The squealing and grunting were deafening. A crimson tunnel closed in around his vision, darkening the world.
Murtagh groped for Zar’roc. His fingers found the pommel, but he didn’t have room to draw the sword while lying on his belly.
A word from the ancient language leapt to mind. A single utterance and he could drive the boars away or else kill them entirely. But then he would have failed Bachel’s challenge, and failure was more painful than the blows battering his frame.
He managed a quick, shallow breath. It wasn’t enough.
Blast it. He was running out of time. If—
He cried out in pain as a boar stomped on his right elbow. His wards kept the joint from breaking, but the pressure pushed his arm into the soft soil, and the angle caused something in his elbow to stretch or snap.
Then a black hoof came down along the side of his head, scraping his skull, and the impact whipped his neck to the side.
Stars filled his vision, and the world grew dark and hazy, and all sound faded into the distance, dimly heard and badly apprehended.
CHAPTER VIII
Mother’s Mercy
A black sun rimmed by black flame hung against a darkling sky. The stars were faded, guttering; the air cold and dry, and a bitter wind blew from the north.
The world was dead. All the ground was cracked and charred as by Nal Gorgoth. Bare trees stood on the flanks of slumped mountains, the sharpness of their peaks defeated by the passage of uncounted eons. No birds or beasts were to be seen; if he wandered to the ends of the land, he knew he would find nothing but bones and ashes.
Existence was a tomb wherein the sins of the past lay interred.
But no…not entirely.
Ahead of him, close to the dim grey horizon, an enormous section of the ground heaved upward, as if the world itself were breaking apart, but the sawbacked enormity moved and shifted as only a living creature could. Flecks of red flashed from the silhouette, like coals seen through smoked glass.
Dread consumed him. Total, thought-destroying dread that caused his limbs to go limp and his mind to go slack with unremitting fear. All had been lost, and there before him lay the instrument of their destruction.
The beast rose rampant against the black sun—a wingless dragon, apocalyptic in size, terrifying in presence. Destroyer of hope, eater of light, snake-tongued and hook-clawed.
And the beast turned, and its flaming eye settled on him, and he shrank before it, feeling death’s cold touch seize his heart, feeling the helpless, inevitable surrender before what could not be changed, what could not be stopped.
The dragon’s mouth parted, and withering flame lit its maw, and—
“Wake! Wake, Kingkiller!”
Murtagh’s eyes snapped open, and he jolted upright with a panicked yell as fire coursed through his veins and his heart convulsed like a dying rabbit.
Bachel stood over him, blood-smeared, black-bladed dagger in one hand, spear in the other. Grieve and her warriors ringed them, and half a dozen dead hogs lay on the trampled ground nearby: a battlefield in miniature, but no less fraught or deadly because of it.
Before Murtagh could collect himself well enough to understand what had happened, much less speak, Thorn crashed through the forest of mushrooms, roaring as he came. He stopped directly over Murtagh and turned and snarled as he searched for foes. The sun was behind Thorn, and his scales sparked red and bright.
The sight caused Murtagh to flinch as he remembered his vision of desolation. Deathly fear again gripped him.
Thorn reached for him with a paw, as if to pick him up and fly away, and Murtagh raised a hand. “No,” he croaked. “I’m fine.” He wasn’t, and Thorn knew it.
The dragon said, Are you wounded?
Murtagh got to his feet, unsteady. He checked himself. None of the blood seemed to be his, but his right elbow throbbed, and it was already starting to swell. He bent and extended his arm; it still moved as it should. So nothing torn. He cast a quick healing spell—careful to speak the words without sound—and only then noticed how deeply exhausted his wards had left him. His hands and feet were cold, and there was a gnawing hunger in his belly. Nothing too serious. Did you see what I saw?…The dragon?
No, said Thorn, baring even more of his teeth. Your mind was closed to me.
Murtagh was so shaken, he didn’t pause to consider the wisdom of his action as he shared the memory with Thorn in all its terror-inducing immediacy. A deep hiss came from Thorn, and he dug his claws into the ground. Murtagh felt his own fear reflected in Thorn’s thoughts.
It was just a dream, Murtagh hastily said.
An evil one, though. Perhaps it was more than just a dream.
A premonition? They can’t reach that far into the future.
Thorn shivered and lowered his head until his eyes were level with Murtagh’s. Is that known for sure? Who has proved it?
I—
“My son, are you hurt?” asked Bachel. She pointed with her dagger at the blood on Murtagh’s chest. His jerkin was torn, and the air was cold against his skin. “You are covered in gore.”
The tip of the dagger was uncomfortably close. Murtagh fell back a half step. His hand moved to Zar’roc’s hilt. “Not hurt, no. Thank you for…helping.”
The witch nodded, satisfied. She wiped her dagger on her leather vambrace and sheathed it. “It is better to hunt as part of a group than to hunt alone.”
“You might be right.” He shivered and rubbed his arms, trying to coax warmth back into his limbs. “When I was on the ground, I saw…I saw a vision. An evil one.”
Bachel’s expression grew intense, and she stepped forward and grasped his shoulder with her free hand. Surprised, he resisted the urge to knock her hand away. The witch’s grip was like heated iron. “A vision,” she said, her voice low and forceful. “Describe it to me, my son. Quickly now, before your memory fades. It is important.”
Annoyed but also curious, Murtagh complied, speaking in swift, short sentences, eager to force the words out so he could stop thinking about the black sun and the impossibly large dragon….
Grieve and the warriors listened with close attention, and they murmured with what seemed to be either awe or reverence as he described the dragon.
“Ah,” said Bachel. “You are indeed fortunate.” She released him and circled her hand above her head, indicating both the small side valley and the cleft that contained Nal Gorgoth. “All who come here dream, but few there are who receive such clear portents, and those who do often become Speakers themselves.”
“Have there been many Speakers?” asked Murtagh.
“My Lady,” said Grieve in a tense voice. “It is not right for an outsider to kn—”
“Tsk, tsk,” said Bachel. “Our guest is no ordinary person. Indeed not.” A disapproving scowl settled on Grieve’s seamed face, and he pulled at the cuff of his blood-splattered robe in a nervous, angry manner, as if what he really wanted to do was wrap his thick fingers around Murtagh’s neck.
In a grand voice, the witch said, “There have been many Speakers—some false, some true—through the ages. We are Du Eld Draumar, and we have lived in these places of power since before elves were elves. We were known to the Grey Folk themselves…known and feared.”