Cradle of Darkness Read online

  He left the town behind and padded the most direct route back to the castle, avoiding the feline temptation to chase mice or mark his unlikely territory. He considered changing shape back to human form outside the castle, but he didn’t know how he would be affected, and calculated he’d be safer within the sanctuary of his tower.

  The decision proved to be wise, because as he gathered his will and his appearance morphed back, a sapping weariness overcame him. During the transformation he could not focus on his surroundings; he felt vulnerable, weak, and exposed. When full awareness returned, he was shocked to find himself lying on the floor, a thumping pain between his temples.

  He stirred himself, feeling an almost poisonous cramp in every muscle conspiring against the simplest of movements. “By the stars, this ability may not be worth the cost,” he said out loud. “Entering the Dreamworld has its consequences, but this is … almost intolerable.” With a considerable effort he lurched over to a seat and poured himself a goblet of water from a nearby jug. After a time, feeling returned to his numbed frame, and he felt able to think again. The thoughts that formed in his mind moved about like tessellating pieces of a mosaic until they formed a new and improved scheme, a pathway that would lead to the dominion he had yearned for during the decades of standing in the shadows. The realisation caused a twitching smile to spread on his face. He would sleep for now, but come the morning an audience with the Cuscosian Queen would be the order of the day, then a meeting with Eétor and finally another sojourn in the Dreamworld.

  He was about to close his eyes when a shifting rustle in the opposite tower caught his attention. Grizdoth’s feint padding would have escaped the attention of most, but to Zodarin with his off-worlder ears the spy’s footfall was all too easy to detect. This was despite the two hundred strides or so that separated Zodarin’s tower from that of the main library. The wizard heaved his frame to the window and observed Eétor’s spy emerge from the foot of the tower and creep furtively along the battlements.

  Where do you return to, you sneaky rodent? Zodarin’s patience was rewarded minutes later when Grizdoth appeared outside Eétor’s quarters, fully visible even at this distance.

  So Eétor has his own insecurities, Zodarin thought. Well that was to be expected. Anyone poised for rulership would be a fool not to have extra eyes and ears in his service. The question is — how much has Grizdoth observed? And how has he circumvented my magical defences? Perhaps the spy has seen enough to warrant an abrupt end to his treacherous life? Perhaps — but there are other ways to make use of the situation apart from crude dispatchment. More to ponder.

  The weariness from his earlier exertions afflicted him again, and he staggered to his bed. There may be conspiracies and counter-conspiracies, he thought as he laid his head down, but I am in control. All is well, all is well. Then he drifted off into a dreamless exhausted sleep.

  16

  Unusual appetites

  “This is the bestest toy you’ve made for me yet, Papa. What was it called again — a Charry-at?” Palimin crawled in the sandpit Nalin had made him earlier that week, pushing a sturdy but expertly carved chariot along a track swept out in the sand from Palimin’s primitive excavations.

  “That’s right, son. But what’s that lump of rock over there?” Nalin pointed at a knobbled lump of limestone that the grabeling had heaved in from the castle courtyard.

  “It’s the cave-stable for the horses,” Palimin said enthusiastically.

  “But how do they get in? There are no entrances.”

  “I’ve got to chiz … chisel them out.”

  “You’ll need some tools for that, then.”

  “Can you give me some, Papa?”

  “Chisels and hammers? They’re sharp and hefty, son. You’re likely to mash and cut a few fingers before you’re done.”

  “Won’t,” Palimin said. “I’ll very, very careful.”

  Nalin smiled. Here in the depths of the Cuscosian castle, the grabeling was safe and secure. A place where a distinguished father could keep an eye on his wandering son and make sure he didn’t get up to any mischief.

