick vine that had grabbed his father and was threatening to crush his skull. It was the phantom, the lord of the forest who had terrorized the surrounding villages for decades.

Drool ran from Balteon's mouth, and his body convulsed. His lips moved as if to say something to his son, but no words came forth. He hung in the air like a stocky, grey-bearded puppet, as the vine-fingers went on crushing his skull.

Alandair swiped up the wood axe. He leapt around his father and hacked at the vine, cutting into it. But it did not sever. Frantically, he turned his assault on the phantom's torso, but the axe went right through it as if it were mist.

A vine shot out and struck Alandair in the forehead, knocking him on his back. The phantom floated toward him, and more vines slithered out and wrapped around his legs. They squeezed so hard they threatened to break his bones. Meanwhile, Balteon hung limp in the phantom's grasp, blood dripping from his mouth.

Alandair hacked through the vines and staggered up. He swung at the phantom again, and as before, the axe passed through it as if it were not there. At last, he leapt away and let the axe root itself into his neck again. "How can I defeat the phantom?" he asked. "If you're so ancient and powerful, you must know a way!"

"The big vine is its link to the living world," the axe hissed through Alandair's lips. "You must sever it, or the creature cannot lose."

Alandair wrenched out the axe and delivered blow after blow to the vine, while smaller vines tried to wrap around his legs and trip him. After his arms had gone numb from the strain, Alandair at last managed to cleave the great vine in two. The phantom and its vines faded into nothingness. Balteon fell to the ground and lay still, blood pooling around his head.

Alandair knelt and checked the old man's pulse, though he already knew the truth. Balteon, a man who had survived countless battles and brought many dangerous criminals to justice over the years, was dead.

Alandair slammed the axe to the ground and cursed at it. "You led him to his death! He would never have dared come here if it hadn't been for you. Yes, you destroyed the phantom, but that single deed--done for your own selfish reasons--cannot make up for the countless lives you have ruined. Yet you expect me to honor a bargain that will allow you to inflict great misery upon the land. You, who have slain the phantom, would now replace him as a tyrant. Meanwhile, my father lies dead and will never get a chance to settle down and find happiness."

Alandair put his head in his hands and grieved. And in the midst of his pain, an idea came to him. It was time to simply give in. He was going to do what the wood axe wanted. He would deliver it to a lord--a powerful man who ruled his lands without opposition. Alandair told himself he was done questioning his honor, that he just wanted to be rid of the axe forever regardless of the consequences.

***

A week passed before Alandair made the journey--time enough to bury his father and make peace with his decision. At last he headed along a winding road to the mountains. He carried the axe over one shoulder, not allowing it to drink from him. He decided it was not a condition of the bargain that he feed the axe--only that he deliver it to a lord. The axe was still fattened on his father's blood, and it tired him to bear it. The root at the end of the handle was constantly groping for his flesh.

Alandair gazed at the bloated, yet ever-hungry axe, and he was disgusted with himself over what he was doing--allowing an evil creature to drink the blood it so craved. He cursed the axe with all his heart. He was going to feed an abomination in order to fulfill his vow. But his father had taught him to always keep a promise, and he wanted to honor Balteon's memory by being the man his father had raised him to be. It was all he had left.

Or so Alandair told himself. But below the surface he still hungered for vengeance, wanting to see the axe come to ruin in payback for leading his father to his death. It took all of his willpower to keep from setting the weapon ablaze. But it couldn't end that way. His vow had to be honored.

By the time Alandair reached the lord's castle, night had fallen. A pale moon hung in the sky, and the air was chill. Wolves howled in the pine forests on the mountain slopes, and bats flew through the light of his lantern. But he trudged onward until the great castle rose up before him amongst the trees.

Alandair knocked on the huge oaken door, and it swung inward with a creak. A tall man appeared, looking concerned. He was a handsome, dark-haired fellow, with pale skin and a kindly face. He wore a colorful robe, from which soft, almost feminine hands protruded. He managed a smile. "Well, hello there, good sir. What are you doing way out here after dark, if you don't mind me asking?"

"I'm looking for Lord Vanska. I brought him a gift." Alandair's heart lurched. Again, he considered what he was doing. He glanced down at the wood axe, reminding himself that he was consorting with an evil, blood-sucking fiend to honor a vow. Wasn't an oath just words? He envisioned his father's stern face. No, it was more than that.

"Yes, I have a gift for him," Alandair repeated, shoring up his will. "It is something truly special."

"Is that so?" The tall man leaned closer. "I am the one you seek. And that curious-looking piece of wood? Is that my gift?"

Alandair nodded, doing all he could to hold himself together. "I think you will find this gift most worthy." At last, Alandair handed him the wood axe.

Lord Vanska examined it. "Lovely, indeed. So very lovely... In honor of this gift, you may pass freely and safely through my lands henceforth." With that, Lord Vanska bit into the axe and began to suck. Blood ran down his chin.

Alandair shuddered and bowed. "Thank you. May I take my leave?" In spite of his conflicted emotions, he felt good overall, the taste of vengeance sweet as he watched the axe quiver in misery and desperation.

Lord Vanska lowered the axe, his fangs dripping blood. "Have a pleasant journey home, young man." He turned away and the door slid closed.

End.

The Necromancer's Burden

"How are you feeling, Master?" Geleon asked. Drezian looked pale, and the mass of wrinkles that was his face seemed to sag more than usual. He was taking his time with breakfast and was actually bothering to chew his food for a change. He hadn't lit a lantern, and the early morning gloom hung thick in the dining hall. The threat of death seemed to fill the air, merging with the shadows.

"I feel fine," said Drezian. "Pesky lad! Can't an old man eat in peace?" He sipped some water and then slammed the mug down with a splash. "It's a wonderful summer day. What is there to feel I'll about?" His voice reeked of sarcasm.

"We should talk about this," Geleon said, who, with greying hair of his own, was not fond of being called a lad. "I want to help you."

Drezian sighed. "If you must know, I am not ready to die. I feel there is still so much I can learn and accomplish. But the assassins will come and put an end to it. And Lord Vasyl calls that honor? I call it murder."

"I find no honor," Geleon said, "in assassinating the old and feeble. It is sickening. How can the king allow such a law to exist in a civilized society?"

"Regardless," said Drezian, "this is an outright sham. Lord Vasyl is not taking my life out of some misguided sense of morality. He's doing it because I quit selling corpse warriors to him when I found out he was using them to terrorize the poor who couldn't pay their taxes. This happened many years ago before you became my apprentice, but he has held a grudge ever since. This assassination order is nothing more than a legal revenge killing."

Geleon's hands clenched into fists, and his face burned hot. "I want to kill him before he kills you, Master. There must be a way."

Drezian frowned. "He is beyond our reach, Geleon. Many have wanted to kill Lord Vasyl over the years, but he is too well guarded. Some believe he is favored by the gods. He feels he has divine right to assert his will upon anyone he chooses."

"Then what can I do, Master?" Geleon said.

Drezian's eyes narrowed. "So you want this cranky old man to stay alive a bit longer and continue to make your life miserable? Very well. Then build me a corpse warrior that no assassin can defeat. Make it as strong as Heracles and as swift as Hermes. Then put it outside the door of my room to guard me as I sleep."

Geleon shook his head helplessly. "You know I don't yet have such skills, if I ever will. If you cannot build such a warrior, how can I?" Drezian molded the dead like a sculptor molded clay. His wrinkled hands, scarred from so many laboratory mishaps, would creep over the bodies with astounding precision, caressing his will into the mortified tissue. He always knew exactly where to implant the hydra's teeth, so that his corpse warriors were flawless in their obedience.

"Nevertheless," said Drezian, "I want you to do this. My creations are too weak to protect me in the long run against the elite assassins Vasyl will send after me. So I ask you to do it. Build me a worthy defender. Save my life, boy!"

With a sigh of frustration, Geleon walked away and climbed the stone stairs of the castle's tower. The first rays of the morning sun streamed in through open window shutters, along with a fresh summer breeze, but Geleon barely took notice. The dread in his heart seemed to weigh him down, and his steps were slow as he ascended the twisting stairs up past dusty landings, barrels, and cobwebs--until at last he stood in his laboratory.

His eyes met those of his assistant Helen. Her young, pimply face showed concern. "You look rather downcast, Geleon. What's wrong?" Helen was a sixteen-year-old girl from a poor family. She had started out as Drezian's housekeeper, but she had become so used to helping Geleon with various tasks she was like an apprentice to him.

"I'm fine," Geleon said, pushing past her.

"You don't look fine," she said, her eyes narrowing with suspicion. Helen had a sharp (and nosy) mind, and she could be annoyingly persistent.

"It's none of your concern," he said. "My mind is burdened lately, but it's nothing I cannot deal with."

"Is something wrong with Drezian?" she asked, her eyes widening.

Geleon grimaced before he could prevent it. "Why should you think that?"

"He is a very old man," said Helen. "I worry about his health."

"Drezian's health is good," Geleon said, looking away.

"Are you being truthful with me?" said Helen.

"Yes!" Geleon snarled, slamming his fist into his palm. "Now cease with your endless worrying. If you mention it again, I'll send you home for the day. Is that understood?" His lip quivered, and he seized his hair in a subconscious gesture that signified his stress had boiled over.

Helen nodded reluctantly, and her eyes strayed to the mass of graying hair that jutted up from Drezian's head. "Why don't you ever get that hair cut? Or at least brush it? And you certainly shouldn't keep yanking on it!"

"Why isn't the body on my work table?" Geleon snapped, his heart racing. "I came here to work, not engage in idle chatter."

"It just arrived a few minutes ago," said Helen. "The delivery man was in a hurry and didn't help me unpack it." She scurried into a storage room and came out dragging a dead body--which had a gaping wound in its throat--and leaving a trail of sawdust. Her scrawny arms seemed tested to the breaking point. She brushed sawdust from her dress and stood panting for a moment. "Well, are you going to help me or not?"

Geleon studied the body, which was covered only in a loincloth, and grimaced. "The man looks weak. This was the mercenary Kaletor? Or the barbarian Hothyar?"

"Kaletor," said Helen. "The delivery man told me Hothyar won't arrive until tomorrow, because of some barbarian death ritual. Isn't he already a week late or something?" She shivered and rubbed her hands together as if to warm them.

Geleon slammed his fist down on the table. "We paid a lot of gold for this corpse--enough so that his family will live good for months." He thrust a piece of parchment toward her. "This says that Kaletor was a powerful warrior in top physical condition. And yet these arms are as thin as my own, and the stomach bears fat!"

Helen raised her eyebrows. "I guess he was more of a skilled sort of fellow, huh? So can you use him, or should I stick him back on ice?"

