as if it were an effort to get the words past its over-large tongue.
Axis nodded and edged Belaguez forward a step. ―Who are you? What do you want of
us?‖ he asked.
The creature laughed, a horrible gurgling hiss. ―I? I am one of the favoured five—we are
the SkraeBold. We serve Gorgrael. What do we want? We want Tencendor, Rivkahson. We want
to see your fields and forests stained dark with the blood of your peoples. We are sick of
inhabiting only misty frozen wastes. We grow solid with our need, our hate.‖
―We will stand before you,‖ Magariz said flatly behind Axis. ―We will keep you to your
frozen wastes.‖
The SkraeBold tilted its head, opened its beak, and howled its amusement to the sky. All
the men shifted nervously as the sound crashed about them. The SkraeBold abruptly shut its beak
with an audible snap and looked back at them.
―You will not be able to stop us,‖ it hissed angrily. ―Gorgrael gives us strength. Gorgrael
recreates us from the flesh and blood that we kill for him. Once we were mist, now we can
walk.‖
Again a maddening thought hovered at the back of Axis‘ mind.
The SkraeBold continued. ―The day will come, soon, when your blood will feed my
brothers, when your daughters and sisters will offer us the use of their bodies in exchange for
their lives, when you, Rivkahson, will beg for mercy before Gorgrael!‖
Axis smiled coldly and leaned forward over the pommel of his saddle. ―I have a message
for your Gorgrael, SkraeBold. Tell him that my father loved me. Ask him, did his father love
him?‖
The creature took a step forward in fury and both Magariz and Belial lifted their swords,
but Axis did not move, keeping his smile on his face. ―I and my four brothers love Gorgrael!‖ it
screeched in fury. ―He needs no father but us! We were the ones who midwived his birth!‖
Then it simply faded. One moment it was there and the next it was not. With it went the
final vestiges of the mist.
Axis wheeled Belaguez about and smiled at his patrol. ―I think we have done enough this
day, my friends. Shall we ride for Gorkenfort?‖
Borneheld was at weapon practice in the fort‘s courtyard when the patrol returned, his
bare chest glistening with sweat even in the frigid air, his skin steaming, the heavy sword
hanging from both hands. To one side of the quadrangle Faraday watched, wrapped in her
dark-green cloak.
Nineteen men had ridden out early in the morning, including Axis, and nineteen returned.
They must have evaded all the wraiths, Borneheld thought as he swung round to receive them.
Cowards. Women. He failed to notice that all nineteen rode with straight and proud backs and
that whatever demons Axis had carried out with him earlier in the morning, he seemed to have lost them somewhere in the snowfields. Borneheld also failed to notice that the neck of Axis‘
grey stallion was spattered with blood, or that a goodly crowd of men had followed the patrol up
to Gorkenfort‘s gates. He most certainly did not notice the object that Axis carried half-hidden in
his cloak. Perhaps if he had noticed all these things he would have been a little more circumspect
in what he said in front of the many witnesses who crowded the large courtyard of Gorkenfort.
Jorge and Roland looked on from the parapets, while, unseen to most eyes, the three Sentinels
watched from behind a half-unloaded cart of supplies. They had feared deeply for the StarMan‘s
life out there this day.
Borneheld leaned on his sword, proud of his physique, as Axis stopped his horse some
ten paces away. ―Did your horse run too fast for the wraiths to catch you, BattleAxe?‖ he
sneered. ―Did you discover for yourself that only men can deal with these creatures? If you yet
have the bravery to admit your nerve has completely abandoned you I will summon enough
sympathy to find you a job cleaning the pots in the kitchens. You should be safe enough there.‖
He allowed himself a small laugh at his wit.
