The sailors moved in silence, unencumbered by armor the way militiamen would be. The king's army corps seldom went anywhere without the rattle and clangor of chainmail or plate. Those things were death to a man fighting on a ship if he somehow ended up in the water.
Finding the entrance to the underground cavern in the ruins turned out to be easy. Darrick held his group back, then followed the last of Raithen's pirates down into the cleared path that led into the bowels of the earth beneath the remains of Tauruk's Port.
None of them spoke over the droning buzz that filled the cavern farther down. The dank earth blocked the wind, but it kept the wintry chill locked around Darrick. The cold made his body ache worse. The long climb up the cliff as well as the battles he'd fought had stripped him of energy, leaving him running on sheer adrenaline. He looked forward to his hammock aboard Lonesome Star and the few days' journey it would take to reach Westmarch.
Fog or a dusty haze filled the cavern. The haze looked golden in the dim light of the lanterns Raithen's pirates carried.
Gradually, the tunnel Darrick followed widened, and he saw the great door set into the stone wall on the other side of the immense cavern. The tunnel went no farther.
Raithen and his pirates stopped before entering the main cavern area, and their position blocked Darrick's view of what lay ahead. Several of the pirates seemed in favor of turning and fleeing, but Raithen held them firm with his harsh voice and the threat of his sword.
Hunkering down behind a slab of rock that had slid free during the excavation, Darrick stared into the cavern. Mat joined him, his breath rasping softly.
"What's wrong?" Darrick whispered.
"It's this damn dust," Mat whispered back. "Must not have settled from the explosion earlier. It's tightenin' me lungs up a mite."
Taking the sleeve of his torn shirt in one hand, Darrick ripped it off and handed it to Mat. "Tie this around your face," he told his friend. "It'll keep the dust out."
Mat accepted the garment remnant gratefully and tied it around his face.
Darrick tore the other sleeve off and tied it around his own face. It was a pity because the shirt had been a favorite of his, though it was no comparison to the Kurastian silk shirts he had in his sea chest aboard Lonesome Star. Still, growing up hard and without as he had, he treasured things and generally took good care of the ones he had.
Slowly and tentatively, Raithen led his pirates down into the cavern.
"Darrick, look!" Mat pointed, indicating the skeletons that lay in the cavern area. A few looked old, but most of them appeared to have been just stripped clean. Ragged clothing, torn but not aged, swaddled the skeletons.
"I see them," Darrick said, and the hair at the back of his neck lifted. He wasn't one for magic, and he knew he was looking at sure proof that magic had been recently worked. We shouldn't be here, he told himself. If I had any sense, I'd leave now before any of us are hurt. In fact, he was just about to give the order when a man in black and scarlet robes stepped through the immense doorway in the far wall.
The man in scarlet and black looked as if he was in his early forties. His black hair held gray at the temples, and his face was lean and strong. A shimmering aura flowed around him.
"Captain Raithen," the man in scarlet and black greeted, but his words held little warmth.
The droning buzz increased in intensity.
"Cholik," Raithen said.
"Why aren't you with the ships?" Cholik asked. Hecrossed the cavern floor, oblivious to the carnage of freshly dead men scattered around him.
"We were attacked," Raithen said. "Westmarch sailors set fire to my ships and stole the boy we held for ransom."
"You were followed?" Cholik's anger cut through the droning noise that filled the cavern.
"Who is that man?" Mat whispered.
Darrick shook his head. "I don't know. And I don't see a demon around here, either. Let's go. It's not going to take that Cholik guy long to figure out what Raithen and his pirates are doing here." He turned and signaled to the other men, getting them ready to withdraw.
"Maybe it wasn't me who got followed," Raithen argued. "Maybe one of those men you buy information from in Westmarch got caught doing something and sold you out."
"No," Cholik said. He stopped out of sword's reach from the pirate captain. "The people who do business with me would be afraid to do something like that. If your ships were attacked, it was through your own gross ineptitude."
"Maybe we should just skip all this faultfinding," Raithen suggested.
"And then what should we do, captain?" Cholik regarded the pirate captain with contempt and cold amusement. "Get to the part where you and your murderous crew kill me and try to take whatever it is that you've imagined I've found here?"
Raithen grinned without humor. "Not a very pretty way to put it, but that's about it."
Cholik drew his robes in with imperious grace. "No. That won't be done this night."
Striding forward, Raithen said, "I don't know what kind of night you had planned for yourself, Cholik, but I aim to get what I came for. My men and I have spent blood for you, and the way we figure it, we haven't gotten much in return."
"Your greed is going to get you killed," Cholik threatened.
Raithen brandished his sword. "It'll get you killed first."
A massive shape stepped through the door in the stone wall. Darrick stared at the demon, taking in the writhing snake hair, the barbaric features, the huge three-fingered hands, and the black skin slashed through with pale blue.
TEN
Raithen and his pirates drew back from the demon, filled with fear as the nightmare from the Burning Hells strode into the cavern. Men yelled in terror and retreated quickly.
"Okay," Mat whispered, fear shining in his eyes, "we can tell the boy an' his uncle the king that the demon exists. Let's be away from here."
"Wait," Darrick said, mastering the thrumming fear that filled him at the sight of the demon. He peered over the stone slab they hid behind.
"For what?" Mat gave him a disbelieving look. He made the sign of the Light in the air before him unconsciously, like the child he'd been when they'd attended church in Hillsfar.
"Do you know how many men have seen a demon?" Darrick asked.
"An' them livin' to tell about it? Damned few. An' ye want to know why, Darrick? 'Cause they were killed by the demons they was gawkin' at instead of runnin' as any sane man should do."
"Captain Raithen," the demon said, and his voice rolled like thunder inside the cavern. "I am Kabraxis, called the Enlightener. There is no need for disharmony between yourself and Buyard Cholik. You can continue to work together."
"For you?" Raithen asked. His voice held fear and awe, but he stood before the demon with his sword in his fist.
"No," the demon replied. "Through me, you can find the true path to your future." He strode forward, stepping in front of the priest. "I can help you. I can bring you peace."
"Peace I can find in the bottom of a cup of ale," Raithen said, "but I'll not resort to serving demon scum."
Darrick thought the reply would have sounded better if the pirate captain's voice hadn't been shaking, but he didn't doubt that he would have had trouble controlling his own voice if he'd spoken to the demon.
"Then you can die," Kabraxis said, waving a hand in an intricate pattern before him.
"Archers!" Raithen yelled. "Feather that hell-spawned beast!"
The pirates were stunned by the presence of the demon and slow to react. Only a few of them nocked and released arrows. The dozen or so arrows that hit the demon glanced off, leaving no sign that they had ever touched him.