  Mischief? Nalin laughed at the thought. Isn’t it in Kaldoran nature to be up to no good? If there were awards for roguery, then Nalin would be sure to receive first prize, so he supposed this burden was well deserved. Ellotte, his wife, was enjoying a night spent knitting and sharing the latest hearsay with her circle of friends, so it fell to him to look after the little burrower. Not that he resented the duty. Palimin was one of only a select few Nalin placed before himself in order of importance. Looking at him crawling about in the box of sand, his heart swelled with a father’s love and pride. Kaldorans were no different to any other race in this respect. Already the characteristic plates of hardened skin were forming on the grabeling’s legs, back and arms. Soon, the natural protective armour of the Kaldorans would cover him. He would grow of course, moulting every eighteen months to make way for his developing frame. Five sols, Nalin thought, philosophical about how quickly time went. Reckon he’ll be taller than his father, hopefully cleverer too.

  As his son played in the sand, making neighing noises and shouting the commands of his imaginary charioteers, Nalin pondered the engineering problem that had perplexed him all day. He had visited his hideaway, the secret location of an invention he had come to call the ‘cave-crawler.’ The machine had performed reasonably well in trials. It ate through rock with its cutting head, burrowing a tunnel twenty spans wide at a rate of ten spans per minute; a distance far too slow for his ambitions. How could he increase its efficiency? The solution eluded him, despite hours of pondering and looking at the problem from different angles.

  Perhaps replacing the drill cutters with higher-grade diamond? No, that would be costly and add little to the excavating power. Construct a triple nose-cone with replaceable carbind implants? No, that would take months to develop, and carbind is not hard enough. The nose-cones would have to be replaced far too often.

  When he next looked at the water clock, he was surprised to find half an hour had passed. Sometimes, when pondering his designs, he entered what his wife called a ‘muse-state’. More often than not, this was an effect of the jarva-leaf, but he hadn’t indulged since mid-afternoon. I need to put the problem aside, he thought, return to it with a fresh mind in the morning.

  “Time to go to bed,” Nalin said, bringing his attention back to his son. Palimin turned, sand covering his face and hands. “Oh, already? Can’t I finish this one last channel?”

  Nalin chortled, “Always one for digging, aren’t you little burrower? But I think it’s time you lay your head to rest. You’ve had enough for one night.”

  “Then maybe a story?”

  Nalin narrowed his eyes. The grabeling was playing for time, of that he had no doubt. But Ellotte wouldn’t be home for another couple of hours, and he was partial himself to a little recounting of tales and legends. “All right,” he said, “which story would you like?”

  Palimin’s face lit up. “Tell the one about Gatdroul and the Brabagant.”

  “That’s a favourite of mine too,” Nalin said, “now come and sit on Papa’s knee and I’ll tell it.”

  And so, Nalin did. He told the legend precisely in the words of the stone fablers, as was the custom amongst the Kaldorans. Legends were passed down by word of mouth, the language unchanged, and Nalin did not depart from this custom.

  Many hundreds of moons ago, before the rise of the Cuscosians, there lived a tribe of humans called Dorwin in the valley of Limneth, just south of the Dragon Vale. They were a hardy people, colonisers who threw up their wooden settlements rapidly, spreading across the plains like an infestation.

  One day, an ancient behemoth from the clan of Brabagants descended from the hills. His name was Yauthlorgh, and he stood ten centiarchs tall, bearing a spiked ironwood club and a sack in which he placed his victims. His feet shook the earth as he thundered across the plain and the Dorwin cowered in their huts, trembling in fear. A few brave so
uls confronted the giant with spears and pikes, but they were no match for him. Yauthlorgh beat them to a meaty mush and placed them in his sack.

  But he did not stop there. He broke down the villagers’ hastily-constructed dwellings and lifted the bodies up, handfuls at a time, squeezing the life out of them with fingers the size of pythons. They fled before him, hiding in the woods until he had finished decimating their township.

  Once he had left, they sent out search parties but could not find the Brabagant’s lair. Their mourning was great, and many considered leaving for the Southern Lands from which they had come. However, after a month with no further appearance, they thought the beast gone, and started to rebuild. It was untimely, though. The Brabagant returned and slew a handful of the villagers, not exacting as great a toll this time as the Dorwin fled as soon as they heard his approach.