Gritting his teeth, Geleon seized a handful of his hair and yanked on it. "I don't have time to worry about it. He'll have to do until the next body arrives." He paced around, muttering curses under his breath. "Get me the red hydra's teeth."

Helen's mouth dropped open. "Did you say red hydra's teeth?"

"I can't talk about it, Helen. Just do as I say." Geleon tossed her a ring of keys, and then heaved the body onto his work table. He struggled fiercely to envision how the corpse would be molded, how it would be different from all the other warriors he had created. The harder he strove for new ideas, the more his head ached and the more his mind seemed to shut down.

At last, Helen returned bearing a leather sack and handed it to Geleon. He grabbed some softening wax and ran it over the body in various places. Then he carefully massaged the corpse. Helen joined in, and soon the flesh began to turn rubbery and mold like clay beneath their fingers. Geleon shoed Helen away and poured some of the red hydra's teeth from the sack--a handful of gnarled black fangs, able to cause instant death with a slight prick of the skin.

One by one Geleon implanted them in the body, pushing them deep into muscles and organs, letting his sorcery and instincts guide his hand. The process took hours of careful poking and turning of the teeth. The flesh could not be mutilated or even cut. Rather, the teeth had to work their way perfectly into the softened tissues almost as if taking root, with only a little help from Geleon. Angle and location were everything. The teeth were spiteful toward living flesh, covered in sharp ridges, and his hand was soon cut and bleeding--though he was careful to avoid any contact with the poisonous ends that would have caused Geleon to breathe his last.

Finally, he stepped back and examined his work. Geleon had made several new and risky moves, but he had to trust his skill and his sorcery or he had no hope.

"Looks good," said Helen, locking adjustable iron cufflinks onto the corpse's wrists and ankles and securing it to the table. "I'll bet he's going to be a fierce one." She patted the corpse on the chest. "Guess we'll find out tomorrow when he's awake. I'm hungry. Shall we get some dinner?"

Geleon realized the afternoon was wearing on and he hadn't yet eaten. "You can remain for dinner if you like," he said. "In fact, you can cook it."

"What should I prepare?" said Helen.

Geleon shrugged and walked away, not hungry at all. He paused on the stairs, wishing he were a normal man somewhere with a wife and children--far away from the madness of raising the dead for profit. He cursed Drezian, regretting the day he had met him back when Geleon was a miserable little thief and Drezian had taken him under his wing. Perhaps if Drezian hadn't come along, Geleon would be dead by now or rotting in some dungeon, but at least he might not have been crushed by burdens that only seemed to grow heavier with each passing year.

***

The next morning, Helen and Geleon were back in the laboratory. The corpse had awakened sometime during the night, and it lifted its head as they approached. It moaned and fought to escape its chains, then moved its lips as if trying to form words.

"Silence!" Geleon commanded. The corpse closed its mouth. Geleon noted the flesh was a healthy grayish-blue in hue and that the eyes were heavily bloodshot--signs that the hydra's teeth were rooted solidly in place. The corpse's hands had swollen to twice their previous size, the fingers having become webbed, and its ribs now jutted out beneath its flesh. The shoulders had broadened, and the neck had thickened and displayed gill-like protrusions.

Geleon examined the gills closely, while the corpse watched him with something that bordered on curiosity--a sign of intelligence rarely present in his warriors. "I've never seen anything like this," he said. "It has taken on an almost aquatic appearance."

"Maybe it can breathe underwater now," said Helen.

Geleon gave her a piercing stare, his hands clenching into fists. "It does not breathe, remember? It is still a dead body, empty of a soul."

"I was only joking," she said, her face reddening. "Anyway, it looks like a powerful warrior. Are you going to take it below and test it?"

"I don't have time," Geleon said, rubbing his forehead anxiously.

The door opened and Drezian entered. He approached with a scowl, using a cane to help him along. His body seemed little more than bones beneath his robe, his face a haggard map of lines. "Is this my defender?" he asked, pointing at the corpse. "Is this the warrior that will save my life?"

"We should not speak of this," Geleon said, "when Helen is present."

"What?" Drezian's scowl deepened. "I don't care what the girl hears. I've been marked for death by Lord Vasyl, and everyone should know it."

Helen gasped and put her hand over her mouth.

Drezian inspected the corpse, running his fingers over it, and nodded. "Interesting," he said. "So what makes it so special? What can it do?"

Geleon swallowed. "I'm not sure exactly. I took a risk and--"

"You don't know its capabilities?" said Drezian. "Is that what you're saying?"

Geleon nodded. "I had to try something new. You know this, Master. I'm not half as good at this art as you, and I probably never will be."

"Perhaps not," said Drezian, "but I think you have something special here nonetheless. What you lack in technical knowledge, you make up for in imagination. This is an ugly creation to be sure and certainly imbalanced, but it's a true monster that is capable of anything. If it manages to protect me in the coming days, you must build more of these as new bodies arrive--until all the red hydra's teeth have been used and I'm surrounded by elite defenders."

Geleon reached up to tug at his hair, but Helen pulled his arm down. Her hands were trembling. He wrenched away from her. "If this corpse fails, Master, I won't be able to forgive myself. Your life depends on the power I have woven into this body. I wish you hadn't forced this burden onto me."

"I'm sure you do," said Drezian. "But pressure can bring out the best in someone. Whether I die or not, that's worth something."

Helen turned away, tears flowing. Geleon patted her on the back. "I shall wait with the corpse warrior outside your door. I'll sleep in the hall, with sword and dagger by my side. If the warrior fails, I will do my best to defend your life."

"You'll do no such thing," said Drezian. "You're not a fighter, Geleon, and I don't want you in harm's way. You'll sleep in your own room and leave me to my fate."

"This is foolish, Master," Geleon said, not convinced in the least that his warrior could succeed. "You should leave the keep and flee somewhere beyond Vasyl's reach. You have enough wealth. You could even hire men to protect you."

"Never," said Drezian. "I would rather die here, in my home, than flee like a coward. And hiring men to protect me--rather than using my own corpse warriors--would destroy my reputation and put me out of business. No, I will rely on the defenders that you build for me to save my life."

Geleon gazed at Drezian in silence, striving to comprehend his reasoning. Geleon noted a strange glint in Drezian's eye--almost as if Drezian welcomed the challenge of trying to survive.

Drezian turned away. "We have talked enough."

"Master, are you sure you don't want to--"

"We have talked enough!" Drezian rapped his cane on the floor.

Geleon strode from the room, slamming the door behind him.

***

That night, Geleon lay tossing and turning on a hard mattress. A lone candle cast flickering shadows about the stone chamber, and a sinister feeling hung in the air. A noise like a groan drove him from his bed, but he found the door was locked by some unknown method--sorcery that was beyond his comprehension. He cursed Drezian for locking him in his own chamber as if Geleon were still a young apprentice who didn't know what was good for him. He stood trembling, with his ear pressed to the cold metal. More groans reached him, coming from below in the direction of Drezian's room, followed by loud thumps. Then all went silent.

Geleon sat down on the bed and put his head in his hands. Now it was Geleon's groan that quivered in the air, as the years unreeled in his mind. He could do nothing but sit there and wait, his chest tight with worry and sweat burning his eyes.

Mercifully, morning came at last along with a knock on the door. "Geleon?" Helen called out. "Are you awake yet?"

He tried the door. It opened easily.

Geleon strode out and shoved past Helen. "Go to the laboratory," he said. "Wait there until I come for you."

"What's wrong?" she asked, her brown eyes widening. "Drezian...?"

"Go now!" he shouted, pointing.

Throwing up her hands in frustration, she ran down the hall.

Geleon walked down a flight of stairs. At the bottom, in front of Drezian's door, his corpse warrior lay torn to pieces.

Geleon swallowed, trying to steel his nerves for what he expected to find. At last, he forced his legs to carry him into the chamber. Drezian was missing.

Geleon saw no blood or other signs of a struggle in the room.

"Where is he?" a voice whispered in Geleon's ear.

With a cry, Geleon whirled around to find Helen. His breath rushed out, and he slammed his fist into his palm. "I told you to wait in the laboratory!"

Her face fell. "I was worried about Drezian. Do you think someone...?"

"Abducted him?" Geleon said. "I don't know. Go home for the day, Helen."

"But I want to know if Drezian is okay," she said, tears springing forth.

Geleon nodded and leaned against the wall, the strength gone out of him. The assassin had taken apart his warrior, which meant Drezian was almost certainly dead.

And then the old man came limping down the stairs, using his cane to help him along. He bore his usual scowl.

"Master!" Geleon cried, stepping toward him.

"Stay back," Drezian snarled. "I'll not have you embracing me, by the gods. Yes, I'm alive. I slept in a hiding place last night, where the assassin couldn't find me. But rest assured, my foes will eventually learn where it is."

Geleon motioned to the remains. "The red hydra's teeth were wasted. If only I could pull them from the flesh and use them again!"

"But you have more," said Drezian, "and you had better start implanting them. He rapped his cane on the floor. "You need to reach deeper than you ever thought possible, Geleon, or I'm not going to last much longer."

"But why don't you build the warrior, Master?" Geleon said. "Or at least help me place the teeth? You're far better at this art than I could ever dream of being."

"But I'm old and weary," said Drezian. "And you have potential you haven't yet realized. You can do what I cannot--by strength of imagination alone."

Geleon reached up and tried to yank on his hair in his usual subconscious gesture of anxiety, but Helen clutched his arm nervously in a bear hug. Geleon shook her loose. "Annoying girl!" he muttered. "And an equally annoying old man. This is what I end up with after four decades of life--resurrecting dead bodies when they should be resting beneath the soil and trying to save an old fool that I am forced to call Master. I regret the day I asked to be your apprentice."

Drezian turned away. "I suggest you get started with your task, or you won't have to worry about this old fool much longer." He headed back upstairs.

Geleon turned to Helen, who stood with her hands in her apron pockets looking miserable. "We'll get the remains packed on ice so they can be returned to the family," he said, "and then we'll go see what we have to work with."

Drying her eyes, Helen stooped and lifted a severed arm. "I don't want Drezian to die," she said. "I just want things to be normal around here again."

Geleon said nothing.

***

The next body that arrived was more impressive--a towering barbarian, laden with muscle, who had perished from a spear in the back. He was every bit as formidable as the order form suggested, though getting a bit ripe after two weeks on melting ice. It gave the three of them--Helen, the delivery man, and Geleon--quite a struggle to get him from the wagon, up the stairs, and onto the work table.

