Miranda put her hand on Nakor’s and said, ‘Enough.’
Calis said, ‘You said you are of the Ardanien. You knew Gorath?’
Arkan looked surprised for the first time. ‘He was my father.’
Calis nodded. ‘I see the resemblance. I met him when I was young. You had a remarkable father, Arkan. He was the first moredhel I had ever spoken with and he bore a terrible burden.’
‘He is counted a traitor by most of our people.’ He glanced at the three faces confronting him and felt reluctant to discuss family history, but he was surprised to discover that Calis had met his father. ‘I know there are rumours and some, like Liallan, think him a saviour, but the truth of those days is shrouded by lies and rumour.’
‘Perhaps Pug can shed some light on that time?’ said Calis.
‘Pug?’
Nakor said, ‘The man in black, in your aunt’s vision, is almost certainly Pug or perhaps his son Magnus. Both are given to wearing black, and both are great sorcerers who struggle to protect this world. If the vision of dragon riders is more than mere metaphor, they would be the Valheru’s most powerful opposition.’ He glanced at Miranda.
She looked deeply troubled. ‘We know things,’ she said to Arkan. ‘Some of which are best discussed after we find Pug. We seem fated to travel together. If we can contrive some way to get past this invading army and navy blocking our way!’ She sat back in her chair with an audible sigh and said, ‘If there was some way I could contact Pug, reach out with my mind and tell him …’ Tell him what? she wondered silently. That his dead wife’s memories had been attached to a demon queen, who under any other circumstances would happily rip off his head and devour his brain; but who would now like nothing more than for him to hold her? Tears threatened, and she willed herself away from that emotional trap.
‘Pug,’ she said softly. ‘I wonder what he’s doing this minute?’
CHAPTER FOUR
Pug signalled.
Sandreena and Amirantha moved out from behind the large rock where they had been waiting. She was clad in the traditional armour of her order, the Shield of the Weak, and he had forgone his usual finery to don a more appropriate outfit: heavy woollen trousers, a dark green flannel shirt, and stout black boots. His attire made the staff he carried look almost gaudy. It had been created that way for theatrical effect, to help gull potential victims into his confidence scheme — summoning relatively harmless demons then banishing them for reward — but was a powerful magic artefact in its own right.
They were tired and dirty from their journey down to the region where Jim Dasher had encountered what he thought was a Pantathian Serpent priest, and it had proved far more problematic than anticipated.
Reaching a safe house in the Keshian city of Teleman had been simple enough, since Pug’s orb had taken them there. But that was as far south as the Conclave had established any permanent stations. Like almost everyone monitoring Kesh, the Conclave had considered the nations of the Keshian Confederacy barely worth consideration. They were universally regarded to be nothing more than an annoyance to the Empire on her southern boundary, and not an area noteworthy enough to warrant the Conclave’s continuing surveillance. The Conclave resources had limits, and Kesh was a vast land. Most of their intelligence gathering had been focused on the City of Kesh, heart of the Empire, and key population centres along the borders with the Kingdom, as well as major sea ports. None of Pug’s agents had travelled below the Girdle of Kesh, as the two ranges of mountains that divided the Empire from the Confederacy were called. Which made it the perfect place to organize the major undertaking of subverting the Empire’s rulers and launching a wholesale invasion of the Kingdom.
And it made it impossible to reach by the magical means at Pug’s disposal.
So, more mundane means of transport had been required. Pug had the ability to transport himself magically to any place in his line of sight, and to the places he knew well, but he was limited in how far he could transport himself and two others repeatedly. Still, the occasional sorcerous jaunt was handy for bypassing certain obstacles and to avoid roving bands of raiders, bandits, and what passed for the local militia, but most of their journey had been made by horseback, small boat, and foot.
The weather was chilly, as it was now early winter in the southern hemisphere. A misty rain had been falling intermittently since dawn and the three travellers were just damp and cold enough to be irritable. Sandreena in particular was beyond patience, as she had been forced to leave her horse stabled in a tiny village on the mainland coast with the other mounts. As a Knight-Adamant of the Order of the Shield of the Weak, worshippers of the Goddess Dala, she found that being on foot was like having to fight with one hand; something she was able to do, but would rather not.
Pug had secured a boat but the owner had refused to row them over to the large island, and at last Pug understood why. The maps that Macros had drawn years before and left behind in his library were full of errors and inexactitudes, one of which was sloppy translation. After speaking to the locals on the far shore of the mainland, Pug now realized that this was not the ‘Island of the Snakes’, but rather the ‘Island of the Snake Men’.
Apparently, he had found the Pantathian homeland. Which puzzled him, as he had thought the heart of the Pantathian murder cult had been located near the foothills of the mountain range named the Pavilion of the Gods. Legend said many of the Valheru Dragon Lords had resided in that region as well.
The Pantathians were an unnatural race, distorted by a Valheru by the name of Alma-Lodaka, Mistress of Serpents, who had created them to serve her. She had bred them, then evolved them into intelligent beings and granted them magical abilities. It was conceded that while the Valheru could not create life, they could manipulate and distort it.
One unintended consequence had been the creation of a death cult who worshipped the long-departed Mistress of Serpents as a goddess, longed for her return, and who would stop at nothing to bring it about. Much of Pug’s personal history was intertwined with these snake men: upright serpents who were human-like in form, but who were more alien than any other race Pug had encountered on Midkemia. He understood the Dasati, a race from another plane of reality, better than he understood the Pantathians.
Pug and his son Magnus had been instrumental in destroying the Pantathian creches in what they had thought to be the final blow against the lizard race, but apparently there had been more than one enclave of the creatures. As disgusting as it might have been to obliterate every egg and spawn they had encountered, Pug had at least found some solace in the knowledge they were not natural creatures, but twisted parodies of intelligent life focused only on one purpose, and that purpose entailed the annihilation or enslavement of all other races on Midkemia in service of their ‘goddess’.
Pug surveyed the landscape and sniffed the air. There was a burnt wood tinge in the heavy damp air. He motioned for his companions to follow him and led them up a small rise to a ridge overlooking a shallow valley. In the distance they could see what looked to be a community, but even at this distance it was clear that it had been burned to char.
Pug motioned for Sandreena and Amirantha to stand close, and they stepped forwards to flank him, and put their hands on his shoulders.
In an instant they were standing at the edge of the town. Signs of battle were evident in all directions. ‘Looks like whoever did this wasn’t willing to let anyone survive,’ observed Sandreena.
‘They were making a point,’ said Pug.
‘Point?’ Amirantha looked at the short sorcerer.
Pug nodded. ‘I’m not entirely sure of what the point was: vengeance, perhaps. This wouldn’t be the first time an army destroyed every man, woman, and child of an enemy. You don’t slaughter those who farm and raise livestock if you plan on occupying a land and ruling it.’ He looked around. ‘The dead pay no taxes, either.’
Pug silently turned in a full circle. ‘This valley runs to the south from here.’ He pointed to a nearby stream. ‘If we follow that stream I suspect we’ll find more villages.’
