The Illearth War

choked on the grief in his throat. 'Then we lost the brothers. Lost them. We arose to one sunrise, and they were gone.

'We did not send to the Lords. How could we bear to tell them that our hope was lost? No. Rather, we searched. From the Northron Climbs to the Spoiled Plains and beyond, we searched. We searched through all the summer. Nothing. In despair, the searchers returned to The Grieve, Coercri, last home of the Unhomed.

“Then the last searcher returned-Wavenhair Haleall, whose womb bore the three. Because she was their mother, she searched when all others had given up the search, and she was the last to return. She had journeyed to the Shattered Hills themselves. She called all the people together, and told us the fate of the three before she died. The wounds of the search-”

He groaned again. “Now I am the last. Ah, my people!” As he cried out, he moved, shoved himself to his feet, stood erect against the wall. Towering over his hearers, he put back his head and began to sing the old song of the Unhomed.

Now we are Unhomed,

bereft of root and kith and kin.

From other mysteries of delight,

we set our sails to resail our track;

but the winds of life blew not the way we chose,

and the land beyond the Sea was lost.

It was long, like all Giantish songs. But he sang only a fragment of it. Soon he fell silent, and his chin dropped to his breast.

Again Lord Hyrim asked, “Who is he?”

The Giant answered by resuming his tale. “Then he came. Omen of the end and Home turned to misery and gall. Then we knew the truth. We had seen it before-in lighter times, when the knowledge might have been of some use-but we had denied it. We had seen our evil, and had denied it, thinking that we might find our way Home and escape it. Fools! When we saw him, we knew the truth. Through folly and withering seed and passion and impatience for Home, we had become the thing we hate. We saw the truth in him. Our hearts were turned to ashes, and we went to our dwellings-these small rooms which we called homes in vain.”

“Why did you not flee?”

“Some did-some four or five who did not know the long name of despair-or did not hear it. Or they were too much like him to judge. The ill of the Sarangrave took them-they- are no more.”

Compelled by the ancient passion of the Bloodguard, Korik asked, “Why did you not fight?”

“We had become the thing we hate. We are better dead.”

“Nevertheless!” Korik said. “Is this the fealty of the Giants? Does all promised faithfulness come to this? By the Vow, Giant! You destroy yourselves, and let the evil live! Even Kevin Landwaster was not so weak.”

In his emotion, he forgot caution, and all the Bloodguard were taken unaware. The sudden voice behind them was cold with contempt; it cut through them like a gale of winter. Turning, they found that another Giant stood in the doorway. He was much younger than the Giant within, but he resembled the older Giant. The chief difference lay in the contempt that filled his face, raged in his eyes, twisted his mouth as if he were about to spit.

In his right hand, he clenched a hot green stone. It blazed with an emerald strength that shone through his fingers. As he gripped it, it steamed thickly.

He stank of fresh blood; he was spattered with it from head to foot. And within him, clinging to his bones, was a powerful presence that did not fit his form. It slavered from behind his eyes with a great force of malice and wrong.

“Hmm,” he said in a despising tone, “a Lord and three Bloodguard. I am pleased. I had thought that my friend in the Sarangrave would take all like you but I see I shall have that pleasure myself. Ah, but you are not entirely scatheless, are you? Black becomes you. Did you lose friends to my friend?” He laughed with a grating sound, like the noise of boulders being crushed together.

Lord Hyrim stepped forward, planted his staff, said bravely, “Come no closer, turiya Raver. I am Hyrim, Lord of the Council of Revelstone. Melenkurion abatha! Duroc minas mill khabaal! I will not let you pass.”

The Giant winced as Lord Hyrim uttered the Words of power. But then he laughed again. “Hah! Little Lord! Is that the limit of your lore? Can you come no closer than that to the Seven Words? You pronounce them badly. But I must admit-you have recognized me. I am turiya Herem. But we have new names now, my brothers and I. There is Fleshharrower, and Satansfist. And I am named Kinslaughterer.”

At this, the older Giant groaned heavily. The Raver glanced into the back of the cell, and said in a tone of satisfaction, “Ah, there he is. Little Lord, I see that you have been speaking with Sparlimb Keelsetter. Did he tell you that he is my father? Father, why do you not welcome your son?”

The Bloodguard did not look at the older Giant. But they heard Keelsetter's pain, and understood it. Something within the Giant was breaking. Suddenly, he gave a savage roar. Leaping past the four, he attacked Kinslaughterer.

His fingers caught the Raver's throat. He drove him back out of the doorway onto the headrock of the piers.

Kinslaughterer made no attempt to break his father's hold. He resisted the impetus until his feet were braced. Then he raised the green stone, moved it toward Keelsetter's forehead.

Both fist and stone passed through the older Giant's skull into his brain.

Keelsetter screamed. His hands dropped, his body went limp. He hung from the point of power which impaled his head.

Grinning ravenously, the Raver held his father there for a long moment. Then he tightened his fist. Deep emerald flashed; the stone blasted the front of Keelsetter's skull. He fell dead, pouring blood over the headrock.

Kinslaughterer stamped his feet in the spreading pool.

He appeared oblivious to the four, but he was not. As Korik and Tull started forward to attack him, he swung his arm, hurled a bolt of power at them. It would have slain them before they reached the doorway, but Lord Hyrim lunged, thrust up his staff between them. The end of his staff caught the bolt. It detonated with such force that it broke the staff in two, and flung the four humans against the back of the cell.

The impact made them unconscious.

Thus even the Vow could not preserve the Bloodguard from the extremity of their need.

Korik was the first to reawaken. Hearing returned before sight or touch, and he began to listen. In his ears, the noise of the Sea grew, became violent. But the sound was not the sound of waves in storm; it was more erratic, more vicious. When his sight was restored, he was surprised to find that he could see. He had expected the darkness of clouds.

But early starlight shone through the doorway from a clear night sky. Outside, the Sea thrashed and heaved across the piers and up the levee as if goaded by rowels. And along the sky lightning leaped, followed by such thunder that he felt the bursting in his chest. Through the spray a high wind howled. And still the sky was clear.

There was a bayamo upon the Sea.

Then a different lightning struck upward into the heavens-a bolt as green as blazing emerald. It came from the levee. Looking through the darkness, Korik discerned the form of the Raver, Kinslaughterer. He stood down in the levee, so close to the tide that the waves broke against his knees. With his stone, he hurled green blasts into the sky, and shook his arms as if the windstorm were his to command.

On the levee behind him were three dead forms the three Bloodguard whom Korik had sent to the northern end of the city.

For a time, Korik did not comprehend what Kinslaughterer was doing. But then he perceived that the seas out beyond the piers moved in consonance with Kinslaughterer's arms. As the Giant-Raver waved and gestured, they heaved and reared and broke and piled themselves together.