It took a lot of waxing to get the body softened up, but at last he was ready to receive the red hydra's teeth. Geleon sent Helen from the room and closed the thick iron door, bolting it. He had no idea what was going to happen and he feared for her safety.

Geleon took a fang and ran it over the flesh, near the heart. His sorcery guided his hand, until the hand seemed to move of its own accord. His breathing grew raspy, chills flooding his body as he plunged deeper into the unknown. He lost track of time and his surroundings. He was vaguely aware that his head was throbbing with pain and pressure.

Geleon lived in his imagination, envisioning a warrior that was unstoppable in attack and defense. He implanted six teeth this time, two more than usual, working them into areas he would previously never have dared go near--the lungs, the heart, and even the ultimate danger zone of the spine. One slight wiggle or accidental turn of a tooth could corrupt the corpse and either make it too weak to be useful or too savage to be controlled.

When he was finished, Geleon slumped to the floor and slept. Later, a groan startled him awake. He scrambled up and came face to face with his warrior. Not only had the corpse awakened after only a few hours, but it had also ripped its chains in two. It stood before Geleon, its cunning eyes looking him over. Its flesh was a fiery crimson hue rather than the usual grayish-blue. Some sort of hard-looking exoskeleton covered its body, as if the corpse had been turned inside out. Two twisted horns jutted from its forehead, and large fangs--similar in appearance to the hydra's teeth--hung from its jaws. Its fingers tapered into bony talons.

"Stand still!" Geleon commanded, his voice shaky in his ears. The corpse tore the iron cufflinks off its wrists and raised a clawed hand as if to rip off Geleon's head.

"Halt!" Geleon bellowed, forcing himself to stand his ground.

Slowly it lowered its arm, the crimson eyes sizing Geleon up. Geleon realized he had gone too far. In his burning desire to protect Drezian, he had violated rules Drezian had always warned Geleon to adhere to at all costs. This corpse warrior had become almost like a child of the red hydra, bearing some of the legendary monster's characteristics.

Geleon pointed to the table with a shaking hand. "Lie down."

The warrior glanced at the table, seemed to consider Geleon's command for a moment, and then did as ordered. Geleon's breath rushed out in relief.

"Wait there until I call upon you," Geleon said.

"Geleon?" Drezian called out. "Open the door."

Geleon unlocked it, and Drezian and Helen came in. Drezian inspected the warrior, his eyes wide with awe. "What have you created, Geleon? I told you to build me a defender, not a demon. It's as if you have violated every rule I ever taught you!"

"By the gods, it's ugly!" said Helen, shuddering. "It barely looks human."

Geleon bowed his head. "I lost control, Master. And I suggest you not get too close to it. It seems reluctant to obey, and it acted as if it wanted to attack me."

"It is hopelessly aggressive," said Drezian, stroking his chin thoughtfully, "like the red hydra herself." That strange gleam Geleon had noticed earlier was in Drezian's eyes again. "Tonight, I will sleep in my room. And my life will rest in the hands of your creation."

"Why?" Geleon said. "You should sleep in your hiding place again."

Drezian shook his head. "No, I cannot hide forever. I will make my stand tonight. I sense that you have reached your limit for now with this creation and can go no further without more work and training."

"But what if it's not enough?" Geleon said.

"My will leaves most of what I own to you," said Drezian, "and a little to Helen." He embraced the girl. "Be strong, my dear," he said. Then he limped from the room.

"Don't let him die, Geleon," Helen pleaded.

"It's not up to me anymore," Geleon said. "I've done all I can. It's up to that demon on the table."

***

Geleon spent another sleepless night locked in his room. He heard more groans and thumping noises, and a terrible screech like that of a bird of prey. "Unlock this door, you stubborn old fool!" Geleon howled, but no one responded. Once again, he sat on the edge of the bed and yanked at his hair, his body shaking.

At last, morning came along with Helen. Geleon found the door was now unlocked. He ordered Helen to wait in his room, and then he ran downstairs. A corpse lay in pieces in front of Drezian's door, but the skin was bluish and the body parts looked different than those of Geleon's latest creation--more like parts from a typical corpse warrior.

"Is Drezian okay?" Helen asked, running down the stairs.

Geleon peeked into the room. Drezian was sitting on his bed, and standing near him was Geleon's warrior, its bone-crusted arms folded across its chest. "Yes, come on in," Drezian said, motioning impatiently.

They entered the room. "What corpse warrior lies torn apart in the entrance?" Geleon asked, struggling to make sense of the scene.

"One of my own making," said Drezian. "The same one that defeated your warrior the night before. It was my best fighter."

"Then there was no assassin," Geleon said, his hands clenching in anger. "The threat was not real. But why did you lie to me, Master?"

Drezian frowned. "The assassins will still come--eventually. Vasyl's death order is real. I was simply testing your creations, using my best fighter from a stable of corpse warriors I keep in hiding. I wanted you to be under extreme pressure because I felt it would bring out the best in you."

"And my creation defeated your greatest warrior," Geleon said, unable to keep from feeling a surge of pride in spite of his anger.

"It didn't just defeat my best fighter," said Drezian, "it obliterated it! You've created the most powerful corpse warrior that I have ever seen--perhaps that has ever existed. I knew your talent far exceeded my own, Geleon. I knew it the first day I tested you and made you my apprentice. You just had to reach deeper than you thought you could to unlock it. It must have taken extraordinary courage to give in to your sorcery like that. I'm proud of you."

"I suppose you expect me to make more of these," Geleon said.

"It is not necessary," said Drezian. "There is a great risk involved in creating such monsters, and I only need one."

"Why only one defender?" Geleon asked.

"I don't need a defender at all," said Drezian, smiling. "I need an assassin."

"An assassin?" Geleon said. "But who are you planning... Oh, I see."

Drezian sneered. "Lord Vasyl is getting kind of old. Why, I'm starting to think he might be turning a little feeble, too. Perhaps it's time I did him a favor and gave him the honorable death he was planning for me. What do you say to that, Geleon?"

Geleon smiled. "I say Lord Vasyl deserves such a gift, if anyone does."

"If Lord Vasyl dies," said Helen, "will things be normal around here again? Or will I have to worry until I'm an old woman?"

"Things will return to normal," said Drezian.

"Not entirely," Geleon said, sitting down next to him. "I have been under a lot of pressure over the years, Master. I'm getting old before my time. I'm thinking I would like to quit being a necromancer and instead practice more traditional sorcery."

Drezian nodded, his face not betraying whatever he was feeling. "You have done all I could ask of you. I think it's a shame, however, since your talent is so vast."

Geleon sighed and leaned back. "I don't care about that anymore. This latest turmoil has finally pushed me over the edge. I'm tired of dealing with deadlines and dead bodies. I want some peace of mind. I have made enough money at this business to be comfortable for life. Now I just want to relax and broaden my knowledge a bit."

"I saw this coming," said Drezian. "I dreaded it, but it is no surprise. I'll just have to find a new apprentice." He fixed his gaze on Helen. "Perhaps I have already found one."

Helen's face brightened. "Do you mean...?"

"No," Geleon said, standing up. "Helen is my apprentice now, Drezian. I won't have her living as I have lived. She doesn't need such burdens."

Drezian's eyes narrowed. "Then you are serious about this?"

"Yes," Geleon said. "I'm tired of this business and I want out."

"Take a few days off and think it over," said Drezian. "You may change your mind. Many challenges still await you in this profession, Geleon. You have only just begun to unlock your potential. Choose carefully, my friend."

"I will," Geleon said, and walked away.

For the first time in months, Geleon left the castle grounds and wandered into the fields. He paused in the deep grass and inhaled a breath of fragrant summer air, and he whispered a prayer of peace for the dead.

End.
Tower of Dread

The tower rose into the afternoon sky like a bony finger, its long shadow from the setting sun cutting into the grassy hills. Zercha ran his hand over the tower's smooth brown surface that reminded him of an insect shell. Deep mysteries bound the lad to the tower, demanding he unlock the secrets within, and time lost meaning as the sun settled down in a crimson blaze.

A wisp of skuneberry smoke curled in front of Zercha's face, snapping him from his trance. He turned to see his father scowling at him. The old man puffed at the hollow skuneberry stem and shook his head in disgust. The blackened berry at the end of the stem burned like the old man's gaze. He was a tall, bald, lanky fellow with a large hook nose and beady eyes that seemed almost black. He held a sack of freshly picked mushrooms in one wrinkled hand.

"Foolish boy," the old man muttered. "Why do you waste time gazing at that old tower? You've lived through eighteen winters now. You should have outgrown such pursuits."

Zercha looked away sheepishly. His gaze wandered across the hills, where stone ruins lay crumbling in the grass. Towers, castles, and odd keeps had once dotted the countryside, rising darkly from the old world mist, but now only mossy boulders remained aside from the lone tower that loomed over him. Yet the footprints of spell-hands and great sky worms were still there in Zercha's mind, the traces of forgotten magic lingering on through summer warmth and winter frost.

The old man raised his eyebrows. "Indeed!" His scowl deepened. A chill breeze rippled the grass of the hilltops and made Zercha shiver. His father's shadow seemed to bear down on Zercha. "I pick the mushrooms for our stew," the old man snarled, "while you stand around with your head in the clouds."

Zercha shrugged, limped to a boulder, and sat down. He rubbed his aching thighs. "My legs hurt more than usual today, Father."

The old man nodded, his face grim. "The disease grows stronger. Eventually it will take your legs."

"Don't remind me," said Zercha.

"I won't be carrying you home," his father said, grimacing. He adjusted his black robe made of troll skin that hung loosely over his frame. The robe was bound by a leather belt with a large brass buckle, and from beneath it poked pointy-toed ash boots of woodland design. Troll-skin clothing and woodland boots were very expensive, and Zercha always wondered how his father had managed to gain possession of the articles. Furthermore, such clothing was flamboyant and imaginative, not at all appropriate for a man who seemed to lack the slightest hint of either quality.

Stung by his father's words, Zercha struggled up and stood swaying. "I can walk. I don't expect to be carried."

"Not yet, anyway," said the old man. "But when your legs finally do give out, what then? With your mind lost in fantasies, you'll be utterly useless." His eyes narrowed. "Part of it is this wretched tower. All your life you've come here, seeking a way in and obsessing about it. And what have you gained? Wasted hours that could have been spent on worthwhile pursuits. I've had enough, my son. Maybe it's time we visited that old sap blood--the Wood Lord--in the forest."

"You've been threatening that for years, Father," said Zercha, rolling his eyes. He gazed at the dark tower, wishing he could crawl inside it and escape everything.

