“Drem,” Byrne called, and he hurried past the bulk of Balur to walk alongside his aunt. To either side, carved out of the cave walls, were more open cells, iron bars rusted. Here and there a smaller tunnel branched off. At each of these one of Byrne’s guards stopped, a guardian against any hidden foes creeping up on them out of the darkness.
This is not a good place to be caught in an ambush, Drem thought.
Balur stuck his head inside one of the open cells, holding a torch he’d taken from the wall and lit with Keld’s. He wrinkled his nose and spat.
“When you came here before, did you enter this place?” Byrne asked Drem.
“No,” Drem replied. He had been to the mine twice: once on his own, searching for his father’s murderers, and once with Sig, Keld and Cullen. “I did hear… things, in here, though.”
“What things?” Byrne asked.
“Ferals, I think,” Drem said, straining his memories. “It was the night Sig fell. We were fighting, out there.” He nodded back towards the circle of daylight disappearing behind them. “Cullen was standing on the table, I was with Sig.” He paused, frowning. “Keld opened the cages in the cliff face, letting the Ferals who weren’t loyal to Fritha out. It was chaos, you understand, but I can remember hearing howling, like a storm, deafening, echoing out of the tunnel mouth.”
“Hmm,” Byrne said. “Ferals.” She nodded, looking either side of them. “A lot of empty cages.”
“They’re not here now, though, more’s the pity,” a voice said behind Drem. Cullen, he realized.
Byrne looked at Cullen and frowned. “So, where are the Ferals now?”
“Food for crows,” Cullen said, grinning. “We carved them all up back in the Desolation.”
Drem shook his head. “There are a lot of cages down here,” he said.
Byrne nodded. “We fought many Ferals, but this many?”
Ahead of them the torch stopped moving. Keld was standing and staring at something ahead. Drem saw Fen take a few steps ahead of Keld, muscles tense and coiled, as if he was hunting something. Ralla, the red-furred hound that had belonged to another hunter lost in the battle at the Desolation, paced forwards with a deep-throated growl, to stand beside Fen.
The group moved to join Keld, staring ahead to where the tunnel entered a large chamber. The scuff of their boots on stone echoed into the dark. The path curved left and right into the darkness.
A cavern?
A terrible smell pervaded the air. Decay, faeces and urine.
And before them was a drop, their torchlight flickering down into what looked like a pit, the sides too uniform to have been made naturally. It was deep, but in the dim light Drem saw shadowed shapes on the ground, utterly still. Without thinking, his seax was in his fist.
Balur stepped to the side and raised his torch to a sconce in the wall, lighting another torch, its flames crackling into life and illuminating more of the room.
Cullen slipped past them and walked along the left pathway, taking the torch and lighting others set into the walls.
Light slowly seeped into the chamber. Drem saw that the motionless shapes in the pit were cadavers, piles of skin and bone. Misshapen skeletons with long claws and too many teeth, elongated spines, sometimes a clump of fur.
“Ferals,” Utul said.
“Dead Ferals,” Cullen said, looking down into the pit with interest. “Anything that did walk or draw breath is long gone.” He wrinkled his nose. “Or long dead.”
A sound drifted out of the darkness.
A scraping and wheezing.
The sound was coming from the pit.
Something crawled out of the shadows, human-like in shape, in that it had a head, two arms and two legs, but there were patches of fur on an elongated skull, its lower jaw was distended, teeth like tusks curling out over its snout, and its hind legs were bunched and misshapen with muscle. With one long-clawed hand it reached forwards to dig into the hard-packed earth and drag itself along. The other arm was twisted tight to its body, like an old, arthritic man’s. It made a snuffling, rasping sound from deep in its throat.
Fen and Ralla’s growling grew deeper, more malevolent.
A Feral, Drem thought, though it didn’t resemble the creatures he had fought in the Desolation. They were all mutated, twisted beings, animals and humans merged with dark magic. But the animal part of most of the creatures Drem had fought resembled wolven. This thing before him looked more as if it had started life as a boar.
“I’ll put it out of its misery,” Cullen said, with a grimace.
Before Byrne could say anything, Cullen had jumped into the pit. He threw his torch behind the crawling thing, revealing an empty space behind the creature.
Cullen’s sword hissed from its scabbard.
The thing on the ground had seen or smelled Cullen and dragged itself towards the red-haired warrior. It left gouged tracks in the ground behind it, and in its wake some kind of dark fluid moistened the hard earth.
It crawled to a stop before Cullen, taking deep snorting breaths, apparently exhausted.
“Poor beast,” Cullen said.
It sniffed, a wet snorting, its one good arm hovering in the air, its hind legs scrabbling, bunching under its torso.
