Philip Athans - Scream of Stone

By the time they’d climbed the many flights of stairs to the upper reaches of the palace, Pristoleph felt as though he was walking in a dream. Everywhere they should have met resistance, they found nothing. No arrows, crossbow bolts, or gouts of magical flame came from any of the well-concealed murder holes, and no acid-spitting black firedrakes manned the various blind spots in curving stairways designed for just such an ambush. They arrived at the doors to the ransar’s bedchamber entirely unmolested.

Pristoleph stood before the doors with the undead creature on his left side and Gahrzig on his right. He looked at the wemic, who only shrugged. Neither of them were entirely sure how to proceed, though Pristoleph had envisioned that moment for months, if not years.

Not sure why he was doing it even as his hand came up, Pristoleph knocked on the door.

“Enter, Ransar,” came a voice from within. The voice was deep, and seemed to rumble from the space beyond the carved mahogany door like thunder. It was not Salatis’s voice.

Pristoleph opened the door and the wemics all tensed.

The large room was filled with men in armor as black as their hair. They looked so much alike they could have all been brothers. They were armed, but their swords were sheathed, and their spears were held point-down. When Pristoleph stepped into the room they went down on one knee in such perfect unison the genasi thought they must have practiced it for days-and maybe they had.

One of them didn’t kneel. though. He stepped forward.

“I am Captain Olin,” the black firedrake said, and Pristoleph recognized his voice as the man who’d bid him enter.

“Captain Olin,” Pristoleph said, “are you prepared to surrender?”

The black firedrake smiled in the way parents smile at children who ask where babies come from. He stepped aside and motioned to the floor. The rest of the black-haired, dusky-skinned men parted to reveal the twisted wreckage of a man lying on the scorched wood floor. Only then did the stench of burned flesh assault his nostrils. The wemics behind him grunted and backed away a step, but Pristoleph stepped forward.

Salatis lay on the floor, melted from the neck down, his head left unscathed by acid so that he could be recognized. A little orange light played around the edges of what was either flesh or some leather strap across the dead man’s chest. Pristoleph bent over the corpse, the black firedrakes stepping farther back to give him room. He played a fingertip across the smoldering line and drew away a lick of fire the size of a candle flame. He let it burn from the tip of his finger, and thrilled at the subtle warmth of it. He held it up so that the black-armored guards could see it burn but cause no injury to his half-elemental flesh.

“I claim the palace,” he said. “I claim the title Ransar of Innarlith.”

The black firedrakes, still kneeling, bowed their heads, and Captain Olin took a knee.

“We serve the ransar,” the captain said.

The wemics let up a warbling ululation, but the black firedrakes stayed on one knee until Ransar Pristoleph told them to stand.

“You,” he told the hooded undead, “take this back to your master”-he indicated the liquefied corpse of Salatis-“and give him my thanks.”

The undead creature shuffled forward and did as it was told.

14 Tarsakh, the Year of the Unstrung Harp (1371 DR)

THE CANAL SITE

Excuse me, sir,” the stout Innarlan man with the mud-hardened trousers said, his tattered wool cap in his hands.

Surero looked up and scratched his beard. He’d had it for months, but still wasn’t used to it.

“Sir?” the man repeated.

Surero nudged Ivar Devorast with an elbow to the ribs and whispered, “He means you, Lord Ditchdigger.”

Devorast stopped his steady rhythmic shoveling and looked up at the man, twelve feet up the side of the trench from him. He squinted into the sun and blinked a few times, but otherwise waited to hear what the man had to say.

The man cleared his throat and looked both ways as though afraid of passing carts. He opened his mouth to speak then seemed to think better of it. He set his cap on the edge of the trench and climbed down to the level where Surero and Devorast dug.

“You’re him, all right,” the man said in a voice that made it plain he was holding back a laugh or some other expression of joy. Surero stood, leaning on his shovel, also working to keep a smile off his face. “They said not to say anything, and I swear by whatever god looks after people who dig holes in the ground that no one will hear your name from these lips.”

Devorast nodded and said, “Thank you, Mister …?”

“No mister, anyway, sir,” the man replied, embarrassed. “My name is Fador, and I’m pleased to make your acquaintance.”

“What can we do for you?” Surero asked, startling Fador, who looked at him as though just then noticing someone else was there.

“Um, well …” he started, forcing his attention back to Devorast. “Little Lord H”-as the men had come to call Horemkensi-“he’s told us to use four inches of sand instead of eight from now on as it’s takin’ too long using eight inches and he wants us to build faster.”

Devorast shook his head, and Surero smiled when he saw no anger or even frustration there. It was as though Devorast had already fixed the problem that had been brought to him.

“It has to be eight inches,” he told Fador. “Tell everyone I said so.”

“But Little Lord H, sir …” Fador mumbled.

“He’ll never know,” Surero assured the man. “Likely as not he’s already forgotten the order.”

Fador smiled at that, still embarrassed. “But if we don’t build faster?”

Devorast started digging again and Surero realized that for him, at least, the conversation was over.

“The horses had to be reshod this month,” Surero said-the first thing that came to mind. Fador answered with a confused look. “If the horses all have to be reshod the work will slow, even if you used less sand.”

“But the horses are fine, Master …”

“Call me Orerus,” Surero replied. “Don’t actually reshod them, Fador, but your Little Lord H won’t know you didn’t, will he?”

Fador smiled and nodded. He looked back at Devorast and seemed anxious to say something else, but Devorast just went on digging.

“Thank you, Fador,” Surero said.

Fador nodded and scurried back up the trench wall, laughing.

“Well,” Surero said to Devorast when Fador was finally out of earshot, “I guess the word is spreading.”

Devorast, seeming to reply to an entirely different question, said, “The zombies won’t lie about horseshoes.”

Surero stood staring at Devorast, who went on digging for some time.

“The zombies …” the alchemist finally said, lifting his shovel to dig. “I’ve been thinking about that.”

3 Mirtul, the Year of the Unstrung Harp (1371 DR)

THE SISTERHOOD OF PASTORALS, INNARLITH

Surero didn’t mind standing in line with the rest of them for a bowl of soup and a crust of bread. It gave him a chance to look at Halina. She had changed since last he saw her, some four years before. She had aged, but in a way that flattered her. The tired, almost simpering girl had not so much hardened, but solidified-no, he thought, that is a terrible choice of words to describe a woman so beautiful.

“I’m sorry,” he said when finally he stepped in front of her, a dented pewter bowl in his hands.

She looked at him with a curious expression, as though she recognized but didn’t remember him.

“You have no need to apologize, Brother,” she told him. “The Great Mother smiles on all her-”