"This time I mean it!" the old man said. "The Wood Lord is the most cynical creature I know of, yet as wise as they come. He'll set you straight about this tower. All of these spell-hand keeps are barren old spires of dread and madness. There is nothing alive in there, just dust and cobwebs and evil energy. The old ways are gone forever. But we still have hard work and common sense."

Zercha kicked a stone away angrily, and winced from the burning pain that erupted in his leg. "Let's go home, and you can make your stew. I would rather not hear any of this talk. I just want to eat and go to bed."

The old man gazed into the distance. "No, I mean it this time. I've had enough." He threw down the sack of mushrooms. "The stew can wait. We are going to see the Wood Lord this very night, beneath the crimson stars and black willow boughs--across the three rocky rivers. It's time for you to grow up."

Zercha studied his father's face and shuddered. "You actually intend to take me there. I can see it in your eyes."

The old man didn't answer. He grabbed two staffs that were leaning against the tower and handed one to Zercha. Zercha's staff was plain, smooth oak, but his father's ash staff was engraved with delicate runes and was topped by a detailed sky worm's head. Zercha would have preferred the sky worm staff, and he saw no reason why his father should possess it other than to mock him.

"The river cats will be on the prowl tonight," said Zercha, "with the recent arrival of summer. If we go, we should wait until tomorrow."

The old man smirked. "No one can enter the Wood Lord's hall in daylight. In fact, it cannot even be found. It must be approached on a clear night beneath the crimson stars--like I suspect this coming night will be. As for the river cats, that's why we have staffs to defend ourselves. I didn't train you to fight for nothing. You can't work or get your head on straight, so you at least better be able to fight."

Zercha bowed his head. "I can't fight worth a damn and you know it. But never mind. Just lead the way and I'll try to keep pace."

The old man frowned. "Look, my son, I've always only wanted what's best for you. Yet you view me as a tyrant."

"Lead on," Zercha said, through clenched teeth.

"I'm not a tyrant. I've always made sure you had food, shelter, and training. I taught you to read and write and to know wisdom. I taught you--"

"Lead on!" Zercha drove the staff against the earth. "It's all about you, Father. It always has been. My opinion means nothing."

The old man turned away in anger, his black robe billowing. "Fine, you ungrateful sod. Maybe the Wood Lord will force you to learn the value of gratitude. And perhaps he'll knock some sense into your head while he's at it."

The old man strode on through the grass, with Zercha limping along behind him. Then he turned and tapped his staff against the earth. He waited, then tapped it a few more times. Then he took to waiting again.

Zercha sighed with impatience. He didn't know what his father was doing, and he couldn't have cared less. Everything the old man did was merely to annoy Zercha. "Are you done yet, Father?"

The old man puffed at the skuneberry stem and blew a twisting, serpent-like wisp of smoke that drifted off over the hills. "Yes, I'm done." He caressed the staff and closed his eyes, his lips muttering words too low for Zercha to hear.

Zercha groaned. "Father? Can we please be off now?" His stomach boiled with dread over the thought of going before the Wood Lord, yet his father still found cause to delay the journey.

The old man raised his staff and whispered something. The setting sun bathed his cheek in a crimson glow and lit up his brass belt buckle. He gazed into the distance, where gnarled petrified wooden villages stood like forests of craggy tree stumps. "It's a beautiful land we live in, my son. Even after all these years."

Zercha threw up his hands. "I know what it looks like. If we don't get moving, Father, I swear to you that I'm just going to go home."

The old man lowered the staff and nodded. "I'm just trying to prepare for our journey, son." With that, he started walking again. "Besides, your sorry legs needed a rest. We'll stop off at the Pine Vale Tavern and have a mug of Grodlop."

Zercha cringed at the thought, but said nothing.

The old man pulled something from his pocket, touched it to the burning skuneberry, and tossed it into the air where it buzzed off in a shower of green sparks. Some of the sparks settled over Zercha and made him tingle from head to toe. Zercha brushed them away angrily. "Don't do that, Father. I hate those stupid crackle-eggs of yours."

The old man chuckled. "What's wrong with a little entertainment? Maybe you should lighten up a bit, my son. Have a mug of frog spit with me, watch some crackle-eggs without such a critical eye. Like the fellows in the tavern."

Zercha groaned. "I don't want to be anything like them. All they care about is farming and hunting and working from dawn until dusk."

"True," said the old man. "But they also love Grodlop and crackle-eggs." He blew a smoke wisp that reached forth like a finger and tickled Zercha's nose.

Zercha batted the smoke finger into ruin. "Enough, Father! No marsh eggs, no skuneberry smoke, no lectures. Just lead to me the Wood Lord. It's not going to matter, anyway. I still want to know what's in that tower. I want to see magic, and read the writings of the spell-hands. That's right, Father, I said spell-hands! Yes, I live in a dream world. I make up silly stories in my head. I don't want to be anything like you or those men in the tavern. That's not who I am, or who I will ever be."

The old man yawned. "Are you done spouting off? Because I'm done listening to it. I'll stick dirt in my ears if you keep on with this. You talk of spell-hands and old towers that no one cares about. You talk of magic, of all ridiculous notions. Face reality, boy. We're simple folk destined for simple things. I want you to quit trying to be a spell-hand and start learning how to take care of yourself."

Zercha limped along, his teeth clenched in defiance.

The old man paused by a lone apple tree and whispered to it, while caressing the bark. He studied the leaves carefully. "I think we picked a good night for this journey. This tree thinks the crimson stars will shine brightly, which will make it easier for us to enter the Wood Lord's hall."

Zercha nodded, feeling too weary to care. "Can we move on, then?"

"You should learn these techniques, my son," said his father. "Get your head out of the clouds for a moment and learn something. Apple trees can teach you a lot, if you know what to look for and how to listen to them."

Zercha knew he should keep his mouth shut, but he couldn't resist. He sneered. "A spell-hand wouldn't need to talk to an apple tree, Father. He would use magic to tell him what he needed to know."

The old man grimaced. "Learn the ways of the land, boy, and forget about spell-hands. The natural world provides all that we need in life."

The hills grew wooded, a dirt road winding along between the trees. Darkness settled over the land, the crimson stars burning in the deep blue heavens, and animal noises filled the woods around them. The old man did something to his staff to make the worm head glow with a greenish flame. The old man was always fiddling with something, and sometimes his skills inspired envy in Zercha. Zercha glanced at his own sorry staff and sighed.

The old man made great strides down the trail, and Zercha was barely able to keep up. The forest seemed as ugly as his mood in the greenish light, the trunks huge and gnarled and the craggy roots crisscrossing the trail. The roots let the old man pass, but they occasionally tried to trip Zercha. The boy had no idea why the trees favored his father over him, but it was just one more source of annoyance.

Laughter erupted in the treetops as burning blue ghost lights frolicked about. Some of them hovered around the green fire of the old man's staff, their pale eyes wide with delight, but they ignored Zercha completely even though he was fascinated by them and would have loved the attention.

"My little friends!" the old man laughed. "You know, son, if you weren't so cynical, perhaps they would find you more appealing."

"You're the cynical one, Father," said Zercha, "which is why I can't understand why they are attracted to you."

"I'm only cynical toward the clutter that fills your mind," said the old man. He waved the ghost lights away and they rose into the treetops.

They entered a tavern with walls made of petrified wood that was nestled amidst some pines by the roadside. As they stepped inside, Zercha cringed. He didn't look at anyone, but he could feel the men staring in his direction. He followed his father to bar, and stood with his hands in his pockets.

"Welcome, Brimbal," said the short, scrawny tavern owner, addressing Zercha's father. "Fresh Grodlop tonight, and it is a good brew indeed." He looked Zercha over, and his hawk nose wrinkled in some unfavorable gesture. "I see you got your boy out of the house." He winked at the old man and grabbed a pitcher and two mugs. He dipped the pitcher inside a large, hollow tree stump that stood behind the bar and placed it before them. Foam ran down the side.

Brimbal nodded. "My son is a grown man now, Werlo. Though his head is still lost in the sky."

Werlo chuckled. "Is that right, boy? Do you still believe in spell-hands?"

Zercha shrugged, wishing he had waited outside. His instinct was to say nothing, but his mouth seemed to have a will of its own. "Why shouldn't I believe in them? It's better than sitting around getting drunk."

The bar keep nodded. "That's true enough, I suppose." He laughed. "So when are you going to meet one of these spell-hands and bring him to my tavern? He might provide some good entertainment. Unlike your father here, who does nothing but drink frog spit and throw around crackle-eggs."

"That reminds me," said Brimbal. He tossed some crackle-eggs into the air and they danced around the room. A few of the patrons cheered.

A drunken bear of a man turned toward Zercha, foam dripping down his thick black beard. He belched. "Spell-hands, huh? Where they at? I want to see one for myself!" He roared laughter and swatted Zercha on the back. Werlo laughed as well, and the two men exchanged a wink.

Zercha took to glaring straight ahead in silence, which was the only way to get the fellows to stop tormenting him.

"We would all like to see one of those spell-hands," mused the bar keep. "Wouldn't you, Brimbal?"

"No, I wouldn't," said Brimbal, his voice taking on a hard edge. "Listen now, you fellows watch what you say. I don't want my boy thinking you actually believe in that nonsense. There are no spell-hands these days."

The bar keep shrank back. "Not a problem, Brimbal. Didn't mean to offend. Can I buy you another pitcher of Grodlop?"

"Indeed," growled the bear of a man, "don't offend old Brimbal! We like having you around, Werlo. Who else is going to supply us with Grodlop? No one else owns a queen stump anywhere near these lands. Old Brimbal might take that staff and send you over hill and river."

"I'm not sending anyone anywhere," said Brimbal, waving his hand in a dismissive gesture. "I'm just enjoying some good brew."

A tall, bony man with a chest-length grey beard approached them. "Hey, Brimbal," he said, "what kind of winter are we going to have?"

"Mild," said the old man, wiping foam from his lips. "The chill will creep north and bed down in the eastern slopes. It will not rise again until the following fall, when its wrath will be twofold."

Zercha groaned in boredom. He tried to sip his Grodlop, but he didn't care for it. "We should get going soon, Father," he said. "You're not going to stand around and talk about dull stuff like the weather all night?"

Brimbal shrugged. "They ask questions. I give answers."

Zercha realized the bar keep was directing a look of pity his way. He glared back. "Is something wrong?"

Werlo shook his head. "No, nothing's wrong, boy. But I have a question for you. Now that you're eighteen, is your father going to explain--"

"Enough!" snapped Brimbal, pounding the bar.

Werlo nodded sheepishly. "Sorry, Brimbal." He glanced at Zercha apologetically. "Your father would rather I keep my question from your ears."

