But now Lord Despair was displaying some new power.
He can speak to my mind, Vulgnash realized, with the powers of an Earth King, though he cannot hear my thoughts.
This development delighted Vulgnash. It almost made him equal to the Death Lords, and it raised his value to the master. At the same time it afforded him some privacy.
But an onus was upon Vulgnash. His master would be angered if he took too long to punish the Fang Guards.
Kryssidia came shortly, and the two of them raced to the nearest window and leapt from the tower, unfolding their crimson wings and taking flight.
They swooped low, so that the shadows of distant mountains covered them, and flew madly above the trees, careering this way and that, using their own momentum to hurl them forward faster and faster.
Day faded to dusk, and dusk surrendered to darkness.
As he flew even with Kryssidia, the Knight Eternal apprised him a little better of the situation at Caer Luciare. The Fang Guards were taking endowments, and they thought themselves powerful enough to challenge the empire. They were led by an egotistical fool named Chulspeth who did not know yet that Despair had taken physical form and now dwelt at Rugassa. Nor of course would Chulspeth be aware that Despair had gained unheard-of powers, the protective gifts of an Earth King.
Vulgnash knew Chulspeth. He was the leader of the Fang Guards. Vulgnash had personally chosen the man for the honor of being the first to take an endowment of bloodlust.
Once again, Vulgnash thought, I have not served my master well.
Kryssidia grew hungry, and the Knights Eternal slowed their flight for a time, veering from their course as they hunted. They found a small settlement where a little smoke from evening cooking fires hung in a haze.
It was a guard post of some kind for the small folk, a mountain village with nothing but a wall made of wood. Guards paced about in towers.
The Knights Eternal swept into the village, dodging arrow fire as they came. They spotted children playing in the street, children that leapt up in terror at the cries of their parents.
Vulgnash swooped low and scooped up a toddler on the wing, and Kryssidia did the same. The parents screamed frantically and chased after them, shaking their fists and hurling curses.
We are like jays, robbing the nests of lesser birds, Vulgnash thought as he placed his hands over the squirming boy s face and began to drain him. Child or adult, the spirits of these creatures provided the same amount of nourishment. So he and Kryssidia drained their prey, then let their corpses, their empty husks, rain from the sky.
Moments later, he heard his master s voice in his mind. When you finish punishing my enemies, return with all haste. Bring back more blood-metal ore for forcibles.
"Yes, Lord," Vulgnash whispered to the wind, for he knew that his master could not hear him.
As they neared Caer Luciare, Vulgnash heard his master s voice in his mind once again. Careful, my friend. Careful. The enemy has set a trap. When you land, they will attack. It is not with a sword that you can win this battle.
Vulgnash signaled to Kryssidia with a slight tremor of the wing, and both of them veered to the left and landed in the woods.
"Our master bids us go in with fire," Vulgnash said, and without preamble he kicked a few dead leaves into a pile, along with some wind-fallen twigs, then used a portion of his own body heat to give birth to a small flame.
He let it lick at the leaves for a few moments, growing in power and might, then twisted the flames so that they took a small alder. A warm breeze nourished the flames until soon they raged and leapt up the tree, and from there began to spread through the detritus on the forest floor.
Vulgnash strode into the midst of the burgeoning inferno and basked in the heat, like a lizard in the morning sunlight, until the inferno did not just warm him but permeated his flesh.
Then the two Knights Eternal rose into the air and went winging up the mountain.
The dead wyrmlings from the recent battle were strewn about, littering the ground where they had fallen. To be left upon the battlefield was considered a great honor, and it was the wyrmling belief that any warrior left thus would rise up from the battlefield, weapons in hand, on that day when the Great Wyrm made flesh cleave to rotten bones and brought forth her honored warriors for the last great battle at the End of Time.
The three great arches of Luciare were no longer lit by the spirits of the human ancestors; vulgar glyphs now adorned the bone-white walls, signaling that this was wyrmling territory.
No proper guard seemed to be watching the doors. Perhaps there was no one left who could. Kryssidia had described the scene inside while on the wing-fallen wyrmlings strewn about the great hall, each with an endowment wrung from him, until few were left standing.
Never had Vulgnash heard of such abandonment, such debauchery.
Vulgnash settled on the ground at the mouth of the central arch, and called out, "Chulspeth, come!"
No one stood at the door, but after a long moment, a voice cried out, high in pitch and fanatical.
"Am I a cur to be commanded so?" From the sound of his voice, Chulspeth had taken too many endowments of metabolism-perhaps twenty or more. Though he tried to slow his speech so that it might be better understood by common folk, it sounded squeaky and high, with strange lapses.
"You re not a cur," Vulgnash said, hoping to sound reasonable, hoping to lure his enemy into the open. "I honored you, and respected you. You were the first of our master s servants to taste the kiss of the forcible. It is rumored that you now crave it like wine, and you have lost all composure. I have come to reason with you, to offer you a chance to serve our master once again. You could be his most valued warrior."
"I would rather serve a bull s pisser than our craven emperor!" Chulspeth squeaked. Still there was no sign of movement from within the fortress.
"The emperor no longer rules Rugassa," Vulgnash informed him. "Despair has taken flesh, and now walks the labyrinth among us."
The news should have inspired a proper sense of religious awe in Chulspeth, or even fanatical zeal. Instead, there was only a yelp, followed by a snarl and a threat.
"I do not fear Despair!" Chulspeth cried. "What are you, Vulgnash, nothing but a serving boy, bringing your lord dinner one moment, then pleasuring him the next? You should have a place of honor beside your lord, not groveling at his feet." Now Chulspeth tried the inevitable bribe, one that Vulgnash had heard a thousand times before, though it varied in particulars. "You, Vulgnash, should dwell with us. You would be welcome here. You would have honor among us, and be a great lord. The finest food would be yours, the finest women."
A soft chuckle rose from Vulgnash, cool and deadly.
"I do not desire such things," he said. "And it would not be an honor to be counted among you. Lord Despair has come among us, and he has strange powers, unheard of among mortal men. I fear that if I were among you, he would crush us all beneath his heel, as if we were mice."
Chulspeth roared in anguish.
Attack! Despair s voice raged in Vulgnash s mind. Vulgnash raised a hand, prepared to unleash a fireball.
Suddenly, from the recesses of Caer Luciare, Chulspeth rushed from the shadows. Never had Vulgnash imagined such speed. Chulspeth came sprinting from the darkness, running at well over a hundred miles per hour, a black iron javelin in his hand.
Vulgnash hurled a fireball, white-hot and roaring in its fury. It was the size of his fist when he hurled it, but as it traveled it expanded in size, so that it was a dozen feet in diameter when Chulspeth came bounding through it.
For a heartbeat, Vulgnash imagined that his foe would simply race through the flames unscathed, like a child leaping through a campfire.