Mel Odom - The Black Road

"Is he here with us?" Taramis asked.

Darrick shook his head, but the movement felt distant from him, as if it were someone else's body. "No. He's dead."

"But he's talking to you," the sage said.

"It's a lie," Darrick answered.

It's not a lie, ye bloody great fool! Mat exploded. Damn ye, ye thick-headed mullet. Ye was always the hardest to convince of somethin' ye couldn't see, couldn't touch for yerself. But if ye don't listen to me now, Darrick Lang, I'm gonna be travelin' the ghost ways forever. I'll never know no rest, never be at peace. Would ye wish that on me?

"No," Darrick said.

"What is he saying?" Taramis asked. "Have we come to the right place?"

"It's a trick," Darrick said. "Mat says that the demon is in my head, trying to weaken me. And he's telling me he's not the demon."

"Do you believe him?" Taramis asked.

"I believe the demon is in my head," Darrick said. "I've somehow betrayed you all, Taramis. I apologize."

"No," Taramis said. "The sword is true. It came to you."

"It was a demon's trick."

The sage shook his head. "No demon, not even Kabraxis, could have power over Hauklin's sword."

But Darrick remembered how the sword had resisted him, how it hadn't come free at first down in that hidden tomb.

The sword couldn't be freed at first, Mat said. It couldn't. It had to wait on me. It took us both, ye see. That's why I was wanderin' the ghost ways, stuck between hither an' thither. That's me part of this. An' the third man, why, he's yer way out, he is.

"The third man is the way out," Darrick repeated dully.

Taramis studied him, moving the lantern in front of Darrick's eyes.

Despite the irritation he felt at having the light so close to his eyes, Darrick found that he couldn't move.

You ain't my son, his father roared in his mind. Folks look at you, and they wouldn't blame me if I killed your mother. But she's bewitched me. I can't even raise a hand to her.

Pain exploded along Darrick's cheek, but it was painfrom the memory, not something that was happening at present. The boy he'd been had landed in a heap on a pile of dung-covered straw. And his father had closed in and beaten him, causing Darrick to spend days lying in the stable with fever and a broken arm.

"Why didn't I die then?" Darrick asked. Everything would have been so much easier, so much simpler.

Mat would still have been alive, still living in Hillsfar with his family.

I chose not to be there, Mat said. I chose to go with me friend. An' if ye hadn't given me reason to get out of Hillsfar, I'd have gotten out of there on me own. Hillsfar wasn't that big a place for the likes of ye and me. Me da knew that, just like he knew about me leavin' for ye.

"I killed you," Darrick said.

An' if it wasn't for ye, how many times over dead would I have been by now? Before we ended up at Tauruk's Port?

In his mind, Darrick saw Mat slam into the cliff wall again, the skeleton hanging to him like a leech.

How many times did them captains we crewed with tell us that the life of a Westmarch Navy sailor wasn't worth havin'? Long hours, short pay, an' an even shorter life was it come to that, as it most likely would. The only things what made it all worthwhile was yer shipmates an' what few tavern wenches would roll their eyes at ye like ye was some kind of big damn hero.

Darrick remembered those speeches and those times. Mat had always made the best of it, always got the prettiest wenches, always had the most friends.

An' I'd be knowin' if me luck holds true in the hereafter, Mat said, were I ever to get finished with this last bit of business we signed on for. Take up the sword, Darrick, an' stand ready. The third man is comin'.

Part of the malaise lifted from Darrick. Only then did he realize that Taramis had gripped the front of his shirt in both fists and was shaking him.

"Darrick," the sage said. "Darrick."

"I hear you." Darrick heard the thunk of quarrels meeting the metal shields that the other warriors held up aswell. Evidently the church guards had grown braver and decided to pick some of them off if they could. At the moment, the warriors were able to keep the shields overlapping so that none of the fletched missiles got through.

"What third man?" Taramis demanded.

"I don't know."

"Is there a way out of this?"

"I don't know."

Desperation creased the sage's face. "Use the sword."

"I don't know how."

Ye're waitin' , Mat said.

"We're waiting," Darrick repeated dully. He'd dwindled so close inside himself that nothing mattered. His father's voice was muted, somewhere in the background. Maybe Mat had found a way to keep it quiet, but if he believed that, then Mat couldn't be the demon, and Darrick was pretty certain that the demon inside his head was Mat, too.

"There's other guards coming," Palat announced.

Without warning, stone shifted against stone.

Taramis glanced over Darrick's shoulder. "Look," the sage said. "Perhaps your friend was right."

Numbly, Darrick turned and spotted the rectangular hole that opened in the sewer ceiling above the pile of rubble. Peering closer, he realized it wasn't a door that had opened but rather a large section of rock that had been lifted up and out of the way. Light shone on the rubble and the water below.

A man shoved his head through the rectangle. "Darrick Lang," he called.

Shifting his lantern, Taramis brought the man into view.

Staring into the burned wreckage of the man's face, Darrick didn't believe for a moment that help had arrived.

"Darrick Lang," the burned man called again.

"He knows you," Taramis said at Darrick's side. "Who is he?"

Shaking his head, unable to recognize the burned man's features in the shifting of light and shadows, Darrick said, "I don't know."

Ye know him, Mat said. That's Cap'n Raithen. From the pirates what was at Tauruk's Port. Ye fought him aboard the pirate ship.

Amazed, knowing somehow Mat was speaking the truth, Darrick recognized the man. "But he died."

"He looks like he did," Taramis agreed in a quiet voice, "but he's offering us a way out of certain death. He's certainly mastered close escapes."

"This way," Raithen said. "If you would live, hurry. That damned demon has sent more people into the tunnel after you, and now that they've seen me open this one, they're likely to check up with the maps and figure out how I got here."

"Come on," Taramis said, taking Darrick by the arm.

"It's a trick," Darrick argued.

No, Mat said. We're joined, the three of us. Joined in this endeavor.

"We stay here, and we'll die like fish in a barrel," Taramis said. He shoved Darrick into reluctant movement.

As they neared the debris pile, the rats scattered, and quarrels struck the stones and sometimes the rats, but luckily the warriors all got through.

Raithen shoved his hand down toward Darrick. "Give me the sword," the pirate captain said. "I'll help you up."

Before Darrick could move the sword, Raithen reached down for it. As soon as the man's fingers touched the sword, they hissed.

Raithen yelped and yanked his hand back. Fresh steam rose from his burned fingers as he retreated into the tunnel above the sewer. He cursed and broke two more rocks free, enlarging the space so the demon hunters could more easily gain entrance.

Taramis went through first, clambering into the smaller tunnel above them. Dully, Darrick followed, taking care to watch the enchanted sword.

After introducing himself, Taramis offered his hand. The pirate captain remained out of arm's reach and ignored the hand. His gaze focused on Darrick. "Has your dead friend been in touch with you?" the pirate captain demanded.