Zercha groaned and leaned on the bar, not caring in the least about whatever the bar keep had intended to say. "Can we leave now, Father? I really want to get this over with. Otherwise, I'm just going home to sleep."

Brimbal polished off his mug of frog spit and tried to hand the bar keep some silver. As always, the bar keep adamantly refused the money. Zercha grimaced. It was amazing how many people respected the old fool and treated him like he was something special. But they didn't have to live with him and endure his criticism every day.

When they stepped outside into the shadows, Zercha's anger boiled over. "Why do you bring me in there, Father? Just to humiliate me?"

"I bring you in there for some good Grodlop," said the old man. He adjusted his robe, looking uncomfortable.

"I hate frog spit," said Zercha. "You know I do. And now you want to make me walk on my aching legs all the way to the Wood Lord's domain so I can be made to feel even more foolish. Why do you treat me this way? If Mother was still alive, she wouldn't let you bully me like this."

Brimbal's eyes widened. "Bully you? How dare you say such a thing! I've done nothing but baby you since your mother's death." He started to turn away, but Zercha was eighteen now and ready to open doors he had once feared to touch.

"You never cared about Mother!" Zercha yelled. "You didn't even try to cure her illness. All you did was--"

His eyes smoldering, the old man seized Zercha's tunic. "Don't ever say that again, boy! I did try to save your mother, but some things are beyond even... Some things just cannot be cured."

"Like my legs?" said Zercha. "I'm sick like Mother was, but you obviously couldn't care less."

"I do care," Brimbal said quietly. "That's why I try to teach you things, why I was hoping to take you to the Wood Lord this night. You're not as sick as your mother was. Your legs can be cured, but not by me."

"Then who can cure them?" said Zercha, a spark of hope burning within him. "The Wood Lord?"

"No, not the Wood Lord," said Brimbal. "They can be cured by you, when you learn to stop being so stubborn and self centered."

"That's a lie!" Zercha shouted. "I can't cure my legs and you know it. You're just playing games with me, Father, like you always do." Zercha gazed into his father's eyes, and he understood just how deep the old man's contempt for him ran. His father cared nothing for him, and he made that known every day.

Brimbal sighed and leaned against a pine. "I don't know, my son. Maybe I'm just an old fool. Maybe I have been cruel to you all these years." He threw down his worm-head staff. "I carved that to mock you." He threw down a handful of crackle-eggs. "I collected those--a very dangerous task, by the way--just to annoy you, because some say they have magical properties and I knew you lacked the skills to collect any yourself. I can't deny it. I wanted to mock your beliefs and make you feel terrible about them. I wanted you to hate magic, but I obviously failed miserably."

"Why?" said Zercha. "What did I ever do to deserve that?"

"Wrong or right," said Brimbal, "I felt you lacked character and work ethic. I felt like you would never amount to anything unless I kept humiliating and pestering you. I wanted you to learn common sense above all else."

"You think I'm worthless," said Zercha.

Brimbal shook his head. "No, son. I think you have plenty of worth and a big heart. But I wanted so much more out of you. My expectations were too high, and when you failed to live up to them, I didn't know how to handle it. But lately I've come to realize that was wrong. I want to take you to the Wood Lord because he can bring out the best in you. With the Wood Lord, hope yet lingers."

"I'm not going," said Zercha, wiping his eyes viciously with his sleeve. "If I'm not the man you wanted me to be, then that's the way it is. But I'll never change! I'm going back to that tower, and I'm going to sit there until it opens up or I starve to death. I don't care anymore." With that, Zercha turned and limped off down the road.

"Zercha!" Brimbal called. "Come back, son!"

***

Zercha gazed up at the dark, skeletal finger that pointed accusingly at the heavens. "Let me in!" he bellowed, beating his fist against the tower's hard shell-like surface. Zercha was burning with emotion, and the tower felt blistering hot beneath his touch. He pushed against it with all his might, willing it to open.

The tower seemed unfathomable, a wonder left over from a forgotten world. The ways of magic had been lost and were kept alive only in tales by firelight and in the hearts of dreamers like Zercha. His passion was a thirst that could never be quenched, because the mystical waters had dried up long ago.

Yet Zercha pressed on when reason told him to surrender, demanding the tower receive him. His hands seemed bound to the dark shell by fire, and his will seemed to burn equally hot within him, as if being tempered in a forge.

The hard surface suddenly gave way, and Zercha stepped forward through what felt like a wall of thick jelly. He found himself standing in a winding hallway lit by a faint greenish glow that seemed to have no point of origin. But when he pushed against the wall where he had entered, it was solid.

"Zercha, what have you done!" he whispered to himself.

The hallway wound upward, and Zercha followed. His legs seemed ready to buckle beneath him, more from terror than pain. The hallway contained a gloom he had never imagined, like a withered soul that had been hiding beneath a simple and mysterious shell. All the wonders and longings that had been growing in his heart since childhood were torn away. Magic was not a warm blessing that would bring him happiness--rather, it was bitter, bringing to mind a coiled snake waiting for centuries amidst dust and stone to latch onto living flesh.

Zercha leaned against the wall and groaned. "Father, why didn't I listen to you? Now I have trapped myself forever!"

Noises arose from all around him--scraping sounds and faint voices he couldn't understand. Zercha slammed his staff against the wall, hoping his father would hear him and try to find a way into the tower. But deep inside he knew his father was too simple to understand what had happened. Brimbal would assume his son had been devoured by wild animals or that he had wandered off with the intent to never return.

The staff broke in two, and Zercha hurled the pieces to the floor. "This is what I wanted?" he whispered in disbelief.

Having no choice, Zercha continued his climb. He passed round doors bearing strange markings, and walls covered in lumps and pits that looked like eyes, mouths, and horns. The tower seemed to be a single, living entity, though Zercha couldn't fathom what type of monstrous creature it might have been.

At last he reached the tower's peak and entered a circular chamber filled with fragments of multi-colored, shattered crystal. Immediately, an unseen presence seized his throat and began to strangle him.

The coiled serpent that was the essence of magic had struck, burying its fangs deep into Zercha. The ancient energy flooded his body like burning pain, opening channels and planting seeds. Once the magic had thoroughly infested him, the choking sensation departed, and Zercha was left physically unharmed--yet his body was bitterly poisoned by sorcery.

Zercha studied the room for clues, and found images of spell-hands engraved on the walls. They all looked like his father--tall, lanky, bald, and dressed in robes--and they pointed fingers at him accusingly, their faces contorted with the fury of judgment.

Zercha slumped to his knees, the will drained from him. The revelation didn't shock him. In fact, it made perfect sense. Magic didn't make men wise and thoughtful--it made them hard-willed and sour.

Footsteps echoed outside the room, but Zercha didn't turn to look. He knew it was his father approaching.

"It's a shame things have come to this," said Brimbal, striding into the chamber and placing his hand on the boy's shoulder. "Yet because you're my son, you were all too susceptible to this fate."

"Tell me, Father," said Zercha, "will I grow taller and thinner now? Will my hair fall out? Will my eyes become beady like those of a hawk? Will the ghost lights now fawn over me, and will I be able to collect the crackle-eggs from the poisonous marsh? Will I become a cynical, wretched excuse for a man? I'm a blind fool, Father. The men in the tavern know what you are, and they mocked me for my inability to see it. Yet you helped to cloud my vision, and then you let this happen. You could have prevented me from coming here."

"Yes, I let it happen," said Brimbal, sighing. "Had you followed me to the Wood Lord's lair, he would have taught you simple living and common sense--a truly magical way of life. He would have taught you how to heal your legs through the gifts that nature has given us. But when you ran off, I felt my lone opportunity to take you there had been wasted. And so I let you go to your fate...young spell-hand."

"You should have stopped me," said Zercha. "Instead, you let me succumb to a most bitter curse. You are an utter failure of a father!"

"Maybe so," said Brimbal, "but I was unable to cure your mother. I couldn't let you lose your legs. It's a hard world for the crippled, my son."

Zercha stood up. Already, his legs felt stronger, but his heart felt colder. "So what now, Father? I feel a terrible darkness within me that seems to want to devour my soul. How shall I live?"

Brimbal's face hardened, and he stood up tall. "You shall learn to control it." He pointed at the broken shards of crystal. "Or you shall destroy yourself in your madness like most of the spell-hands of old."

Zercha glanced down. At his feet was an unbroken lump of white crystal. He lifted it. "The merging of my will and sorcery, bound in physical form. There is so much of me within this stone. Too much. It shines with such promise, Father. Yet perhaps I should smash it now and be done with it. Would you even care?"

Brimbal gritted his teeth. He pulled a green crystal from his pocket and held it up. "But that's not what you want, my son. You would rather I smashed my own and fell into ruin. Yet I have lived for hundreds of years. I will outlive you, boy! Mark my words. Your broken shards will lie in this tower while I still walk the land."

With that, Brimbal turned and strode from the chamber.

Zercha gazed at the white crystal, which seemed to pulse in his hand like a beating heart. He smiled. "We shall see about that, Father. I may surprise you." The old dreams still stirred within him, and he clung desperately to them. He had become a spell-hand, but he was not like his father--or any of the spell-hands of old. The magic within him was already molding into a new and gentle form. Zercha was strong in a way his father had never realized. His dreams were the essence of his strength.

End.
Brock Strangebeard and the Skulls of Callaharn

Sullen eyes met in the wagon's small prison cell. The cracked wooden roof could not shut out the downpour, and water dripped on the grizzled prisoners. Brock gazed at the cell bars in contemplation. He had already tried bending them twice. Perhaps, with a little help from the others, it could be done, but unlike Brock, the men feared execution if caught trying to escape.

"Blasted rain!" a big man named Keleaf muttered, as it rolled down his face. He sat apart from the others, and no one but Brock dared meet his gaze.

Brock frowned. "Why curse the rain, Keleaf? It's sure to turn the road to mud and slow us. Are you that anxious to stand trial?"

"I'll be found innocent," Keleaf growled, slamming his fist against the iron floor, "unlike the rest of you dogs. I didn't force myself on that wench. It's a lie." He sneered. "But you, little man--I'm guessing you're here for a good reason."

"I'm guilty all right," said Brock, shrugging, "and proud of it." He had broken the jaw of one of Lord Lassanair's soldiers in a bar brawl. Just another fight to Brock--but it was probably enough to earn him a good many years in a stinking dungeon.

Keleaf grimaced. "You make trouble for the rest of us, dwarf. I ought to choke you dead and be done with you." He leaned toward Brock, his huge shoulders hunched with purpose and his bearded face bearing a maniacal grimace. He outweighed the dwarf by more than a hundred pounds. "And don't think these other cowards will back you up." He glowered at the other men in challenge. They looked away.