“Get out of there, you idiot,” Byrne called down to Cullen furiously, “until we have this room lit.”
“It’s as weak as a newborn,” Cullen assured her, eyes fixed on the creature at his feet. The thing looked up at Cullen, then, in a shocking burst of speed, it erupted towards him, hind legs propelling it forwards. Its one good arm wrapped around Cullen’s leg and it sank its tusks into his calf.
Cullen screamed, shock and pain mingled, and he hacked down at the thing. His blade bit, but not as deep as Drem had expected; the thick folds of skin on the creature snared Cullen’s sword. Blood welled.
Byrne was shouting orders as Drem leaped down after his friend. It had not been a conscious decision. His seax and small axe were in his fists, gleaming red and gold in the flickering torchlight as he broke into a run.
Sounds came from the darkness: snorting, scrabbling noises.
Drem heard Byrne’s voice, followed by Balur One-Eye’s battle roar and the ground trembled as the giant jumped into the pit after him. Drem was close to Cullen now and raised his axe as he ran.
Something slammed into Drem’s side, sending him flying through the air. He hit the ground hard, air punched from his lungs, and tumbled with something heavy on him, another Feral—solid, all muscle, coiled strength and a frenzied, ravenous hunger. The sharp stench of urine and blood filled his senses. He struck at it, felt his axe bite, then lost his grip on it as they rolled. He had a glimpse of tusks and rowed teeth, of snapping jaws and fetid breath. Still rolling, he stabbed with his seax, which did better than his axe. He felt the blade pierce the thick hide and sink deep, felt blood well over the hilt, over his glove and soak into his linen undershirt. With a high-pitched squeal, the creature pulled away. Drem yanked on his seax but it grated on bone, was snagged somehow, and the blade was ripped out of his hand.
Drem crashed into one of the cadavers. It exploded, covering him with stinking strips of skin and gnawed bone. He scrambled to his feet, breath heaving, a hot pain radiating from his ribs where the thing had connected with him. There were rents in his mail, rings hanging. In his peripheral vision he glimpsed Cullen still hacking at the creature trying to eat his leg, many more of the beasts attacking a handful of Byrne’s honour guard who had joined them in the pit, and Balur One-Eye swinging his hammer.
Drem realized he was standing a dozen paces from the boar-thing that had attacked him, with no weapons in his hands.
Then it was coming at him again.
Stumbling away, he reached for his father’s sword, sheathed at his hip, had a moment to wish he had a boar spear with a cross-bar, probably the best way to kill one of these things and keep it from goring him with its tusks. His draw turned into an upward cut, the blade’s tip shearing through the beast’s lower jaw, cutting through one tusk and up, through its cheek and on, carving through its brain and exploding from its skull in a spray of teeth and blood, brain matter and fragments of skull. The Feral’s charge powered it on a dozen paces before its body realized it was dead and it crashed to the ground, skidding to a halt.
Drem had half a heartbeat to stare at the dead Feral before another one crashed into his legs, hurling him into the air. This one was bigger. Its momentum carried it on beneath him as Drem slammed into the ground behind it, feeling a sharp pain in his shoulder as he started to rise. The beast skidded, already turning, its feet scrambling for purchase on the bones and carcasses scattering the cavern floor.
It came at him again, snorting and squealing, tusks gleaming. Drem desperately tried to lever himself upright with his sword, knowing he was too slow.
Two snarling wolven-hounds collided with the onrushing creature, knocking it off course, and it stumbled past Drem. Fen and Ralla, their jaws wide and biting, ripping chunks out of the Feral.
It came to a halt, twisting and spinning shockingly fast, its head catching Fen, hurling the wolven-hound into the air. Ralla snarled and threw herself onto the creature. Drem was on his feet now, rushing forwards, sword raised, and then Keld was there, sword and axe a blur, blood in the air.
The creature screamed, gurgled, legs spasming as it collapsed.
Keld wrenched his axe from the dead beast’s skull.
“LASAIR!” Byrne’s voice yelled behind Drem, and he turned to see her in the pit with them. Her sword was covered in blood, Ferals lying dead about her, and Utul was close by, chopping, slicing and stabbing at a trio of attackers. Byrne raised her hands and pointed towards an unlit torch upon the pit wall. It sparked into life, almost immediately followed by the one next to it, and then all of the torches in the chamber were bursting into flame, a wildfire chain reaction rippling around the huge cavern, light flaring bright.
The pit was revealed in its entirety: a broad stinking hole scattered with half-decomposed remains and hunger-mad creatures. One of the Ferals that appeared dead still moved, just raising its head where it lay, too emaciated and debilitated to move. Others had clearly been feeding on the weakest and were still strong.
