Michael Williams - Before the Mask

A long silence filled the night air, then the mace whined and sputtered in his hand. /

You still do not trust me. But very well. Look to the battlements.

Verminaard pivoted in the saddle and looked back toward Castle Nidus. He saw a dark form trooping on the moonlit wall, in the blood-red glow of Lunitari.

Who is it? he asked. Who is it, Lady?

Why, 'tis you, my dear, the Voice exulted. 'Tis you, to all mortal eyes. For whoever told you that Cerestes had but one form, one countenance? He rules with your face and voice, and with my magic. It is a pattern of things to come.

Verminaard smiled malevolently.

I am confirmed, Lady. I am assured past disbelief.

Good, the Voice prompted as Castle Nidus vanished into the swiftly falling darkness. This is no time for questions and fears. Depart like a man to arrive like a man.

West from Nidus, a single night's ride on the well-traveled Jelek Road took Verminaard to Jelek itself. He skirted the town to the south, then veered west over the farthest stretch of Taman Busuk, toward Estwilde and the easternmost Solamnic outposts. Armed only with his mace, guided by the stars and the Voice and the scattered auguries of the rune stones, he carried but seven days' worth of waybread, certain that the week's end would find him in East Borders, safe in the house of his father.

And when he arrived there…

Well, the Voice would tell him what to do, what to say. And how to demand his rights from the father he had seen only once, gray and distant beyond an arching bridge.

Verminaard traveled by night, hooded and cloaked against the wind and masked from curious eyes. He traveled swiftly as well. Orlog was tireless and fluid beneath him, erasing the miles as though he were winged. Those who met them on the road-the caravans to Sanction and the pilgrims to Gargath and Godshome, the patrols and the solitary travelers bound for more private destinations-all wondered whether someone had passed their camps indeed, dark and flying toward the western horizon, or whether the night and the wind and the shifting clouds had conspired to form a dream of a rider, cloaked in black, astride an enormous black stallion.

Through five long nights, Verminaard spoke only to himself and to the Voice arising from the mace. He muttered in the saddle as Orlog rushed past the outskirts of Jelek and into the gray foothills north of the ruins of Godshome, then north again through the narrow, rubble-strewn pass of Chaktamir, site of a Solamnic victory a full century ago, and down to the rocky, forbidding borders of Estwilde.

Estwilde was a stark country, a place of vast and desolate stretches, seldom touched by rain and even less frequently by mild and temperate winds. Verminaard rode on tirelessly, and his vision in the cave of the gods returned to him as he rode-how he flew on the proud, enormous beast, its broad back thick and striated with powerful muscles…

And he was sure that this was the moment that the vision had foretold, the tale of the young man returning to claim his inheritance.

Early the sixth morning, horse and rider rested on a rocky rise overlooking East Borders. Orlog grazed wearily while Verminaard stretched in the short, crisp grass and peered down at the distant castle.

The castle was where the Voice had told him, set on a knoll in the midst of a wide and barren plain, prime country for the huntsmen and a good vantage against approaching armies.

And yet East Borders itself was a simple motte and bailey that looked modest, almost meager compared to the lofty battlements and the four towers of Castle Nidus. Verminaard had hoped for something more grand and daunting, and for a moment, he suspected he had lost his way, only to stumble on the moat house of some petty noble or bandit chieftain, misplaced and forgotten in the middle of Estwilde.

But it was Laca's castle, all right. He could tell by the insignia on the banners: the silver kingfisher of the Solam-nic Order, fluttering side by side with the black dragon and white lance of Family Dragonbane.

"This is my home," he whispered uncertainly.

This is your possession, the Voice corrected, its inflections soft and urgent and musical. Ride down and claim it.

The mace quivered in his hand, and a strange, unbidden confidence surged through him.

"So be it," he whispered. "East Borders is mine."

Verminaard wrapped the cloak about him tightly as he rode toward the castle. The old black garment was showing its inadequacy from the hard and inclement ride. Frayed and tattered, it offered little protection from the cold southern breezes, and the young rider shivered in the saddle.

He had never thought they would come to meet him.

The gate of Laca's castle opened in the morning gray-ness, and five men rode forth beneath the standard of Dragonbane. Crossing the drawbridge and the outer ditch, they spread out on the plain and approached, each of them armed with the short cavalry spears favored by the mountain armies. Helmets and aventails masked their faces, and they were bundled against the cold wind as well, but from the silver kingfishers on their breastplates, Verminaard could tell that they were members of the Solamnic Order and therefore splendid fighters.

Well, I shall speak with them, he thought. Tell them who I am and demand escort to Lord Laca himself.

Speak? the Voice taunted. Do you think they have come to speak? They stand between you and your inheritance1.

The mace lurched in his hand, flickering with a sudden ebony glow. Before he could protest or speak or even think otherwise, Verminaard found himself pulled by the weapon toward the standard-bearer, the centermost man in the rank. It was as though Nightbringer called him to battle, and he was impelled to answer.

He remembered Aglaca's words in the deepest chambers of Nightbringer's cave: If you choose this, you'll forget that you can ever choose again.

The standard-bearer reined in his horse and stopped on the level plain, his banner uplifted in the time-honored Solamnic sign of truce and parley. Verminaard rode to meet him, Nightbringer lowered and set across the front of the saddle, so that none of the Solamnics could see how tightly he gripped the weapon. He guided Orlog to the side of the standard-bearer, a green-eyed, freckled youth with red hair. The lad stared at Verminaard nervously, intently, and his fingers twitched on the banner pole.

Nightbringer made the decision. Heedlessly, so quickly that Verminaard thought it was his own arm, his own doing, the mace flashed in the air and shrieked into the side of the man's head.

In a crash of bone and metal, the standard-bearer hurtled from his horse. The other knights wheeled and galloped toward the black-robed invader.

Verminaard glanced about. He was encircled-trapped in the midst of four charging knights. Orlog whinnied nervously and bucked, but the Voice in the mace soothed horse and rider.

What if there are four? Would four men have daunted Lord Soth? My champions of a thousand, two thousand years ago? Fret not, Lord Verminaard, for I am with you, and your mace is the comfort I send.

Verminaard smiled and faced the first of the oncoming enemy.

The knight bent low in the saddle, couching the short spear in a jouster's attack. He charged, and Verminaard twisted as the spear tore through the folds of his black cape. Spinning with a raw, awkward power, Verminaard brought the mace thundering down upon the back of the passing knight, who slumped over his horse in a flood of black light and fell soundlessly to the dry plain.

Three left, the Voice proclaimed. They'll come at you one by one, for honor's sake. Three, and the castle is yours.

The next knight approached, circling and menacing like a Nerakan cavalryman, the short spear jabbing the air, waiting for an opening. The other two hung back, veiled spectators at the edge of sight. With a roar, Verminaard spurred Orlog toward the defiant man, who raised the spear and hurled it.