Brock gazed up at him with disgust. "I know your kind, Keleaf. I can see it in your eyes. You don't deserve your freedom."

"You have stayed with the carnival, little man," Keleaf said. "I know all about you. You were a freak that performed for the crowds, and undersized imp on display for the amusement of others."

Brock smiled. His hand curled into a meaty fist. "I might be a freak, but I'm no wretch who terrorizes helpless women."

Keleaf reached out with a huge, calloused hand and seized Brock's crimson beard. "You've got a dagger-sharp tongue, little man, and it's sure to be your undoing. I heard you were abandoned on a pile of fish guts as a baby, that you grew up brawling on fishing boats. You don't seem like much of a fighter, but more like a sissy!" He tugged the beard. "Beautiful little braids, like a woman's hair. Indeed, I had my way with that wench, just like a strong man should. But what would you know of that? Maybe you prefer a strong man yoursel--"

Brock struck so fast Keleaf never glimpsed it. His calloused first burrowed straight into Keleaf's big, hook nose and smashed it into ruin. Brock hit him once more before Keleaf had time to slump to the floor in a pool of blood. Keleaf groaned and clutched his broken nose, then broke into bubbling snores.

Brock rubbed his fist. "Figures I'd have to lay out the strongest of the bunch, when I need help bending those bars."

"It doesn't matter," said another man, named Wofar. "If we try to escape, we'll get cut down right here in the road, with no chance to surrender. I've seen it happen before. Lassanair's soldiers are vicious." He raised his hands. "Why are we not in irons? It is because they want us to try to escape so they can have an excuse to kill us. It provides them with sport. I'd rather take my chances on trial."

"And end up slaving your life away in some wretched pit?" said Brock. "I'd rather take my chances trying to escape."

The rain thundered harder against the wagon roof. The wagon slowed, and they could hear men shouting and Brothus beasts bellowing. Soon the wagon halted.

Wofar muttered a curse. "All this does is delay what must come to pass. Now we have to sit longer in torment and wait for our fates to be decided."

"Not if we break out of here," said Brock. That statement was sounding old to his ears, and he was tired of uttering it. His brawler's temper was starting to flare, demanding he take action.

But no one agreed to help him bend the bars, and so they simply sat and waited. Finally Brock seized Wofar's tunic. "You're either going to help me--"

Gurgling screams of terror and agony mixed with shouting erupted outside. Something thudded against the wagon.

Brock hunched forward, his eyes wild. "What in the seven hells is going on out there? It sounds like we're under attack!"

He shoved a prisoner out of the way and seized the bars, yanking on them furiously. "Help me, or die in a cage!" he grunted.

Wofar leapt to his aid, and then another prisoner joined in. Together, they managed to pull the bars apart enough for the dwarf to squeeze through. But the wooden casing that engulfed the cage was sturdier than Brock had hoped. He shoved his foot repeatedly against the locked oak doors beyond the cell. Finally, the doors cracked apart and daylight flooded in through the back of the wagon.

Even as the sounds of slaughter died down, Brock worked his way through the opening in the bars--and got stuck. "Push on me!" he bellowed. The men shoved him through with such force that he toppled off the wagon into the mud.

Brock rose and wiped muck from his beard. The wagon train stood silent in the downpour, the Brothus beasts gone from their harnesses. Lord Lassanair's soldiers lay dead in the mud. Their heads were missing.

"What do you see?" Wofar called out.

Brock didn't answer. He blinked his eyes in disbelief, even as he swiped up a soldier's sword and backed away from the wagon. His heart thudding wildly, he made his way between the wagons, searching for the head hunter. But he encountered nothing but the dead, and at last he lowered his guard.

Brock found the key and unlocked the cell. The prisoners poured out, except for Keleaf, who was still out cold. Brock considered locking the cell and leaving the big man to rot, but instead he tossed the key in the mud.

The men glanced around with pale faces.

"Grab what weapons you can find," said Brock. He located the wagon where his throwing axes and belt were stored, and gave the sword to Wofar. He flipped an axe into the air in an unconscious gesture and caught it, pondering what he had witnessed. How had the soldiers been slain and their heads removed so quickly? The cuts were messy and jagged, as if the heads had simply been hacked off carelessly, but it had all happened with astonishing swiftness that spoke of something unnatural.

Soon Brock and three men were armed and stocked with provisions. "We'll make for Lord Holnon's lands," said Brock. "I hear he is no friend of Lassanair. We're not likely to be pursued there."

A groan made them whirl around. Keleaf had struggled down from the wagon, clutching his nose. He ripped some cloth from a dead soldier's tunic and pressed it to his face. He glowered at Brock, and kicked the dead soldier in the ribs. "Good for these dogs," he said. "I hope they died in agony. And I hope you suffer the same fate, little man. If I have my way, you will."

Brock nodded. "That's why I'll not travel with you, Keleaf. Make your own way to freedom. There's danger enough around here, obviously, without having to keep my eye on a dirty backstabber all the time."

"You ambushed me!" growled Keleaf. "So who's the backstabber, dwarf? The gods put a curse on you, for your mother to bear such a short and stocky man. No good can come from having a freak like you as company anyway." His eyes wild, Keleaf seized a fallen sword and lurched off between the wagons. "I'll cut off your face!" he howled back, and then he was lost amidst the wagons and driving rain.

"We should have killed him," said Wofar. His dark eyes narrowed in his rat-like face. "His yelling will bring back whatever slew the soldiers."

One of the men--a chubby fellow named Nunro--fell to his knees in the muck, his sword dropping from a shaking hand. He took to blubbering. "I...I've never seen so much death, so much--"

Brock slapped his face. "Straighten your spine, Nunro."

The remaining man, an older fellow with a silver beard named Vancas, sighed and hauled Nunro to his feet. His eyes were cold and dangerous, and Brock sensed he was an experienced killer. "What kind of rogue are you Nunro, anyway?"

"I stole to survive," Nunro sobbed. "Food, mostly. But this..." He looked around, his mouth hanging open. "Their...their damn heads are..."

Vancas released him, and Nunro sagged to his knees again. Vancas glanced at Brock in disgust and shook his head. "He's useless to us. I'll be damned if I'm going to carry a fat whining baby through the muck."

"Get up and walk like a man, Nunro," said Brock, "or lay in the mud and blubber until the head hunter returns. But it's time for the rest of us to go!"

They started off, and Nunro followed. The rain swept the road in sheets, hammering into them. The few twisted pines along the road did little to shield them. Soon they encountered some Seketi ruins--black pillars where victims were chained and left to die. The pillars were from the Age of Cities, when three empires ruled the world with devices from the gods, and they still pulsed with energy. The bones of the dead were absorbed into the pillars, sustaining them somehow.

Wofar pointed with a shaking finger. "The Mark of Callaharn. His priests must have a Gosarni close by somewhere. No doubt they are the ones who beheaded the soldiers for some foul purpose."

Brock examined one of the pillars. Each bore a symbol of a half circle with spikes that protruded upward. "What is a Gosarni?"

Wofar leaned in close, speaking loudly over the storm. "A temple of many arms that captures the will of the stars." He ran a trembling hand over a pillar. "The priests feed the dead to these monuments and receive energy in return. But look--the pillars bear no corpses! The priests must have been in a hurry to leave all those dead bodies back there." His voice dropped so that Brock could barely hear him. "In a hurry to get those severed heads back to their temple. It is said even the dead are not safe in a Gosarni, that corpses can be made to suffer." He pointed at his head. "This is where thoughts come from, and pain... A head might still live even when detached from a body in a Gosarni temple. The priests of Callaharn are vile beyond reason." He bit his lip, and his dark eyes shone with wonder and something that might have been excitement.

"Maybe so," said Brock, frowning, "but it has nothing to do with us. All I see is a golden opportunity to escape the dungeons." Whatever machinery powered the pillars was beyond Brock's comprehension, so they started off again.

"I saw something!" Nunro cried, pointing off into some pines and boulders. "A dark figure. Someone stalks us. Someone--"

Brock clamped a hand over Nunro's mouth. "Don't let them know we've spotted them!" he growled. "Keep your voice down and don't point."

"Too late!" hissed Wofar, raising his sword.

Three figures cloaked in black burst from the trees. They held huge, two-handed curved blades. They ran with the speed and agility of deer.

Wiping rain from his eyes, Brock took aim at the middle one and hurled his axe. He cursed viciously as the figure deflected the axe with his hook blade. Brock drew two more axes from his belt and hurled them both at once. The figure deflected one, but the other slammed into its face. The black-cloaked figure dropped like a stone into the grass beside the road.

The remaining two closed in. Brock had one axe left, and he swung it at a figure's legs. The figure easily jumped the blow and lashed out with the hook blade, just missing Brock's throat. The two foes circled each other, a snarling brawler squaring off against a featureless phantom.

Wofar and Vancas engaged the remaining figure, while Nunro backed away in terror. Wofar blocked a vicious stroke, but the figure kicked his legs out from under him. He landed on his back, the sword flying from his hand.

Meanwhile, Brock ducked another hook slash and caught the figure with a glancing blow to the thigh. The figure staggered, and Brock slammed his axe into its chest to the crunch of bone, driving the figure to its knees. The two foes were now at eye level, and Brock glared into the darkness beneath the hood to glimpse the smooth face of a man. Brock's own face broke into a broad grin of battle lust. He drove his left fist against the fellow's skull even as he wrenched his bloody axe free from his chest. The man shuddered and lay still.

Brock turned to find that Vancas had finished off the other foe. The elderly man knelt calmly by his victim, the rain washing blood from his sword. His cold eyes met Brock's. "Nothing common about these fighters."

Brock raised his bushy eyebrows. "Not in the least." He helped Wofar up, and glared at the still-cowering Nunro.

Wofar spat on the corpse. "I'd hate to think these three slew all those soldiers back there, considering how easily we vanquished them."

Vancas smiled. "Easy, you say? Nothing easy about it. And as I recall, you spent the battle lying on your back in the mud."

Brock recovered his axes and then searched the dead men. Their robes were empty, and large, empty leather sacks hung from their belts. They were young men with smooth, pale faces. His battle lust having subsided, Brock felt a pang of regret. He never liked to see young men cut down in the prime of life, whatever the circumstances. "A damn shame," he muttered. "These lads should be out in the fields working, or learning a trade in town--not lying dead in the road."

Vancas nodded. "It is indeed a sorry sight."

Wofar grimaced. "They're the dogs of Callaharn and do not deserve pity. Their hearts are frozen, their minds born knowing only evil."

