"Tond" continues, and now things get serious.

As we continue the "Tond" story, the nature of the "curse" on Rolan is revealed, leading to the inevitable cliffhanger.

Tond, Book One: The Sons of Tlaen Ras-Erkéltis

Chapter 7

The Poison Spreads

“In the weeks before the Devastation, mordhs appeared in Tond but they were hidden. They whispered in the ears of the Fyorians at night, “The Karjans are plotting to kill you. You must kill them first.” They whispered in the ears of the Karjans at night, “The Fyorians are plotting to kill you. You must kill them first.” In this the seeds of war were sown. The wrath of Kullandu was unleashed, and the mordhs laughed as Tond burned, for they are the bringers of destruction.”

From the Annals of the Ahíinor (Fyorian).

Dzokra-Krtsng, The Karjan Imperium, fifth month, Fyorian year 614

 Humid midnight in Dzokra-Krtsng. The mist settled on the thatched roofs of the Karjan houses, and moved on. From the distant tree-tops came the hooting of nocturnal birds. A night watchman passed through the streets, pausing momentarily in the marketplace to shoo away a feral cat, and proceeded on with his business.

From out of the night beyond the fog, four shooting stars appeared. They did not fizzle out or vanish into the dark. They penetrated the fog, dimmed into semi-invisibility, and settled on the wet cobbled streets. They remained there for half a second (the night watchman may have seen them, he may not, but they were too dim by now to catch his attention) and they evaporated. Where they had been, four impossible creatures now stood. They sniffed the air, paused, and slithered into oblivion, intent on their dark business. The wild cat saw them and bolted, its tail fuzzy, the hair on its back standing up in rough ridges. The night watchman saw the cat again and chased it away. The strange creatures slipped by unseen.

They headed with a definite purpose toward the center of the town, slowly slinking into shadows and dim places where no fires were lit. They passed several rows of houses (a little boy looked out; he saw nothing but dim mist within the mist, and gave it no heed) and they came to the inn. Here they stopped. One tried the door; it was locked. They looked at each other with pale eyes; too many eyes for four beings. The one in the rear came forward, held up a slippery appendage. A pale green light came from it, or from something held in it. The bolt on the door too glowed with the pale green light, and then it became like fog and it faded. The door creaked open. The light went out.

The creatures slipped in, through the common room, silently, on unseen legs.

“Halt!” said a voice.

A light from the four creatures revealed a tall Karjan in armor, his hand resting on the handle of his scimitar. One of the creatures approached him (he may have seen it, he may not, he may have seen only the glare of the light). From its undefined form came a flash of metal. The Karjan cried out briefly (and then his voice went silent) and there was a gruesome cracking, ripping noise, and he collapsed and faded into mist. The light went out. The creature rejoined the others, and they went through the room slowly and padded into the hall.

They went into a room on the left.

 

A fear crept into Rolan’s sleep, and he awoke, saw a glint of pale light off of the misshapen things in his room. He sat up and grabbed at his four-pointed star amulet, sent the glowball from the corner to the center of the room with its light gleaming brightly.

The boundaries had been shattered between animal and plant, between natural and manufactured. At his left stood something with cows’ legs, but it was a big earthenware jug tipped toward him, dripping venom from its uncapped mouth. Behind it was an armored figure, but with feathered wings where its arms should have been and tree-stumps for legs (it seemed rooted in the floor) and its head was a thorny mass of spines. Pale eyes gleamed from within those thorns. Beside both, mounted on a rat the size of a pig, was something carved from a dead tree but sporting a scaly lizard’s tail and a sickly six-eyed human-ish face leering from a crack in the wood. To the right was a green-skinned (and apparently rotting) thing like a man, its eyes completely round and protruding from their sockets, its mouth a reptilian beak, its bald head scaly and shining luridly in the light. Its gnarled, long-fingered claw was resting on a Karjan-style sword strapped to its waist.

They all stood there, unmoving, unblinking, staring at Rolan.

He was too afraid to move. Surely they were here to kill him, to finish what the grosk had begun... The grosk... In his mind’s eye he saw its scaly bulk collapse on him, and he cried out in terror and rage. And that terror and rage became like a physical thing, a living being that he could fight, and he transferred it to these horrid things here in his room. A hideous yowl escaped from his mouth and he grabbed his walking-staff, knocked the end off to expose the sword, and attacked them, flailing and slashing blindly. A pallid metallic light blazed from his hands and eyes. The creatures dodged his blows and faded into mist and were gone, leaving him shaking and crying on the floor.