  One foolhardy soul attempted to parley with the Brabagant and — some would say to his credit, others not — he struck a deal, agreeing that the villagers would offer up five children every month for the beast to devour. In return, he would allow the villagers to live in peace and raise their township again. Some could not stomach this and left for their homeland, despite the meagre living they knew awaited them, far from the lush plains they had come to inhabit. Most stayed however, believing this Brabagant’s burden acceptable to bear.

  Yet after several months, during which they argued over which children they should offer up, the people grew wearied at this harsh imposition and sought another way.

  Now Gatdroul was a famous stonegrabe — a mighty warrior, skilled rocksmith and expert diplomat. The only thing preventing him from becoming Fellchief of the Kaldorans was his dislike of administration and the petty concerns he perceived to be part of running a kingdom. He much preferred inhabiting his workroom, dreaming up new architectural works — for which he was highly renowned.

  One day, the Fellchief summoned Gatdroul to his Rockclave and introduced him to a delegation of the Dorwin. They had approached the Kaldorans with an offer of three sacks of gold pieces and fifty head of cattle to rid them of their monster. They had heard how the Kaldorans overthrew the Brabagants and established their kingdom hundreds of sols ago.

  The offer was acceptable to the Fellchief, and he commanded Gatdroul to deal with it. Gatdroul was loath to follow this instruction, knowing that Brabagants were fearsome behemoths and could only be defeated by a combination of guile, specialised weapons and great loss of life. Yet the Fellchief compelled him, and he took a company of stonegrabes to the Brabagant’s lair.

  They spied on the creature, waiting until it had eaten its latest meal. Then, in a moment of great boldness, Gatdroul approached the satiated Brabagant and parleyed with it, offering a settlement far in the north where it could feed off the North-Eastern enclave of Norisea. They were known to breed like rabbits, and though they dwelt in a secret location, Gatdroul promised to show the Brabagant where they were, and so ensure a plentiful supply of food.

  However, the Brabagant refused, as he had come to like the taste of the Dorwin. He particularly enjoyed the tender flesh of their infants, which it likened to sweetmeat.

  “You should try some,” the Brabagant offered, Gatdroul having ingratiated himself at Yauthlorgh’s fireside. The Brabagant assured the stonegrabe he was safe from his claws as he didn’t like Kaldoran flesh. “Too rocky and acidic. Lies heavy on my stomach,” the creature growled. “But this,” it said, lifting a piece of warm leg meat. “This is much more pleasant to the tongue. Taste it. I insist.”

  Gatdroul was compelled to take the morsel, not wishing to offend the Brabagant. He took it in his hand and sprinkled a little nutmeg and onion powder on it from a sprinkler in his pack, hoping it would take away the flavour of something he anticipated would be abhorrent. To his surprise, the flavour of the cooked child sent his taste buds wild. He salivated uncontrollably and asked, meekly, for a little more.

  “What is that dust?” asked the Brabagant.

  “Just a little seasoning,” Gatdroul replied innocently.

  “It seems to add something to the dish,” Yauthlorgh said, “give it here.

  But Gatdroul was a duplicitous soul and, by sleight of hand, substituted the condiment pot with an identical one. This one, however, contained a poison extracted from the tail of a rock scorpion.

  The poison was quick acting, and the Brabagant was thrown to the floor, writhing in pain. The behemoth lashed out at Gatdroul and his cohort, killing ten and wrenching Gatdroul’s right arm from its socket. Seconds later, though, the Brabagant fell dead with an almighty crash before it could exert a heftier toll.

  Despite the pain wracking his body, brave Gatdroul chopped the thing’s head off and returned it to the Dorwin. The villagers celebrated and paid their dues, despite the cost leaving them destitute for a sol afterward.

  As for Gatdroul, his severe wound healed quickly — a trait possessed by all Kaldoran stonegrabes great and small. The arm grew back but not as it was before, earning him the title, ‘Gatdroul Withered-Arm.’

  He returned to Kaldora, concealing some of the cooked human meat on his person. That very night he shared it with honoured guests who also took an instant liking to the succulent meat.