Brock stepped toward him. "How do you know so much about the priests of Callaharn? I used to travel all over this land with the carnival, throwing my axes for the amusement of the crowds, and yet I barely heard of them. I'm guessing you've had dealings with them."

"You guess correctly," said Wofar. He spat in the mud, his thin, rat-like face twisted in a scowl. "I used to deliver...goods to them, right up until they lowered their payment in a surprise move. I murdered one of the bastards, not knowing they were in good with Lord Lassanair. I was tracked down and arrested."

"And these goods," said Brock, "were no doubt fresh corpses."

Wofar laughed. "Not _all_ of them were fresh. I robbed graves at random, dwarf. Yes, it was wrong. I feel terrible for having done it. But I assure you I have no love for the priests of Callaharn, and not simply because they cheated me. They are the most wicked and disgusting creatures on this earth. The filth in their temples clots in the sewers below ground, choking off all that is wholesome. It's down in those stone bowels that the dead find no peace, their screams echoing upon bloodstained rock."

Brock nodded. "Maybe so, but that didn't stop you from profiting from such evil."

Wofar shrugged. "A man has to earn a living. I didn't like it, but I needed the gold. What can I say?"

Vancas prodded Wofar's chest with his blade. "At least we now know what kind of man you are, Wofar."

Wofar shoved the sword aside. "Before you judge me, old man, tell me _your_ story. You handle a sword better than anyone I've ever seen."

Vancas' lips tightened. "You're better off not knowing, for the moment you learn of my past is the same moment you find my sword in your heart."

Wofar swallowed. "Very well. It's none of my business anyway. We need to get moving. I'm certain we'll be attacked again, and perhaps in greater numbers."

Brock gazed hard at Vancas, his fiery green eyes meeting the cold eyes of a confident killer. Before he could speak, Nunro grabbed Brock's shoulder from behind and yanked on it. "Please, let's just get away from here!"

Brock shoved him away. "Keep your mouth shut. You've got two legs, don't you? If you want to get away from here so badly, start walking."

Nunro sniffled and turned away.

Brock kicked him in the calf and made him hop. "And none of that damn baby stuff. A big man like you shouldn't be crying all the time. Next sob that comes out of your mouth, I'll put my boot in your arse."

Vancas patted Nunro on the shoulder. "Don't go laying hands on the dwarf, and you'll be fine." He laughed. "You're just lucky he didn't fix your nose up like Keleaf's back there in the wagon."

Brock muttered curses under his breath, wondering how he was going to keep Nunro alive. The other men could take care of themselves well enough, but Nunro was a formidable burden. He was easily the most thin-skinned thief Brock had ever met--sharp eyed, certainly, but as weak as they came in battle.

The rain continued to hammer them. They struggled to the top of a muddy hill, which gave them a good view of the surrounding land. Beneath the blackened sky, forest stretched away from them below on either side of the road, and rising from the midst of the trees was a series of huge, crooked stone arms that looked like the legs of some enormous spider spread out above the treetops.

"The Gosarni," said Wofar. "The temple of many arms."

Nunro pointed a trembling finger down at the road. "I see figures, cloaked and hooded. Perhaps more than a dozen."

Brock squinted, but could only see a tiny blur moving in the road in the distance. "I trust your eyesight over mine, Nunro," he said. "It must be more of those priests, out hunting for heads again."

"But they never hunt in such numbers," said Wofar. "They must be planning something unusual. With all those priests stalking the land, the Gosarni may be all but abandoned. I think we should try to loot it."

"Four men," said Vancas, "daring to loot a temple guarded by an army of priests who fight better than most trained soldiers? It would be a risky move indeed. And by what you say, Wofar, we could find a fate worse than death."

"The temple holds precious metals and jewels," said Wofar, "and some of the rarest treasures one can find. The priests loot tombs throughout the land--even the most dangerous tombs where no sane man would venture. They hoard the treasure away in the Gosarni to honor the spirit of Callaharn."

"I think we should loot it," said Brock. Wofar's words had stoked the fires of his lust for treasure. "I am also curious to learn of their plans. Maybe we can do something to thwart them."

"It would be no small risk," said Vancas, his cold eyes gazing down on the temple. "But I'm with you on this. I would like to put a stop to their vile schemes as well." He poked Nunro's ribs. "But what about this useless sack of dirt?"

"He can hide himself in the forest," said Brock, "and await our return."

Nunro shook his head. "I fear to be left alone. And..." He swallowed hard. "And I want my share of the loot."

Vancas chuckled. "Are you growing a spine, Nunro?"

Nunro shrugged and didn't answer.

Brock seized Nunro's tunic. "You have to earn your loot. If you choose to go with us, you'll be expected to hold your own in all ways--including battle."

Nunro nodded. "I can be of value to you." He pulled a leather sack from his pocket and held it up. "These are lock-picking tools that were taken when I was arrested. I got them back when we stocked up on provisions from the wagons."

"You might yet prove your worth, Nunro," said Brock, releasing him.

"Let us leave the road!" said Wofar, motioning them urgently toward the forest. His rat-like face twitched as he glanced about, his beady eyes darting everywhere. "We are too exposed here."

They worked their way down the hill through the thick forest in the temple's direction. They slipped on mud and loose sticks as they descended the steep slope. As they neared the bottom, a large figure leapt out from behind a tree onto Brock and both Brock and the figure toppled several yards down the hill. The figure latched onto Brock's neck with a meaty hand and sought to strangle him.

Brock broke the hold and shoved the figure away. He jumped up, drawing an axe. He found himself facing Keleaf.

Keleaf pointed his sword at Brock's chest. "Are you ready to die yet, little man? I owe you for crushing my nose."

"I should have crushed your skull," said Brock.

The other three men reached them and stood watching.

"You'll see me again soon," said Keleaf. He grinned and backed away, pressing a rag to his nose.

"Another cowardly ambush?" said Brock. "I think not!" He hurled his axe at Keleaf's chest, but the big man had already ducked behind a tree. The axe stuck in the tree trunk, and Keleaf charged off through the underbrush.

"Bastard!" Brock growled, wrenching his axe from the wood. "I should give chase and put an end to him." However, he doubted he could match the speed harbored in Keleaf's long legs.

"We have no time or energy for that," said Wofar. "We need to secure our loot while the priests are out hunting."

"You'll get another chance at him, Brock," mused Vancas.

Soon the temple's huge bulk rose up before them amongst the trees, a dome made of dark, mossy stone blocks with the arms spouting from the top and reaching out above the forest. Rain poured off the dome in rivers.

Seketi pillars rose up here and there from the forest floor, most with headless corpses chained to them. Merged with the stench of decayed flesh was the stench of the sewers that ran beneath the temple and the earth around it.

The men gathered around a stone tunnel that led down to the sewers. The tunnel mouth was covered in a locked, badly rusted iron grating. Below that, a stone ladder was cut into the tunnel wall. The forest was quiet around them aside from the pounding rain, and no priests were visible near the temple walls.

"The priests have several entrances into the Gosarni," said Wofar. "The sewers are an easy way to move corpses and treasure to various locations. The temple itself is like a small city and is sure to be heavily guarded. I fear the best treasure is well beyond our reach, but we may find some worthy loot nonetheless. I suggest we sneak into the sewers, get what we can very quickly, and then get out."

"If we must," said Brock, frowning. "Yet I would prefer to try to get into the very heart of the temple itself."

Wofar's eyes widened. He glanced about wildly, as if Brock had spoken a curse that had summoned their doom. "It is not possible! We would never return from there. No, we must go where the corpses go. I assure you there will be as much fine loot as we can carry."

Vancas tapped the locked grating with his sword. His eyes were sullen and doubtful, as if he were having second thoughts about looting the temple. "Unless we can get past this barrier, we may have to settle for no loot at all."

Nunro glanced around nervously and then sought to pick the lock. He worked at it as the rain beat down on them and the others grew impatient. At last, he shook his head and slammed his tools to the ground. "It's too difficult."

Brock seized Nunro's shoulder and shoved him away from the grating. "What kind of rogue are you that you cannot pick a simple lock? If we smash this lock apart, the noise is sure to echo through the sewers and draw attention."

Nunro shrugged helplessly. "I can't do it."

Brock sighed, squatted down, and seized Nunro's tools. He worked at the lock for a time, shaking his head and muttering. At last, he stepped back. "The way is open," he said, tossing Nunro's tools back to him. "Though I fear I may have unlocked a path to one of the seven hells."

Nunro's eyes widened. "How did you manage it?"

Brock ignored him, and the men pulled the granting open. They worked at it slowly, but the rusted hinges on both sides of the grating squeaked loudly every inch of the way. Finally they just yanked it open quickly.

Vancas took jerky from his pack and tore into it with his teeth. Then he gulped water from a flask. "Better eat now," he said. "Unless you can stomach the stench below. And this might be our last meal."

The others ate and drank their fill, and then climbed below. Their packs were soaked, but Wofar had secured a lantern and some oil from the wagons. They managed to get it lit. A stone tunnel stretched away into the darkness, in the temple's direction. A walkway allowed them to stay out of the murky water that passed under stone beyond the entrance to some unseen end.

Not far along the tunnel, they encountered heaps of bloated animal carcasses, crawling with rats. The stench overwhelmed them.

"Remains of animal sacrifices," said Wofar, his eyes shining in the lantern light. "Unlike humans, the animals have it lucky. They are slain and forgotten, their suffering ended with their lives."

Rats scurried past them, squeaking loudly in the tunnel. One nibbled at Brock's boot and he kicked it away into the sludge.

They encountered storage rooms containing only empty crates and barrels, but then they found one that held three large brass chests. Wofar's eyes lit up greedily and he moved toward the entrance, but Nunro grabbed his arm and held him back.

"Let go of me, you fat oaf!" growled Wofar. "I see treasure in there."

Nunro pointed into the room. "There are tiny holes in the walls. Can't you see them? Something isn't right."

The others squinted in the lantern light, but couldn't see what Nunro had spotted. "A trap, no doubt," said Brock, "which explains why the chests stand unguarded. They are most likely empty."

"But what if they aren't?" said Wofar, his voice growing louder. "What if we're passing up a wondrous opportunity?"

Vancas seized Wofar from behind and laid his sword to Wofar's neck. "You talk in a whisper, friend, or I'll slice you quick and leave you to rot in the stink. I won't have my head claimed for some vile purpose because of an idiot who spouts drool at the sight of something shiny. Do you understand me?"

"Yes, I understand," Wofar said, his eyes showing their whites.

Vancas shoved him away. Wofar grimaced and rubbed his throat, gazing anywhere but at Vancas. When he pulled his hand away, it was smeared with blood from a shallow cut.

