Philip Athans - Scream of Stone

Pristoleph pushed her away, though gently. She never let her eyes leave his.

You’re right , the old woman told her. Phyrea didn’t look over Pristoleph’s shoulder. She knew she’d see the apparition on the roof behind him. You’re right about everything. What would he do, I wonder, if you threw yourself off the roof right now? Haven’t you thought about that? I know you have. Just step off into-

“Nothing,” Phyrea whispered, shaking her head. “Into thin air.”

No , the old woman said, a pleading quality to her thin voice, into our tender embrace. Into the arms of the only family you have left .

Pristoleph looked at her with narrowed eyes under a knitted brow and Phyrea forced herself to turn away from him.

“I don’t understand,” he said.

She wiped a tear from her eye, and said, “You don’t have to … Ransar Pristoleph.”

She hoped he smiled at her, but she didn’t turn to look.

3 Alturiak, the Year of the Tankard (1370 DR)

THIRD QUARTER, INNARLITH

Devorast paused to let a wagon laden with empty crates rattle past him. He didn’t turn to watch it go and only those few missed steps showed he was aware of its passing at all. When it was out of his way he strode forward, as tall and straight, as confident as always.

The thing that once was Willem Korvan put a hand up on the rough bricks of the tannery, letting only one side of his desiccated face break the plane of the corner, only one dry, stinging eye on his prey.

No, the undead creature thought, not prey. Not yet.

Devorast turned a corner and disappeared from sight. Willem had to look both ways, up and down the dark, quiet street. With middark fast approaching, the streets of the Third Quarter were quiet and all but empty. He watched the wagon trundle off around a curve in the street, and there were no other signs of life. Candles and hearth-fires lit a few of the second story windows, but no faces appeared. No one looked down into the deserted street so late at night.

Willem stepped out from the ink-black alley and crossed the street as fast as he could-in six long strides.

Each footfall sent a stab of pain up from the soles of his feet, through his legs, and into the still, hollow place in his chest where his heart once beat. He hadn’t grown accustomed to the pain. Every twinge and jab, every throb and ache, nettled and angered him, reminded him of a time when he could walk without it, speak without it, think without it-but that’s all the memory of that time he had.

There were glimpses of faces, dim recollections of desires and ambitions, but all that had been eclipsed, overwhelmed, swallowed up by a single compulsion: to serve his master. And through all that, like a mountain stream through canyons and valleys, ran the pain.

When he looked around the corner of the vacant building Devorast had disappeared behind, Willem saw his prey-no, not prey, he reminded himself again, not yet-crossing the more narrow street several yards ahead. The sound of people laughing, of stories and jokes told too loudly, assaulted his ears. The pain bounced around in his head and he closed his eyes, riding a wave of rage that burned itself out quickly in his dead, defeated spirit.

Devorast went into a tavern, and Willem rushed behind him as fast as his stiff knees would allow. He slipped into a side street when he heard footsteps approach, and while he listened to another man open the tavern door, releasing another wave of voices and-something else … music? — he turned into an alley. Rats scattered at his approach and one, foolish and brave, perhaps mind-addled with rabies, stopped to hiss at him as he passed. He came around to the back of the tavern then moved to a window that looked out onto the alley on one side.

The sound, strange and alluring-the sound of music-made him blink. He remembered the song but not its name. He liked that song-or he remembered liking it, remembered, vaguely, a time when he was able to form opinions of that kind: like, dislike, love … hate he could still feel. Hate and blind obedience.

He saw Devorast in the tavern, surrounded by happy, living people-happy even though they were simple tradesmen-and Willem reveled in his hatred. It was his hatred that sustained him like the air that used to fill the lungs, which had gone still and empty in his chest.

“Devorast,” he whispered, and touched a cold finger to the colder glass. “My friend …”

Devorast approached a table and two men-no, one man and a dwarf-stood to greet him with smiles. He embraced the dwarf in a way that even the dead version of Willem Korvan couldn’t believe he’d ever have seen from Ivar Devorast. The dwarf was a spectacle-all hair and grime and the drying crust of stale mead. But they smiled and they embraced.

The other man-Willem recognized him, but the name was distant and unavailable to him-patted Devorast on the back and they sat. The man Willem couldn’t remember held up a hand and a barmaid approached with a tray. A man at another table grabbed at her behind as she passed but she didn’t notice. Laughter followed.

The music came from a table in the back upon which sat an old man cradling a yarting. Willem closed his eyes and let the music hammer at his ears. He tried to hear what Devorast said to the dwarf and the alchemist-that’s right, Willem realized, that’s the alchemist-but he couldn’t hear. His head throbbed in time with the music and a pain struck him, as though someone had driven a lance through his right calf.

He had pains like that from time to time and had imagined that they were either memories of wounds he’d forgotten in the past, or premonitions of injuries to come.

He imagined that because the truth, that he was rotting and when you rot, it hurts, wasn’t something he could think about and remain even as sane as he was. If he let himself understand what had truly happened to him, and what was happening to him with every passing moment, he would become the monster Marek Rymut had made him.

If he tried to remember that he was Willem Korvan, he would serve the Thayan as long as he had to until he was finally ordered to kill Ivar Devorast, then he would set himself on fire, throw himself from the top of the Palace of Many Spires, or sink himself into the deepest part of the Lake of Steam.

He’d been dead for over a year, but he still had something to live for.

15 Ches, the Year of the Unstrung Harp (1371 DR)

THE PALACE OF MANY SPIRES, INNARLITH

Pristoleph had lost count of the number of gold trade bars he’d had delivered to the Thayan Enclave in the year he spent holding the Palace of Many Spires hard under siege. The streets around the palace were lined with barricades. Shops and inns had been closed for so long the smarter and wealthier of the owners had since relocated to the edges of the Second Quarter and the less foresighted and more under-funded had simply wandered off, leaving everything behind.

The wemics, surprisingly enough, hadn’t participated in any of the looting. That seemed an entirely human affair. Pristoleph, watching from a commandeered building across the street, a high-class brothel he’d made his command center, sent a daily missive by magical sending to Ransar Salatis, who remained holed up in his palace first for days, then tendays, then months, but the only return he ever got was a single prayer to some god Pristoleph had never heard of followed by a very rude suggestion as to where he should store his ambitions. The note had made Pristoleph laugh.

“It is an abomination,” the wemic, Second Chief Gahrzig, growled. “We cannot be compelled to war at its side.”