“By the Dark Queen’s heads,” Dhamon groaned. “The wight told me his kind steal memories.”
“I’d say there are more than one of ’em in this town,” Ragh said.
“The people can’t remember their names. They can’t remember to charge for their goods and services.”
What by all that’s sacred did the wight take from me? he thought. Nothing important, surely, I have no holes in my memory. I’m certain I fought the wight off before it could do real harm. But these people apparently aren’t able to fight them off.
“We’ve got to get out of here.”
Fiona stood, hands on her hips. “No, we’ve got to help these people. Make them realize if they fight back…”
“Impossible.” The draconian’s eyes glowed faintly red in the darkness. “They won’t believe you.
They don’t have enough intelligence left in their thick skulls to believe you—to believe any of us. All they want is for you and me and Dhamon to stay, to teach them. Except when the wights find us maybe they won’t leave us with anything worth teaching.”
Dhamon gripped the bars tighter and pulled, feeling a slight sense of movement. The bars were imbedded in a hardened clay floor and ceiling. It wouldn’t take him too long if he could muster his strength. “I won’t lie down and die,” he said, working on the bars. “I have things to do. We’re getting out of here.”
Ragh growled from deep in his chest and also grabbed the bars of his cell. Muscles bunching, the draconian strained to budge them. “It’s worth trying.”
The hallway door creaked open, torchlight spilling in.
“Maybe I can help.”
“Maldred!”
“Dhamon, my friend, how do you manage to find yourself in such hopeless predicaments?” Maldred ducked his head to pass through the doorframe, the torchlight revealing he was in his true ogre form. His wide, blue shoulders were a tight fit in the hallway, and the top of his white-maned head brushed the ceiling. Despite his ragged clothes, he was a welcome sight. The torch was small in his large fist.
“But… how, how did you get out of Shrentak, and how did you find us here?” an astonished Dhamon asked.
“I have magic, remember?”
Dhamon glanced at Ragh, who shrugged. Fiona’s eyes were narrowed, but she said nothing. Maldred passed Dhamon the torch, then knelt on the ground, fingers spread wide over the hardened clay. His long white hair fell over his shoulders and down his arms and hid his face. The torchlight danced across his form, exaggerating his massive muscles and the thick veins that stood out.
“What are you doing?” This question came from Ragh.
“Magic. Will you keep it down?” Maldred started humming softly, a tune with no identifiable melody or predictable rhythm. As it quickened, his fingers burrowed in the softening clay. Ripples spread outward from his hands, the clay becoming like mud.
Dhamon found he could more easily move the bars. Ragh’s also gave way a little.
“A little more,” Dhamon coaxed.
“Trying,” Maldred replied, as he interrupted his humming. “Odd,” he added. “It’s getting cold in here.”
The magic humming resumed. Dhamon dropped his torch and worked faster with both hands. The cold meant the presence of wights. Eyes darting, he looked in the shadows for glowing, undead eyes. His breath feathered away from his face as he wrenched the wall of bars loose.
“The shadow men are coming,” Ragh growled.
“Aye,” Dhamon said, stepping to the other cell and helping the draconian work on those bars. With one final heave, the two loosened the bars enough so Ragh and Fiona could squeeze out.
Fiona clutched the bundle of clothes to her chest. Breath misting in front of her, she fixed her eyes on Maldred.
“Liar. Liar. Liar,” she said.
Dhamon shivered to feel the air growing colder still. “Mak we’ve got to get out of here now. There are…” He swallowed his words as he glanced to the far end of the hallway where three distinct shadows had separated and formed manlike images. Their eyes glowed eerily, and their insubstantial hands reached out at them, claws elongating like slithering serpents.
“By my father!” Maldred boomed. “What are those strange creatures?”
“Around here, they call them shadow men,” Ragh answered.
“Foul undead,” Dhamon spat. “Wights! And we’ve got nothing to fight them with!”
Maldred reached for his sword, and the shadows cackled.
“That won’t work,” Dhamon said. He started backing his companions toward the door at the other end of the hallway.
“Maybe this will work.” Maldred pulled something out from under his ragged tunic, cradling it in front of him so the others couldn’t see. “I’ll get us all out of here,” he said. He focused his magical and physical energy, gripped the dragon scale hard, and snapped it in two.
“Liar. Liar. Liar,” Fiona repeated venomously, as a swirling gray mist rose up around them and transported them out of the jail.
Chapter Eight
Shadows of the Past
Dhamon was confronted by a vast emptiness, unending black stretching in all directions. There was nothing to hint at shapes or shadows, but he felt as if he was moving, his feet dangling yet touching nothing. He held his arms up, then stretched them out in front of him and to his sides, his fingers feeling only warm, humid air.
It was a startling change from the cool breeze that had wafted into his jail cell and comforted him until it turned into the frightening, cold currents of the Chaos wights.
He tried to call for Maldred but sucked in a fetid taste and scent. He couldn’t hear himself, couldn’t even hear the beating of his own heart. The taste and scent increased.
It was all magic, he knew, and he should have asked, when Maldred cast his spell, that they all be spirited away to Southern Ergoth, to the far coast where the Solamnic outpost stood. But Maldred had acted too fast. Dhamon hadn’t had a chance to tell him where they were going, so now where was he taking them? Perhaps the Qualinesti Forest, perhaps the eastern shore of Nostar. Certainly not back to the ogre lands.
Dhamon was more curious than worried, as any magic created by Maldred was bound to be a positive enchantment. He called out to Fiona, however, on the chance she might be able to hear him, to reassure her that everything was all right and that she had no cause for alarm. He received no reply.
He continued to float in the nothingness, noting that he was feeling increasingly fatigued—either because quite a bit of time was passing or more likely because Maldred’s spell was somehow sapping his energy. Perhaps Maldred was drawing on his energy.
“Maldred,” he tried to call again. This time at least he heard himself.
A change occurred in the air. The temperature grew warmer still and the fetid smell much stronger.
There were variations in the blackness now, suggestions of blues and grays and faint images that resembled shields, as though rows of knights were standing on each other’s shoulders, three or four men high. He shivered, though it was warm, not cold.
“Maldred?”
“Here, Dhamon.”
“Where are we?”
“My spell’s taken us far away from that jail.”
Dhamon heard strange sounds: a rough, constant “shushing”, the flutter of something like leaves blown in the wind, the muted cry of a shrike, and the throaty cry of a burrowing owl.
“Mal, where?”
It was still night, wherever they were. They were no longer near the sea; there was not a trace of salt-tinged air. However, Dhamon thought he detected the sulfurous scent of a blacksmith’s shop, and now he could sense the draconian and the familiar presences of Fiona and of Maldred. The rank smell overpowered everything, however.