More rats surged fearlessly around their feet and tried to climb their legs. They hacked a few of them into ruin and kicked the rest into the river of filth. The tunnel split in two and they choose one randomly.

Soon they came across a storage room with a locked iron door. Nunro was able to pick the lock this time, and in the small chamber beyond they found some trunks containing fancy clothing and expensive jewelry.

Wofar sniffed the clothing. "These haven't yet picked up the stench of the sewers. This is the type of loot you won't usually find in a Gosarni, but since the priests are out in large numbers seeking victims, there could be many such treasures down here in storage rooms. We must keep searching!"

"You took too much loot, Wofar," said Nunro, who had only secured himself a small article of clothing. Wofar's pack and pockets were bulging.

Wofar sneered at him and tapped the floor with his sword. "So the little coward dares speak his mind. Well, you have no value to us, so don't complain."

"Nunro deserves his share," said Brock.

Nunro's face turned crimson. "Yes, I am a coward. I don't deny that. My very blood quivers in terror right now. But I have nothing, Wofar. Once we escape, _if_ we escape, I'll need something to barter with so I can put food in my belly."

"Your belly is fat enough as it is," said Wofar.

Nunro's hand trembled on the hilt of his sword.

Brock stepped close to Wofar, and flipped an axe into the air. "If you don't give some of that to Nunro, you'll have me to deal with."

With a curse, Wofar tossed some of the loot to Nunro.

They moved on. The tunnel ended at a large stone door, which bore no lock or handle. Brock studied the walls and floor carefully in the lantern light, searching for a trigger that would open the door. At last, grunting with disgust, Brock stepped into the murky waters and probed them with his feet. He felt a short lever beneath the surface. "Of course they'd have to hide it in the filth," he said.

The others exchanged tense glances. "Are you sure we should go through with this?" said Vancas.

"When this door opens," said Brock, "we could be facing anything. This lever could even trigger a trap."

"Maybe we should leave!" said Nunro, who was shaking from head to toe. "I...I think we've gained enough loot."

"I tend to agree," said Vancas.

"We must go farther!" Wofar insisted. "I'm certain we can gain more treasure, and much better loot than what we've found thus far. There are too many priests out and about to guard every minor chamber in these sewers."

Vancas stepped toward Brock, his face grim. "Let it be. I say we turn back while we still can. We can always deal with these priests later."

"Flee if you must," said Brock. He motioned back along the tunnel and waited, giving Vancas and Nunro time to gain distance, but neither moved. With a shrug, Brock kicked the lever. A loud grating noise arose and the door slid up to reveal two hooded priests with curved blades, who were already in motion.

One priest leapt for Brock with such speed the dwarf nearly lost his scalp. As Brock ducked, the hook blade passed over his head so closely he could almost feel its coldness. Brock swung an axe at the priest's head, but the priest stepped back and dodged the blow. Meanwhile, the other priest leapt for Nunro, only to have Vancas' sword meet his blade before it could cut Nunro down.

Brock's foe drove his hook blade down in a vicious stroke that might have cut the dwarf in two from head to toe. But Brock sidestepped it and chopped off the priest's hand at the wrist. A cry escaped from beneath the hood, and the priest tried to swing his heavy blade one-handed. But the swing was too slow and Brock easily avoided it. He slammed his axe into the priest's skull to finish him.

Brock whirled around, to see the other priest skewered on Vancas' blade. Wofar had plunged his own sword into the priest's back. Nunro was crouched against the tunnel wall, his hand over his face and his sword dangling uselessly.

The torch-lit chamber beyond the doorway was empty of foes, but a gruesome sight awaited them. Black, metallic pillars filled the room, with human heads perched atop them. Some of the heads had such thin, pale flesh on them they seemed to be little more than skulls. Rune-covered brass pipes ran from the pillars up into the stone ceiling. Tables stood here and there with headless corpses atop them and strange bloodstained tools.

"By the seven hells!" Brock growled.

Vancas' eyes smoldered with rage and disgust.

Nunro moaned and covered his eyes.

Wofar laughed quietly. "I told you men about this. The heads still live. They feed the gluttonous belly of the temple."

They entered the room, and Brock gazed up at one of the skull-like human heads. Its eyes rolled around its sunken sockets and its thin lips moved. Brock's own face had paled. "We must put an end to this madness!"

Another stone door, on the far side of the room, slid up, and an ancient priest stepped into the chamber. He pulled a lever and the door lowered back into place. His hood was thrown back, revealing a wrinkled face bearing black metal plating on his cheeks and forehead. He also bore metallic claws on his fingertips. In one leathery hand he held a human head. When he laid eyes on Brock and the others, his expression didn't change. He placed the head on a table and approached them.

Brock prepared to hurl his axe, but his curiosity stayed his hand. The priest seemed about to speak.

"Greetings," the old priest said, smiling. "Have you come to learn of the greatness of Callaharn, or simply to loot my temple? I am the high priest of this Gosarni." He motioned to the severed heads. "And these are my children."

"The...the high priest?" stammered Wofar. He gasped and fled from the room. Moments later, the stone door lowered back into place.

Brock cursed. "That dog has trapped us in here!"

"I should have killed him," said Vancas.

The priest stepped closer to them. "Your companion will not get far. The forest is filled with my hunters, and they shall return with his head in due time."

"It's your head that will soon be free of its neck," said Brock. He spat on the floor in disgust. "And then I'll free these victims of their torment."

"You cannot slay me," said the high priest, still smiling. "I bind this temple together, and without my guidance, it would fall into ruin. I knew you were in here. This Gosarni is practically alive, sensing everything. Thieves never return from these halls, but they are a blessing when they come to us. You bring gifts for Callaharn. Your heads will feed the temple so that power from the stars can be captured. That power transforms us, gives us strength far beyond that of any mortal. With the stars aligned to grant ultimate power, we must have more minds to feed energy to the Gosarni."

"So that explains why so many priests are seeking heads," said Brock. "You bring suffering to others just to satisfy your greed for power."

The priest frowned. "No, that would be immoral. We do it in honor of Callaharn. Once, Callaharn was a noble sorcerer who brought great healing to the land. But he was weak and incomplete. In his arrogance, he sought to tame the demonic energies that no mortal can conquer, and they merged with him and enslaved him, and he became something greater--the Callaharn whose spirit we worship now. He is a god to us, and he is all that matters in life."

Brock hesitated, sensing that the priest was harboring great power in his ancient body. But before he could form an attack plan, Vancas hurled himself at the high priest. He moved with astonishing speed, his sword driving toward the old man's throat. But the high priest batted the sword aside easily with a clawed hand, and it clattered to the stone floor. The high priest seized Vancas by the throat and lifted him.

"You have great skill," said the high priest.

"Brock!" Vancas grunted, as he struggled to break free. "I am a spy for Lord Holnon. Tell him of this place, and he will send soldiers to deal with these--"

The high priest ripped Vancas' heart from his chest and devoured it. Then he turned toward Brock, grinning with pointed, bloodstained teeth. Nunro wailed in despair and crouched behind a pillar. With a roar, Brock charged the high priest, swinging an axe at his skull. The priest batted the axe from Brock's hand and caught him by the throat. He lifted Brock into the air.

"You're a strange man," the high priest said. "You seem to have the blood of the stone cutters within you, the little folk from the hills and dark marshes. You have a strong mind, and I thank you for bringing me such a fine gift."

Brock drew another axe and swung viciously at the high priest's head, but the priest blocked the blow with his arm. The high priest pressed his clawed hand against Brock's heart. Then he gasped, fresh blood running from his mouth. Nunro stood behind him, his sword lodged in the high priest's back.

The high priest tried to turn, and Brock slammed his axe down on the metal-plated forehead. The plating split in two along with the high priest's skull. He released Brock and stood swaying, blood pouring down his shocked face. "I go now to my lord Callaharn," he whispered, "where my power will grow tenfold. I may return yet again..." He toppled to the floor and lay still in a crimson pool.

Brock gazed down at the priest for a moment, chills breaking out all over his flesh. Then he motioned to Nunro. "Help me free these heads of the pillars, and then we'll be on our way. I've had enough of this place."

Together, they ended the suffering around them. The heads were attached to the pillars by clusters of thin black wires that were easy to sever, and soon all the pillars stood barren. After that, by axe and sword they did the gruesome work of making sure the heads could never again be revived.

Brock searched the high priest's rope and found nothing. Cursing, he stuffed some bloodstained tools into his pack. Brock pulled a lever that was in plain site, and they stepped out into the tunnel.

Wofar lay dead in the sludge, with Keleaf standing over him holding a dripping sword. The big man pointed the blade at Brock. "Now it is your turn," he said. "But the fat man stays out of it. It's our business."

"Fine by me," growled Brock. He sheathed his axe. "Throw down that sword, Keleaf, and we shall handle this like men!"

Keleaf nodded and tossed the sword onto dry stone. He motioned to Brock. "Come and face me, little man. Right here in the filth."

Brock seized Nunro's arm. "Stay out of this, no matter what." Then, his face breaking into a broad grin, he leapt into the stinking waters.

The two men traded blows, and Keleaf quickly got the better of Brock, landing a glancing blow to Brock's scalp that drove the dwarf to his knees. Keleaf charged in to finish it, but Brock rolled out of the way and jumped to his feet.

Keleaf came in swinging, his eyes smoldering with hatred, but Brock caught him with a massive uppercut to the chin while seizing Keleaf's tunic. Even as Keleaf's head rocked back, Brock yanked him forward and drove a crushing blow into his ribs. Keleaf fell facedown in the sludge and lay still.

Brock stepped up onto the walkway. "Let's be off."

"But he might drown," said Nunro, pointing at Keleaf.

"Good," said Brock, and he walked away.

***

Fortunately for Brock, it was still raining when they emerged from the tunnel. The grime that covered him was quickly washed away.

"Where shall we go now?" said Nunro.

"I'm going to meet with Lord Holnon," said Brock, "and do what Vancas requested of me."

"Do you need a companion?" said Nunro.

"No," said Brock. "Go somewhere and learn an honest trade."

"But I'm starting to become a worthy rogue," said Nunro. "You could use a companion like me. We could grow wealthy together. I feel more confident than I've ever felt before."

"I don't doubt that," said Brock, walking away.

"But what about you?" said Nunro. "Are you going to give up adventuring and learn an honest trade? Are you going to take your own damn advice?!"

Brock said nothing. He wondered who the stone cutters were of the hills and dark marshes that the high priest had spoken of. He wished he could have kept the ancient man alive to question him.

"Are you going to answer me?" Nunro called after him. He cursed.

Brock continued on in silence. Soon he was lost amidst the trees.

End.

### The author's website:

www.robertekeller.net
