Vaughn Heppner - Assassin of the Damned

A lycanthrope howled again. The knight grumbled, but I couldn’t hear his actual words.

I stretched out on a gray boulder. Fifty feet down the lycanthropes in humanoid form crouched forlornly like primitives, with their long arms wrapped around their knees. The black knight crunched across sand as he paced back and forth. He carried his triangular shield and morningstar. Erasmo-

I saw the hole, the dug up sand and dirt around it. Erasmo must have squeezed into the hole. With all these quakes, didn’t he fear cave-ins?

The lycanthropes rocked to-and-fro. One whined.

“Quiet,” the knight said.

“We must leave,” whined the lycanthrope.

“Soon,” the knight said.

“Not soon,” the lycanthrope said. “He will never find it, never. We must leave.”

The knight kept pacing.

The lycanthrope lifted his head and howled.

Did I wait until Erasmo climbed out of the hole or did I go in after him? Why did it always have to be about holes and caves? I might try to hit Erasmo with a stone as he emerged. Could I trust the others to just sit there and wait? The lycanthropes might catch my scent. The black knight had supernatural senses.

I selected a stone and hurled it high and long. It was a simple stratagem. I counted on their fear, their hatred of this place. The stone hit with a thud.

“What was that?” a lycanthrope cried.

“The wizard said this world was dead,” whined the other.

“Quit jawing about it,” the knight said, “and follow me.”

The lycanthropes scrambled to their feet and slunk after the knight. Whatever else Signor Orlando was, he was brave. He clanked in a determined stride, his shield ready and the spiked ball of his morningstar swinging from side to side.

I had little time and couldn’t afford to expose myself long. Anyone of them might glance back. To work down the boulder and the escarpment would take too long. I judged the hole, and I knew I was mad. It must have been this world.

I jumped, plummeted and landed soundlessly. As a normal man, I would have at least broken an ankle and probably thudded in an inelegant sprawl. My Darkling-sight showed me that this was more than a gopher-like hole. The opening revealed a cave. I hesitated because of it. Then I spied torchlight as if it flickered off a cave wall. I drew my knife and dashed in for the kill.

***

I heard fingernails scratch rock. I heard grunts and hard breathing.

“You’ve got to be here, you whore,” Erasmo said low under his breath. The words echoed in the cave. “All the signs…the portents…. You’re here. I know it.”

I nodded. Erasmo had always been impatient.

The cave trembled. Sand rained from the low ceiling. A dislodged stone from the ceiling struck my neck. It made my gut clench with terror so it was hard to keep going. A second later, the digging resumed. That helped unlock me, although I found it impossible to rush in. The best I could manage was a slinking shuffle.

Unlike our boyhood treasure hunt, this time Erasmo dug. Would he have become a crazed sorcerer if my axe hadn’t chopped his foot? Yet a ruined foot wasn’t reason enough to push a man to these extremes. What had urged Erasmo to stake down his own father? Why had his father been here with him?

“Where are you-” Erasmo grew silent as the scratching quit. A wild laugh tore out of his throat.

Now was the moment. I glided around rock.

Erasmo had dug into the side of the cave. The end of his torch was thrust into sand. It flickered and shadows jumped and writhed on the walls. He knelt and tugged at something in the hole.

“Need some help?” I asked.

He looked up wild-eyed, noticed my dagger and licked his lips in his obscene manner.

“Gian!” he said. “I can bring you back to life again. I can break the Moon Lady’s hold over you.”

“But can you restore my dignity?”

He laughed nervously. “If you join me, I can make you a god.”

“You wear my likeness,” I said. “You’ve stained my good name by being me. How can you restore that?”

He brought his hands out of the hole. “We used to be friends.”

“Where’s Laura? Tell me, and I’ll make your passing quick.”

“Gian,” he said, and he eased his right hand upward.

I lunged. He twisted like an eel and hurled himself back. My knife sliced his shoulder. He screamed. Smoke billowed. And the amulet on his chest flared with brilliance. I’m not certain what happened next. His back thudded against a wall. The flame within his black amulet, the flickering tip, zeroed in on me. I leaped after him and a flash blew me backward. At least, that’s what I thought at first. Then I saw the living flame. It had legs, arms and a fire head. It sizzling self lit up the small confines of the cave and poured heat. It was smaller than me, and it watched with eyes that shined like the sun. It blocked me from my old friend.

I made ready to stab the living flame. It took a step at me and raised fiery arms.

“Hold,” Erasmo told it. “Gian, drop the knife. Kneel, and give me fealty, and I’ll let you live.”

I flung a stone, one of several that I carried in a pouch. It lifted a lock of his hair and clicked against the cave wall behind him.

Erasmo shifted behind the flame. “Don’t you understand?” he shouted. “I’m a Lord of Night. If I say the word, my flame will destroy you.”

“You had me chained to an altar,” I said. “You stabbed me in the guts. But I’ll always keep coming. I’m remorseless as death.”

“Lay down your knife and I’ll give you life again,” he said. “I’ll give you Laura, your children.”

“Where are they?”

“In a safe place. But you have to kneel now , Gian. Pitch your knife to where I can see it. I’m losing patience.”

“You’re playing for time,” I said. “You’re hoping the black knight will save you, the lycanthropes.”

Erasmo peered around the flame’s shoulder. I faked a throw. Erasmo ducked like a ferret. I laughed and the flame cackled brighter, angrily, it seemed.

“Don’t do that again,” Erasmo said, “or I’ll unleash the flame. He’ll burn you to death. I don’t want that, Gian. I want your help. I know you don’t believe me, but I wish to learn about the Moon Lady. You can tell me things I don’t know about her.”

“What did you promise your father?” I asked.

“…That was a mistake. I admit it, although if you knew the circumstances, you’d realize I had no choice.”

“No. We can always turn from evil. Fight me, Erasmo. Wash away your guilt with your blood. It will be like old times, just you and me in the sand arena. You always wanted to be a knight. Now is your chance to die like one.”

“You fool. Don’t you understand what would happen to you if you actually won? The door to our Earth would close. You’d be trapped here. Doomed. I’ve opened the door with spells that took years to learn. The Moon Lady sent you after me, but she doesn’t care if you survive. You’re a javelin she has hurled at me. I’m your path to life. Or do you want to die on this dead world?”

I leaped at the living flame, smashed my shoulder against it. The flame staggered back. It had weight like a man. My garments smoldered from the contact. Then I was past it. Unfortunately, its flames blurred my vision. I stabbed at Erasmo, felt flesh part and heard him groan. Then flaming hands latched onto my shoulders and heaved. I sailed and smashed against rock.

The cave trembled then-from a comet, not from me. Sand and stones rained down. Before I could scramble up, the flame aimed its clenched fists. Fire licked upon me. I bellowed in agony and my flesh bubbled, and I tried to crawl away. Through a haze of pain and dazzling brightness, I spotted Erasmo. He clutched his smoking side as blood dripped between his fingers. He spoke a harsh word. The living flame turned from me. I groaned at the pain, at the throb of my fried flesh. Erasmo spoke again. The flame leaped at him, dwindled and sank into the black gem, which I realized had been dark during the fight. Now a flame flickered in the gem as it angrily watched me.