With his words Borneheld instantly lost the respect and loyalty of the nine of his own
men who had ridden in the patrol. Later he would lose the trust and respect of most of those the
nine spoke to. Axis simply smiled benignly and glanced across to Faraday, sketching a courtly
bow to her from Belaguez‘s saddle. ―Greetings, Duchess. I trust you slept easy last night?‖
Faraday stiffened, stung by his words. Her guilt at her betrayal of the man had kept her
sleepless long after Borneheld had rolled his heavy body away from hers.
Axis held her eyes for a moment, then glanced back towards Borneheld. He pushed the
hood of his cloak down about his shoulders so that now the weak noon sun caught the gold of his
hair and beard. His proud bearing and innate grace commanded the attention of all in the
courtyard. If a stranger had walked into the courtyard at that moment he would instantly have
assumed the golden-haired man on the grey stallion was a king and the more heavily muscled
man who faced him his subordinate.
Just as Borneheld opened his mouth, Axis raised his left hand and held the ghastly object
high for all to see. There was a collective gasp of repugnance. Axis‘ eyes had not left
Borneheld‘s. ―Gorgrael sends greetings, brother, and I present you with this wedding gift.
Enjoy.‖
He hurled the head at Borneheld‘s feet and Borneheld jumped out of the way, his face
recoiling with horror as the Skraeling head slid by him on the slippery cobbles to stop just short
of Faraday‘s feet. She took a huge breath and closed her eyes for a moment, but she held her
ground and finally looked away from the head and back at Axis. Her face was tightly impassive
but her eyes were dark with emotion. Her knuckles were white where they gripped her cloak.
―I thank you, Axis Rivkahson,‖ she said, her voice calm and dignified, ―that you thought
I should have deserved such a gift.‖
Axis‘ face hardened and he held her stare for a moment longer before he turned Belaguez
back towards the crowd gathered at the fortified gateway.
Borneheld‘s face darkened in fury as he stared at the repulsive head lying at his wife‘s
feet and heard the cheers of the crowd as they saluted Axis.
44
VOWS AND MEMORIES
Five days later Axis wrapped himself in a thick cloak against the cold, pulled the hood
down far over his face and stepped out through the gates of Gorkenfort, walking quickly down
through the streets of Gorkentown. Even though it was only mid-morning the streets were almost
bare of soldiers, the weather now so frigid that most only ventured outside for essentials. Death
lurked in the wind.
Axis did not see the two hooded and cloaked shadows following him from Gorkenfort,
one trailing the other by twenty or twenty-five paces.
He walked for fifteen minutes until he reached the all-but-deserted Retreat of the
Brotherhood of the Seneschal close to the outer wall of the town. The two surviving Brothers had
long since moved into the fort itself, but Axis had specifically asked the older Brother to meet
him here this morning. He had questions to ask. Here was another link with his mother.
The heavy wooden door was standing open, half off its hinges, and Axis quickly stepped
inside, grateful for the protection from the wind even though it was almost as cold inside as it
was out. He looked about him. The Retreat still bore the scars of the attack by Gorgrael‘s
creatures, the SkraeBolds and the Skraelings, several months previously. Once a comfortable
residence for brothers who desired to spend their lives in quiet meditation in northern Ichtar, now
torn hangings of drapes and tapestries flapped in the stiff breeze that wafted in through the open
doors, while the furniture was broken and strewn about the floors. Axis shrugged deeper inside
his cloak and wandered through the main apartments of the lower floor, occasionally coming
across fragments of torn books and pottery, and a spare habit or two left to hang behind a door or
on a nail in the wall, its owner long since dead.
Brother Francis was waiting for him in the kitchens. Stooped over an overturned cauldron
when Axis entered, he slowly straightened his arthritic spine and faced the BattleAxe.
―Greetings, BattleAxe.‖ He looked about the room for a moment, his transparent
blue-veined skin stretched tightly over the frail bones of his face. ―This was where so many of
the brothers died the night the creatures attacked. It was the only place they thought to find
weapons.‖ He picked up a poker and held it for a moment, his face sad. ―But pokers and pan
ladles are no match for the powers of such beasts as we faced that night.‖