Castle Perilous

jumping to their deaths. Those who didn’t fell to the ground and rolled, or ran in panicky circles slapping at themselves in a frantic attempt to put out the flames.

Vorn’s heart sank. He had never tasted defeat, and now it sat on his tongue like a lump of brass, hard, cold, and bitter.

There was chaos in the ward. Weapons lay strewn about. Soldiers ran and scattered like coals from an overturned brazier. The belfries stood unmoving, mountains of flame, funeral pyres all.

Vorn could look no longer. He stepped down from the wall and walked to the opposite side of the turret. He drew his royal-blue cloak about him and gazed emptily out at lands of the Pale, lands he would curse till he drew his dying breath. He closed his eyes, his chin dropping to his chest.

Presently he felt a hand at his shoulder. He turned.

“You must see,” Melydia said.

He stared at her, his face ashen. He had no words to speak to this woman whom he thought he had known. Now it was as if she were a stranger. Her face was transformed.

“You must come,” she said, smiling as if inviting him to inspect the preparations for a grand ball. “Look what we have done.”

He stared at her for a while longer, striving to find in that delicately beautiful face some clue, some explanation to her mystery.

He found none.

She took his hand and led him across.

The men had stopped running amuck. They stood about, talking, exclaiming, gesturing at one another.

They were all still in flames.

Vorn shook his head, uncomprehending.

“They burn but they are not consumed,” Melydia told him. “Neither are the belfries. Look.”

It was true. The belfries’ structural members were still the color of fresh-cut timber; they had not blackened. Stranger still, no smoke came from the fires at all. The flames seemed to dance on the surface of the wood, furiously trying to penetrate but unable to.

“Soon the men will overcome their shock. The battle will then proceed. They need you now, Vorn.”

She traced a quick pattern in the air and spoke a word under her breath.

“There. They will hear you now. Speak to them.”

Color returning to his face, Vorn mounted the battlement and faced his troops.

“Soldiers of the Emp —” He stopped, tongue-tied by hearing his voice boom out louder than the thunder. Heads snapped in his direction. Arms raised, pointing.

Vorn spoke. “Soldiers of the Empire! We have faced the Devil’s minions and have fought bravely. Now we have come through hellfire itself unscathed.” He paused. “Can any man doubt that our cause is just and holy? Can any gainsay our righteousness? Behold the fortress of Evil itself. It looms before us in all its malevolence. Let no man fear it. We have come to vanquish it, and vanquish it we shall, though all its forces be arrayed against us. Return to your stations. Fight on, bravely, as you have up till now. The Goddess is with us, her blessings are upon us, and her victory will be ours.”

He withdrew his sword and raised it high.

“Fight on, for Goddess and Empire! Fight!”

A great shout rose up from the troops. They all saluted, then picked up their weapons and ran to the belfries.

Vorn sheathed his sword, looking up at the line of crucibles stilt hanging above. Now empty, they were beginning to fade.

He jumped from the battlement. Melydia waved her hand to abrogate the voice amplification spell.

“Why?” he asked her. “Why did you not tell what was to happen? Why did you not warn of this, so that we would know what to expect?”

“Because I did not know what to expect. The spell I cast over each soldier and each of the belfries was general in nature, a protection against whatever form Incarnadine’s magic would take. I could not predict the form, though of late I have dreamt of fire. But I have dreamt of other things too. I cannot see the future. That is not a power of mine. Would that it were. No, the spell was general, which was why it was so difficult to effect. Neither was I sure that it would work. But it did, as you can see.”

Vorn watched his men remount the belfries. The flames were weaker now, and had turned dull red.

Melydia had turned her gaze up to the keep.

“He holds back,” she said. “Still he does not tap his deepest source of power.” Her voice was a murmur. “Perhaps he is afraid. Afraid of me. Of himself. Afraid …”

She swayed, put her palm to her forehead.

“The spell of stamina. It is almost gone.… Vorn, I —”

He caught her as she fell, and picked her up. She lay across his arms like a limp doll.

The pattern, its arcane geometries defying the eye with their complexity, was fading. At the height of the spell it had glowed blue-white and had emitted great heat, so much that Incarnadine could barely approach it to complete the last lines. Now it had reverted to dull red, its power quickly ebbing. Incarnadine stepped up to it again and traced across it the Stroke of Cancellation.

With a hiss like molten metal quenched in water, the pattern disappeared.

Shed of his cloak, his undertunic untied and open across his chest, dripping with sweat, Incarnadine came to the rail.

He saw, and he understood.

He grew aware that Tyrene still awaited his orders. He turned.

Tyrene began, “My lord —”

“The castle has fallen,” Incarnadine told him. “Not yet, but soon. You will withdraw your men to the keep, fighting only those rearguard actions necessary to protect lives.”

Tyrene was appalled. “My lord!”

“Hear me. Once in the keep, you will offer only enough resistance to delay its fall for three days. Thereafter, order your men to disperse through whatever aspects they choose. Do not leave the wounded behind. Do not let anyone be taken prisoner. Order your men to abandon their positions before being overrun. Above all, let no more lives be lost. We have lost too many.”

Tyrene was almost in tears. “Yes, my lord.” Fumblingly he put his helmet back on. “What about the Guests?”

“I will see to them.”

“Yes, my lord.” He stepped forward. “My lord, I —”

“Go, Tyrene.”

Tyrene left.

He waved the simulacrum to a closer view of the outer curtain wall, then focused it even closer … closer still.

There was Vorn. And there was Melydia, in his arms. The prince looked lost, helpless. Strange mien for a victor.

He waved the scene still closer. Melydia’s face, blurred by the great distance across which the simulacrum fetched its image, took form below, bigger than life. She looked calm.

“You do not sleep, Melydia, my darling,” he said, “though your eyes are closed. You do not rest. You will not — until you have destroyed this castle … and me.”

He regarded her for a moment, remembering.

Then, a wide sweep of his hand, and the simulacrum was gone. The vast stone floor below lay bare.

“So be it,” he said, walking away.

Keep — East Wing — Armory

“Hey, you look great,” Gene said as Linda came out of the storeroom.