Ethlinn was in the pit, standing close to Balur, stabbing with her spear. A handful of Byrne’s honour guard were hacking at the frenzied creatures. Balur One-Eye’s hammer swung in a deadly rhythm, his new longsword strapped across his back.
This is hammer-work, little grace to it, or needed.
Bones were smashed to kindling.
And then it was all over.
A Feral’s squeal quietened to a weak rattle and then a final sigh. Cullen kicked and shook himself free of the creature that had clung to him, dead now, Cullen’s sword red to the hilt. He surveyed the room, his eyes coming to rest on Byrne, who was scowling at him, and he gave a shame-faced shrug.
“See, I said I’d put it out of its misery,” he said.
Only the sound of warriors breathing hard, and then Balur’s rumbling laughter.
“What is this place, anyway?” Cullen muttered, looking around.
“It looks like Fritha’s breeding chamber,” Drem said, his toe nudging a pile of gnawed bones. They were small—a cub, or a bairn.
Or both, combined.
“Aye,” Byrne agreed, a look of sorrow on her face.
“Why were they not with Fritha, at the battle in the Desolation?” Cullen murmured.
“Perhaps these weak, deformed ones remained behind,” Ethlinn said, “and they bred.”
Drem nodded; he thought that made sense, though he placed a hand on his throbbing ribs.
Not that weak.
“This Fritha has unleashed a new evil upon the world,” Ethlinn said to herself, as she crouched and rested a hand upon one of the dead Ferals. “I can feel the earth power in it, twisted and tainted.” She sighed. “These poor creatures. What has this Fritha done?”
Drem hadn’t thought of that, Fritha’s creations unleashed upon the world, breeding and mutating, adapting. The Banished Lands were dangerous enough, without Fritha’s new terrors stalking it.
Fritha has much to answer for.
There was the slap of feet, echoing louder down the chamber. They all turned, weapons ready, as a figure emerged from the tunnel entrance and looked down into the pit.
It was Shar, a Jehar warrior and Utul’s captain. Her long dark hair was plastered to her head with sweat and she was breathing hard.
“We’ve found something,” she said.
Drem stood on the shore of Starstone Lake, its slate-grey water glistening in the summer sun. To the south beyond the lake there was a smudge of green-topped hills, and to the east Drem heard the faint sound of gulls, a reminder of how close they were to the Grinding Sea. Decades ago, a canal had been dug by the first inhabitants of Kergard, leagues long, joining what had once been this huge crater to the sea. And then the waters had flooded in, filling the crater and turning it into a lake. That had been the beginning of the Desolation becoming habitable once more.
Since then more and more people had crept into the north, fleeing the strict rule of the Ben-Elim, or just wanting a more solitary life. Drem and his da had been part of that movement. Kergard had been a thriving town when they had come north, and had grown with every passing year.
Kergard is thriving no more. It is an empty, desolate place now.
Drem had passed through the town the day before. Part of it had burned down, gaping holes in the stockade wall, buildings—including Hildith’s mead-hall—little more than ash-filled foundations. But much of the town stood as Drem remembered it. Just empty. Like a dead, soulless corpse.
A number of piers and jetties jutted out over the lake’s water and the ground showed signs of a lot of movement. The shore was rutted with wide wheel tracks, the evidence of many boots lay all along this stretch of land. Abandoned cranes on the piers creaked in the breeze.
But this was not what Drem was staring at, alongside Byrne, Ethlinn and the others. They were standing before a boatshed, one of many along the lakeshore. Within it was a large timber scaffolding frame, discarded tools and offcuts of timber, empty barrels lined along one wall. Keld approached one and looked in.
“Pitch pine,” he muttered, then looked at Byrne. “Caulking for a ship’s hull.”
“Now we know why Gulla was not with Fritha, or to be found anywhere in the Desolation,” Balur One-Eye rumbled. “He’s sailed away, with a warband far larger than the one we fought.”
“Where is the sneaky bastard, then?” Cullen said. His calf was bandaged and he’d walked from the mine with a limp.
Drem turned, looking out across the lake, towards the wide canal that led to the Grinding Sea. He remembered a dark night, watching as ships rowed towards one of the piers, Kadoshim flying in the sky above them. He remembered what those ships carried.
Asroth’s hand, cut from him in the Great Hall of Drassil.
He looked to Byrne.
“There is a reason that Kol and his Ben-Elim have not joined us,” Byrne said, arriving at the same conclusion as Drem. “Fritha was a lure, to keep us in the north, and out of Gulla’s way.”
She looked at them all with a sombre gaze.
“Gulla has attacked Drassil.”