Jeff Crook - The Rose and the Skull

Some tickling of danger warned him as he'd neared the village, but he'd ignored it, so anxious was he to find contact with his race. As he drew closer, he saw that the elves of the village walked with hunched shoulders and bent backs, and their arms seemed unusually long. No elvish voice was raised in song, only brutish grunts and snarls sounded from their throats. When one turned, as though sensing Valian's presence in the trees, Valian nearly cried out in horror at the sight of the twisted, malformed elf. Long fangs thrust up from his bottom jaw like the tusks of a boar, and his almond-shaped eyes glowed red with hate. His hair, once smooth and silken, bristled like fur.

Valian was so stricken with anguish that day, he'd been unable to move, unable to resist, as they gathered round him, grunting, snarling, drooling and touching him with their horrid claws. They grabbed him and lifted him and carried him triumphantly into the village. They brought him to an altar, where wood was piled, wood soaked with tar and oil, and they tied him to the altar, all the while dancing around his prone body. Valian had felt himself outside his own body, as though looking down on the scene from some point high above. He watched them bring torches and light the wood of his pyre, and he watched the flames lick around his body, consume his hair, caress his limbs, sear his flesh.

He hadn't died. Valian awoke on the forest floor, with the ancient and crumbling stone buildings of his dream village all around him. The village had long been abandoned and forgotten, and the forest had reclaimed it, and Valian awoke with a vision of things to come. As he stood and his hair fell about his face, it was white as ash, burned by the fires of his nightmare.

Now, apish hands reached out to touch his body, caress his flesh. Small creatures crowded around him, grunting, snarling like ghouls over a fresh grave. Terror awakened in him, but he was able to move, able to respond. Valian lashed out, and the apes leaped screaming back to their dark lairs. Valian fled; he knew not where.

"Where is Dalian?" Ellinghad shouted as he skidded to a stop beside Jessica. Behind them, Lady Meredith's war cry echoed down the hall. The ring and crash of steel upon steel followed.

"I don't know," Jessica answered. "By the time I got here, he was gone."

"He's betrayed us," Ellinghad snarled. "Either that or he's run off to save his own miserable hide, the coward."

"I can't believe either," Jessica said. "We've just lost him. He'll be back."

Jessica bent down beside the gully dwarf. Glabella's eye were as round and white as goose eggs. "Which way to the dungeons?" Jessica asked her. "Which way to Uhoh?"

Glabella's mouth worked, but no sound came out. "Think, Glabella, think!" Jessica shouted.

The gully dwarf only closed tight her eyes and shook her head.

Suddenly, the battle at the end of the hall grew quiet. Then footsteps pounded, running. Ellinghad poised, his blade ready. Meredith appeared, bleeding from a dozen wounds. She staggered into them and collapsed, almost falling on Glabella.

"Lady Meredith!" Jessica exclaimed.

"What happened?" Ellinghad asked.

"I managed to close the door. There was a key. It won't hold them for long," she gasped. As though to confirm this, a thundering boom echoed from the direction of the kitchen as the draconians began to hammer down the door.

"Which way now?" Meredith asked as Jessica bound the more severe of her wounds. "Which way did the elf go?"

"We don't know. I think he's abandoned us," Ellinghad said.

"Damn him," Meredith cursed. "We should have known better than to trust an elf."

Jessica looked at the leader of the Sword Knights in surprise. Never before had Lady Meredith shown racial prejudices. Perhaps it was the stress of her wounds and the imminent danger.

"What about the gully dwarf? Does she know the way?" Meredith asked. Jessica helped her to her feet.

"I don't think so," Ellinghad said.

Meredith roughly grabbed Glabella by the collar of her dress. "Which way?" she snarled. "Tell us now. No more games."

Glabella only stared in wide mouthed terror. Suddenly, she lashed out, sinking her teeth into the thumb of the Knight. With a scream of pain, Meredith dropped the gully dwarf.

As soon as she hit the floor, Glabella raced away, screaming, "Slagd! Slagd!"

"Glabella!" Jessica shouted as she started after her.

"Wait. Let her go. She's no use to us," Meredith said.

"Let's just pick a direction and go."

Without waiting for the others, she stalked away, choosing the opposite way in which the gully dwarf had headed.

"We came here to rescue one gully dwarf." Jessica muttered. "Shall we leave another behind?"

Behind them, the kitchen door crashed open, and draconians poured into the hall. Ellinghad ducked as a draconian arrow whistled past his head.

Jessica and Ellinghad hurried after their designated leader.

Lady Meredith chose a path which seemed to always take them around a corner just before the draconian archers loosed their arrows. A half-dozen times or more, scores of arrows buzzed angrily though space they had just vacated, or shattered against a wall where they had been standing only moments before. The Knights ran, even though fleeing the enemy was against everything they believed in. All those rules seemed silly now. The only thing to do was to save themselves long enough to save Uhoh.

After making yet another hair's breadth escape, they found themselves in a hall which ended in a door. There was no other outlet. Meredith tried the door and breathed a sigh of relief when it swung open on oiled hinges.

"Through here!" she shouted, as draconians appeared once more at the end of the hall.

Jessica and Ellinghad ducked through the door, and Meredith slammed it shut just as the draconians released their missiles. Meredith threw home a heavy iron bolt. Arrows hammered against the door like hailstones on a slate roof.

"That ought to hold them for a while," Meredith said with a laugh.

"For all the good it will do us," Ellinghad said in response.

They found themselves in a wide, circular chamber whose ceiling was lost in shadows above. In the center of the room stood a low stone slab draped with chains. Opposite the door and dozens of feet above the floor, a narrow balcony jutted from the wall. Heavy curtains concealed the back of the balcony, but torches set in sconces to either side illuminated a short figure draped in dark robes. As the Knights stared up, the figure began to clap, slowly, in mockery of applause.

"Well done," the figure laughed. "Is this the best the Knights could send?"

"Alya!" Ellinghad shouted. "Come down here and find out for yourself."

She threw back the cowl of her robe and shook out her dark hair. "Now I ask you, would that be an honorable fight, Sir Knight? Two against one?" she said.

"Three against one," Jessica said.

"Yes," Alya laughed, "but I think the true odds are more like two against two, isn't that right, General Zen?"

"That's right, Lady Alya," Meredith answered in a deep voice.

Ellinghad and Jessica spun round and watched in horror as their leader threw back the bolt on the door and swung it open. Draconians poured into the chamber, snarling in anticipation.

"Lady Meredith!" Jessica cried.

"At these odds," Alya continued, "I think you might prefer to surrender."

Ellinghad laughed. "I'll never surrender," he said. "Death first."

"Lady Jessica?" Alya asked, a note of concern creeping into her voice.

Jessica swallowed the dry lump in her throat. "Death," she croaked.

"Well, we can't always have our own way," Alya said. "Grand Master Iulus wants you alive, and so alive you must be taken." She clapped her hands.