  Days later, their appetites got the better of them and they conspired an attack on an unwary Dorwin wanderer. It wasn’t long before they were abducting humans more and more to feed their newly-found savage appetites. All the while, their secretive acquisitions remained undetected, the Dorwin assuming there were other fell beasts come to prey upon them. So, their people never established themselves and were easily conquered when the Cuscosian avalanche invaded in later times.

  It was from Gatdroul Withered-Arm’s exploits that the seeds of Kaldorans’ specialised tastes were sown. To this day, we enjoy the feasts of Echthorim, where this rare meat is indulged and we eat our fill.

  Nalin finished his story, studying Palimin’s expression. It was one of wonder and transport. “When can I eat human-flesh, Papa?”

  Nalin tweaked his son’s nose. “Soon enough, my little grabeling, when your stomach is ready — and when we can stock our larders again. Such food has been scarce in the last sol since Cuscosian patrols have thwarted our raids. But this will change soon. Magthrum will see to that. Now, what do you think the moral of this story is?”

  Palimin considered for a moment, then said, “Be brave and you will defeat all of your monsters?”

  Nalin laughed. “Perhaps. But more importantly — extend the hand of friendship to a stranger and then stab him with the other. That is the Kaldoran way.”

  Palimin nodded and then furrowed his brow. “Or … maybe — extend the hand of friendship to a stranger, then eat his flesh with the other?”

  Nalin laughed even louder at this. “You may become a Rockclave poet yet! Now, tidy your toys up and I’ll get you a cup of milk.”

  It was as Nalin rose that a frustrating but ultimately happy accident occurred. He’d left a vial of rare dragon saliva — also called fyredrench — on the edge of the bench, and his elbow clipped it as he brought himself to his weary feet. The vial tipped over, tumbling in the air. Nalin scrabbled to catch it but to no avail. The green glass shattered as it struck Palimin’s cave-stable.

  “Stand back.” He shouted at his son. He knew that one drop of the stuff could eat its way through even a stonegrabe’s flesh in a matter of seconds. Indeed, as they both watched, wide-eyed, the viscous fluid caused the limestone to seethe and bubble, weathering the rock away until it was a flowing trickle of goo in the sandpit. The liquid continued to eat its way downwards until a small crater had formed in the floor — and still the hole grew deeper!

  “Chikohk! Who would have thought?” Nalin exclaimed, realising he’d just wasted a month’s wages in that one vial. But, his frustration turned to glee as he contemplated the implications of this discovery.

  Perhaps, he thought, I may have stumbled on the solution to my problem.

  17

  The burni
ng of yesterday

  The Dragonians came to call it the Dead Zone. The Gigantes had another name — the Ever-forgotten Fields. Before the rise of Cuscosa and the swarming of the Kaldorans it was known as Lyn-Harath — the translation from Oldspeak meaning ‘soul rest.’ Encircled by the Black Mountains, this disc of land spanned seven periarchs in diameter, carpeted with lush meadows and rolling downs, home to a luxuriant myriad of creatures and flora. To those who made their pilgrimage there it was paradise. To the Gigantes it was home.

  This vision of teeming beauty is what Ebar liked to remember. He recalled how his people would pick luscious fruit from the trees throughout the sol to sustain them, and how the heavens blessed that pocket of landscape with even winds and light, warm rain. They would sit in their circles by the light of glow-lamps — for the wood of the forests was sacred — and invoke ancient magics. Their shamanism blessed the surrounding realms with bountiful crops and benevolent weather. They were sought out for their ability to heal the sick and bring comfort to the dying. They were a venerated people, though this was not their aim. Gigantes soothsayers wandered the lands from Escatar to Drumlig, applying their lore, donating herbal gifts and administering wisdom to grateful recipients. The thanks of the people were enough for them. The land gave its bounty freely, and they in turn passed on their blessings to all in need.

  But like anything precious, this pocket of paradise became coveted by the unenlightened eyes of others. Forces that wanted to claim it as their own plotted to acquire Lyn-Harath for their own ends. Thus came the time of the Decimation.