Марк Энтони - The Cataclysm

“Why do you want to know?” Michael asked, greatly daring.

The shadows deepened around him. He felt Soth’s anger, the anger of pride and arrogance at being questioned, his will thwarted. The knight controlled his anger, however, though Michael sensed it took great effort.

“These holy disks could be my salvation,” Soth stated.

“But how? If you don’t believe—”

“Let the gods prove themselves to me!” said the knight proudly. “Let them do so by lifting this curse and granting me freedom from my eternal torment!”

This is all wrong, Michael thought, confused and unhappy. Yet, in his words, I hear an echo of my own.

“The disks are in the great library,” said Nikol, seeing that Michael would not reply. “We would have gone to look for them, but the library is in peril from the mobs. We travel to the High Clerist’s Tower to warn the knights, that they may ride to Palanthas, quell this uprising, and restore peace and justice.”

To their horror and astonishment, Lord Soth began to laugh—terrible laughter that seemed to come from places of unfathomable darkness. “You have traveled far and seen many dreadful sights,” said the knight, “but you have yet to see the worst. I wish you luck!”

Turning the head of his wraithlike steed, he vanished into the shadows.

“My lord! What do you mean?” cried Nikol.

“He’s gone,” said Michael.

The darkness lifted from his heart; the icy chill of death retreated; the warmth of life flowed through his body.

“Let’s leave this place swiftly,” he said.

“Yes, I agree,” Nikol murmured.

She went to lift the waterskin, hesitated, loathe to touch it, fearful, perhaps, of the death’s knight return. Then, resolute, face pale, lips set, she picked it up. “He has been cruelly wronged,” she said, flashing Michael a glance, daring him to disagree.

He said nothing. The silence became a wall between them, separated them the rest of the way up the mountain.

The Tower of the High Clerist was an imposing structure, its central tower rising some one thousand feet into the air. Tall battlements, connected by a curtain wall, surrounded it. Michael had never seen any building this strong, this impregnable. He could now well believe the claim made by Nikol that the “tower had never fallen to an enemy while knights defended it with honor.”

Both stopped, stared at it, overcome with awe. “I have never been here,” said Nikol. The lingering horror of the meeting with the undead knight had faded; her lingering anger at Michael was all but forgotten. She gazed on the legendary stronghold with shining eyes. “My father described it to Nicholas and me often. I think I could walk it blindfolded. There is the High Lookout, there the Nest of the Kingfisher—the knight’s symbol. We planned to come here, Nicholas and I. He said a man was never truly a knight until he had knelt to pray in the chapel of the High Clerist’s Tower—”

She lowered her head, blinked back her tears. “You will kneel there for him,” said Michael. “Why?” she demanded, regarding him coldly. “Who will be there to listen?”

She walked up the broad, wide road that led to one of several entrances into the fortress. Michael followed after, troubled, uneasy. The tower was strangely quiet. No guards walked the battlements, as he might have expected. No lights shone from the windows, though the sun had long since sunk behind the mountains, bringing premature night to the tower and its environs.

Nikol, too, appeared to find this silence, this lack of activity odd, for she slowed her walk. Tilting back her head to try to see through the gloom, she started to hail the tower. Her call was cut off.

Cloaked and hooded figures surged out of the night. Skilled hands laid hold of Michael, swiftly relieved him of his staff, pinned his arms behind his back. He struggled in his captors’ grasp, not so much to free himself, since he knew that was impossible, but to try to keep sight of Nikol. She had disappeared behind a wall of bodies. He heard the ring of steel against steel.

“You are a prisoner of the Knights of Solamnia. Yield yourself,” said a harsh voice, speaking in the crude trade tongue.

“You lie!” Nikol cried, answering in Solamnic. “Since when do true knights move in the shadows and ambush people in the darkness?”

“We move in the dark because these are days of darkness” Another man approached, emerging from the gate leading into the High Clerist’s Tower. More men followed after him.

Torchlight flared, half blinding Michael. Its light shone on polished armor, steel helms, and, beneath the helms, the long, flowing moustaches that were the knights’ hallmark. One man, the one who’d answered Nikol, wore on his shoulder a ribbon. Once bright, it was now somewhat frayed and discolored. Michael had lived among knights long enough to recognize by this insignia a lord knight, one who commands in time of war.

“What have we here?”

“Spies, I believe, my lord,” answered one of Michael’s captors.

“Bring the torches closer. Let me take a look.”

Michael’s guard escorted him to the front. The knights were efficient, but not rough, according him a measure of respect even as they let him know who was in charge.

Nikol looked somewhat daunted at the sight of the lord knight, but she flushed angrily at the charge.

“We are not spies!” she said through clenched teeth. Remaining on guard, she used the flat of her blade to strike out at any who came near her.

The knights outnumbered her, could have taken her, but that would have meant unnecessary bloodshed. They glanced at the lord knight for orders.

He walked over to her, held the light to shine upon her. “Why, it is but a beardless youth, yet one who wields a sword with a man’s skill, it seems,” he added, looking at a companion who was wiping blood from a cut cheek. Frowning, he studied the sword in Nikol’s hand. The lord knight’s face hardened. “How did you come by such a weapon and this armor that belongs to a Knight of the Crown? Stolen from the body of a gallant knight, no doubt. If you thought to sell it to us for your own gain, you have made a mistake that will prove costly. You will end up paying—with your life!”

“I did not steal it! I carry it by—” Nikol paused. She had started to say she carried it by right, but the thought occurred to her that she did not have the right to bear the arms of a true knight. Flushing, she amended her words. “My father is Sir David of Whitsund, now deceased. My twin brother, Nicholas, who is also dead, was a Knight of the Crown. This sword is his, as is the armor. I took them from his body—”

“And she put them on and cut her hair and bravely defended the castle and those of us within it,” struck in Michael.

“And who are you?” The lord knight glowered at Michael.

“Perhaps that false cleric from Palanthas, my lord,” said a knight. “See, he wears the holy symbol of Mishakal.”

The lord knight barely spared Michael a glance, turned to stare at Nikol.

“She?” the lord knight repeated. He stepped forward, scrutinized Nikol’s features, then fell back, his gaze traveling swiftly over her body. “By Paladine, the false cleric speaks the truth. This is a woman!”

“Michael is not a false cleric,” Nikol began angrily.

“We will deal with him later,” said the lord knight. “You have yourself to explain first.”

Biting her lip, her face stained crimson, Nikol looked irresolute. Michael guessed at the struggle within her breast. She had lived the Oath and the Measure, fought evil, defended the innocent. She had come to think of herself as a knight. Yet, by the Measure, she knew she was in the wrong. Kneeling on one knee before the lord knight, she presented her sword hilt-first, over her arm, as was correct for a knight, when yielding to one superior in rank or to a victor in a tournament.