Displayed within was a ring—impossibly delicate, and made of amethyst. It glittered with more than mere torchlight. Sorcery.
The man stepped close enough that Zok could smell his breath. Close enough that even a chained man could give him a good headbutt.
Zok lunged as best he could.
There was a pleasing crunch as Zok’s skull connected with nose-bone. The man let out a howl and a sob as he snapped back, his ruined nose bleeding badly. He dropped the jewellery box, clutched his face, and ran screaming from the room.
An hour passed as Zok watched the torch burn.
Just as the chains were really beginning to hurt, another man entered the stables. He was bigger than the last, with cold eyes. He held a broken broomstick in his right hand. Without saying a word, he walked over and shoved it hard into Zok’s guts. Then he jammed it into Zok’s balls. It hurt. Bad.
“You ready to wear the ring now? You get one chance before I fuck you with this.” He could have been talking about the weather.
Zok’s eyes still burned with tears of pain. “You win, tough man. Just get me some water, eh?”
The man said not a word. He picked up the jewellery box and drew the amethyst ring from it. Then he took hold of Zok’s left hand and placed the ring on his little finger.
As soon as he did so, the ring shimmered and disappeared, though Zok could still feel the cool stone against his skin. There was a flash of light, and suddenly Zok felt something cool and smooth around his neck.
A ring of amethyst, Zok guessed. Just like those the Eastlanders had worn.
The man with the broomstick left. What is going on here? Zok tested his chains again, but of course he was still held fast.
A moment later, Zok heard the slapping feet and wet huffing sounds of a riding beast outside. The stable door opened again, and someone lit torches, but when Zok’s eyes adjusted to the darkness, it was a man, not a beast that he saw entering.
He was a head shorter than Zok, and thin, but he carried himself with the confidence of a big man. And no wonder, given the shining tabard he wore over his armor.
Ah, shit in my stew! Not a Fatherpriest. Zok didn’t mind the road-priests who, nominally at least, followed every one of the Thousand Gods. But he had never met a man who wore the shining tabard who wasn’t a pompous sack of scum. And they had the power of the Empress behind them, which made them dangerous scum. A man with a sword at his hip followed the priest in, then closed the door and stood silently beside it.
The Fatherpriest studied Zok again for a long moment, as if he were considering buying a horse. Let him come check my teeth, then, and I’ll bite off his fucking fingers.
But he stayed a good ten feet back from Zok. “My son. You are called Zok Ironeyes, yes?” he said at last. “I am Father Gabrien, servant of the Fathergod. I have...”
Zok hawked up what wretchedness he could from the back of his throat and spit it at the man, besmirching his pristine tabard and cutting off his speech. “What have you done with my partner?” Zok shouted. “She had better be alive, shit-for-breath!”
Zok had hoped to goad the man close enough to bite him. But the priest showed no rage. He smiled mirthlessly, ignoring Zok’s question.
Gabrien ignored the question. “I am about to unchain you, my son. Do not think to attack me. For at my command, that necklace you wear—my little gift to you—will return to the size of a finger-ring. Depending on which command word I use, it can either behead you as it does so, or reappear on your hand as a harmless but valuable piece of jewellery. Do you understand?”
Zok nodded once. Gabrien’s men opened the locks on his chains. Zok suppressed his rage as best he could, keeping his hands from their throats. The Fatherpriest wouldn’t have had the nerve to unchain Zok unless he were telling the truth about the amethyst necklace.
“Tell me what you know of the Shadow Weavers, Zok Ironeyes.”
The Shadow Weavers? What is this madman about? Zok wondered. He spoke slowly. “The demon-men of the Old Far North, or so the stories go. Ages ago, led by the Dark King, The Man-Shadow, they swept over all of the lands of the Empire That Was. Shadow, shadow, black as night / Grew until it murdered light.” Zok spoke the words of the boyhood rhyme without quite meaning to. “Why are you asking me about children’s tales? And WHERE IS MY PARTNER?”
“The children’s tales tell more truth than you know, my son. Three thousand years ago, the Shadow Weavers—the spawn of man and demon—poured forth from the Plain of Ice and Iron. Northlands, Southlands, Eastlands, Westlands—everywhere they butchered men like animals and ate their souls. Entire kingdoms were slaughtered. Mankind was very nearly destroyed.
“Only the Twelve Clans survived, led by Virgin Queen Glora, whom the Fathergod, in His wisdom, chose as a messenger and a vessel. It was she who finally destroyed the Dark King in single combat, she who sent the Shadow Weavers scurrying back to their holes of cold and metal, but in the battle she was gravely wounded.
“When she died, the Fathergod brought her to His side, to sit at His right hand and bask in the glow of His love, away from the painful world of men.”
Zok yawned, perhaps more loudly than was strictly necessary. He had not been to a Church of the Fathergod in decades, but he remembered the stories well enough. They were no less dull to him now than they’d been as a child, but Gabrien surely had some point to all this blathering.
The Fatherpriest showed no sign that he’d heard Zok’s yawn. “Queen Glora rejoiced to finally be in her Celestial Father’s presence. But she knew that the Weavers would return one day, and that mankind would need a great power to defeat them. Thus she selflessly asked the Fathergod to...”
“...to pour her soul into the Diamond Diadem that our Empresses have worn for a thousand years. The Diadem proves the righteous rule of so on and so forth and so forth and so on. Get to the point, priest.”
Gabrien smiled too broadly for Zok’s liking. “The point, my son, is that the Diadem our Empress wears is a sham.”
“And? Do you want me to act surprised? What does this have to do with me?”
“This concerns all humanity,” Gabrien said quietly. His arrogance was gone. “For the Shadow Weavers are rising again. Indeed, a few of their number already live among us.”
“You’re mad.” Zok said it as soon as he realized it, but he wished he’d held his tongue. The raving priest still held Zok’s life in his hands.
“You’ll see soon enough that I speak the truth, Zok Ironeyes. But there is hope. For I know where the true Diamond Diadem is. And you are going to get it for me.”
Zok grunted.
“I have heard of your talents as a thief and a warrior, my son. And though the Fathergod frowns sternly on true thievery, I have need of your skills. As well as those of your... creature.” Gabrien gestured toward the stable doors, and his lackey opened them.
Hai Hai walked in, a broad man with a spear following her. She was not chained. She even wore her sabers, though they were bound with peace knots. But glittering at her neck was a thin band of amethyst.
Creature. Ages ago, the beastmen—including Hai Hai’s people—were born from dark sorcery. They did not have souls as men did. It was thus a doctrine of the Fatherpriests that the beastmen were no more than animals. But Zok would not let the insult stand, even if Hai Hai hadn’t heard it.
“She is my partner, priest, not a creature.”
Gabrien waved it away, his gauntlet creaking. Hai Hai was brought to Zok’s side, and he exchanged a silent nod with her. Gabrien still spoke only to Zok. “Let me, as you say, get to the point, Zok Ironeyes. I wish to hire you!”