As he spoke, the Ancient lifted his arm and signaled behind him.
Dantanna’s eyes went wide, and he thrashed about painfully, pitifully. Ancient Badden watched passively as Dantanna was slowly lowered into the gorge, the younger man sputtering desperate pleas. The agony in his shattered legs did not even register any longer through the thickening wall of sheer terror. He screamed his repentance to Ancient Badden, but the old and wicked Samhaist had taken up an ancient song of praise to the great D’no, the white worm god.
Dantanna tried to settle his thoughts. He bent a bit at the waist to get a glance at the rope bound to his ankle, noting that it was the same one that bound his hands. He growled and tried to curl up to get near to that rope. He wanted to free himself, to fall the remaining distance and kill himself outright!
Better that!
But Dantanna’s executioner was no novice, and the young priest could get nowhere near the binding cord, nor could he hope to free his hands. In the dimming light he could see the myriad tunnels along the sides of the chasm. The ice was wet down here, as the pieces melted by D’no, blended as they were with the mist of glacial trolls’ blood, could not fully refreeze. The web of tunnels. The burrowing of D’no.
From somewhere deep within the ice of the gorge’s northern side came a guttural rumble, the growl of a monstrous beast.
Dantanna touched down on the wet ice, a trickle of water running past him. Now he scrambled more furiously, tugging his hands from side to side. Somehow he managed to pull one free, and the other slipped out of the noose. He rolled over and sat up, grimacing against the waves of pain emanating from his legs.
“Crawl, crawl,” he gasped, working desperately at the ties about his ankle. His hands were numb and cold, though, and he couldn’t get a proper grip on the rope. He cursed and fought harder. He heard a rumbling growl. Right behind him.
Dantanna’s heart pounded in his chest. The growl became a hiss. He could feel the intense heat of D’no. He turned to face his doom just as the giant worm lashed at him.
From the platform above the crevice, Ancient Badden could see nothing of the feast. But he heard the screams. Indeed, he heard the horrified, delicious screams.
The rope tugged and jerked a couple of times.
The screaming stopped.
Ancient Badden motioned behind him, and the trolls operating the crank began turning it furiously, working with the frenzy of creatures who knew that they might be the next down the rope if they disappointed their mighty master.
Ancient Badden chuckled when the rope came up, to see the bottom half of Dantanna’s leg still attached, the skin of the upper calf blackened by the heat of D’no.
Ancient Badden casually freed the limb from the rope and tossed it back into the gorge. Then, with a look of disgust at Dantanna’s betrayal, he used his foot to sweep the troll ears into the chasm, as well.
“Eat well, Ancient One,” he said.
THREE
Rocks, Always Rocks
Rocks, rocks, it’s always rocks!” the young and strong man complained, his muscular bare arms glistening with sweat. He was tall, more than halfway between six and seven feet, and though he had lost considerable weight on this multiyear journey, he did not appear skinny and he was certainly not frail, his lean muscles standing taut and strong. A mop of blond hair covered his head, bespeaking his Vanguard heritage, and he wore a scraggly beard, for even though his superiors disapproved of it, they would not enforce their rules against facial hair when they possessed no implement to easily be rid of it. He stood on a slope of brown dirt and gray stones-fewer near him now, since he had already tossed scores over the ridge so that they would roll and bounce down near to the wall the man and his companions were repairing. He hoisted another one, brought it near his shoulder, and heaved it out. It didn’t quite make the lip and began to roll back his way. He intercepted it with a few fast strides, planting his foot against it and holding it in place before it could gain any real momentum.
“Catch your breath, Brother Cormack,” said an older monk, middle-aged and with more skin than hair atop his head. “The air is particularly warm this day.”
Cormack did take a deep breath, then gathered up his heavy woolen robes and pulled them over his head, leaving him naked other than a bulky white cloth loincloth.
“Brother Cormack!” the other monk, Giavno by name, scolded.
“Always rocks,” Cormack argued, his bright green eyes flaring with intensity. He made no move to retrieve his heavy robe. “Ever since we came to this cursed island we have done nothing more than pile rocks.”
“Cursed?” Giavno said, shaking his head and wearing an expression of utter disappointment. “We were sent north to frozen Alpinador to begin a chapel, Brother. For the glory of Blessed Abelle. You would call that cursed?” He swept his arm to his left, beyond the ridge and to the small stone church the brothers had constructed. They had placed it on the highest point on the island; it dominated the view though the square structure was no more than thirty feet on any side.
Cormack put his hands on his hips, laughed, and shook his head helplessly. They had departed Chapel Pellinor in Vanguard more than three years before, all full of excitement and a sense of great purpose. They were to travel to the fierce mountainous northland of Alpinador, home of the pagan barbarians, and spread the word of Blessed Abelle. They would save souls with their gemstone magic and the truth and beauty of their message.
But they had found only battle and outrage and their every word had sounded as insult to the proud and strong northmen. Running for their lives more than proselytizing, the band had become lost in short order and had stumbled and bumbled their way along for weeks with the freezing winter closing in all around them. Surely the nearly two score monks and their like number of servants would have found a cold and empty death, but they had happened upon this place, a huge lake of warm waters and perpetual steam, a place of islands small and large. Father De Guilbe, who led their expedition, proclaimed it a miracle and decided that here, on these waters, they would fulfill their mission and build their chapel.
Here, Cormack mused, on a lump of rock in the middle of the water.
“Rocks,” Cormack grumbled, and he bent low and picked up the heavy stone again, this time heaving it far over the ridgeline.
“The lake teems with fish and food. Have you ever tasted water so fine?” said Giavno, his voice wistful. “The heat of the water saved us from the Alpinadoran winter. You should be more grateful, Brother.”
“We were sent here for a reason beyond our simple survival.”
Giavno launched into another long sermon about the duties of a monk of Abelle, the sacrifices expected and the reward awaiting them all when they had slipped the bonds of their mortal coils. He recited from the great books at length. But Cormack heard none of it, for he had his own litany against the despair, an unsought but surely found reprieve, one that he hoped would bring him the greater answers of this muddling road called life…
She glided from the boat as the boat glided ashore and with equal grace, her movements as fluid as the gently lapping waves. The moon, Sheila, was almost full this night and hung in the sky behind and above Milkeila, softening her image further. She wore few clothes, as was normal for everyone on the hot lake of Mithranidoon, other than the monks and their heavy woolen robes.
Cormack felt his heavy robe about him now, and he became almost self-conscious of it, for it felt inappropriate in the soft, warm, misty breeze.
Milkeila’s hand went to her hip as she moved toward him, and she untied her short skirt and let it fall aside. Still walking, she pulled her top over her head. She was not embarrassed, not uncomfortable, just beautiful and nude, other than the necklaces of trinkets-shells and claws and teeth-strung about her neck and a bracelet and anklet of the same design. A large feather was braided into her hair.