The gleam vanished from his eyes and hands a second before Hanroy came in, sword in hand.

“What happened?” asked Hanroy.

“Gruntags. Four of them,” Rolan stuttered, “They came in here. They just stood there, and...”

“Rolan! Your hand!”

Rolan looked at his hand, where the strange light had been shining. There was a scaly green patch there, on the back of that hand, and it shown obscenely in the light of the glowball. Rolan backed away, toward the bed, and collapsed with a sob, dropping his sword. Hanroy went over and hugged him. Out of the window, they both briefly saw four shooting stars, traveling as a group, leap into the air from somewhere near the inn.

A scream rent the air from outside of Rolan’s room. And another scream, almost like an animal’s yowl. Then a chill silence.

“They’re still here!” blurted Hanroy. “Somebody else saw them too! Rolan, pick up your sword.”

Rolan was still staring at the ugly patch on the back of his hand, his eyes wide.

Hanroy slapped him. “I don’t know what that is. But look at it later! Somebody might be being killed!”

Slowly Rolan stood, and faced Hanroy as another scream echoed through the building. “All right,” he said at last. He took his sword from where he had dropped it, and followed Hanroy out into the hall.

There were already some other people awake and running toward the source of the screams. Rolan recognized the innkeeper among them, and several Karjans that he had seen the day before. Andri was standing by the door to Hanroy’s room.

“What’s happening?” she asked.

“Don’t know. Stay here!” said Hanroy. Then he turned to everyone else. “Everybody stay here! Except you, innkeeper. But keep behind me. Rolan, come here.”

Rolan followed. The three of them ran out into the large center room, and they could see nothing amiss. There was a fire lit in the large fireplace, lighting the dark scene. There was an open book on one of the tables, and a half-full goblet of water.

“Everything’s in order, except all this mist,” said the innkeeper. “What is all of this mist, anyway!? And where is Arghak?” (He meant the watchman.)

One more scream, very near, there in the room. It was a pitiful yowl, fading into agonized silence.

The innkeeper turned to Rolan and Hanroy, his eyes suddenly wide. “There were words in that last scream. Karjannic words. But I couldn’t understand them...”

Rolan grabbed Hanroy’s shoulder. “... He’s right. I heard words too. But, it was coming from there, right in the middle of the mist...”

“There’s nothing there!” said the innkeeper.

Hanroy’s eyebrows went up. “There is something there! You two stay here! I’ll go get my pack from Andri...”

He turned, only to bump into Andri, who was holding his pack. “I thought I told you to stay back!” he blurted, then, “...Thank you for the pack. I need a mechana...”

“...I did stay back to make sure the children were asleep,” said Andri.

Hanroy threw his pack on the ground and rummaged through it while the innkeeper replied to the scream with words of his own, in Karjannic. There was no reply.

Hanroy pulled something out of his pack, put it in his pocket. He pulled out something else. “Here. Rolan, hold this crystal. When I say so, throw it into the center of the mist. But not before I say so.”

He went in front of the others, he sword ready, and stood before the place where the screams had come from. “Where are you?” he yelled into the mist. Silence. “Can you hear me?” he yelled again. There came a quiet whimper from the center of the mist. As if that was a cue, he pulled the thing from his pocket and dropped it on the floor, crushing it with his foot. A green light flooded the room, and their vision was transformed. The walls and the floor and the table faded into near imperceptibility, the fire was now black; but the air itself had become a pale green gas that gathered and swirled around itself. Currents and eddies were visible. Other things had appeared too, formless patterns of light and shade, and a tiny points of light like stars but much closer and there in the room. And in the center of the room, in front of Hanroy, where the screams had come from, there lay an armored Karjan warrior on the floor, his curved sword fallen at his side, his face an apparition of pure terror, his chest ripped apart into a huge gaping, ragged wound. He turned and faced them, his body flexed and contorted briefly, and then he was still.

“It’s Arghak!” explaimed the innkeeper.

“Now, Rolan, the crystal,” said Hanroy.

Rolan threw the crystal. It seemed to travel slowly through the visible air, spinning and tumbling. It hit the floor and there was a flash of white light.

That was all. The green light was gone. The room took on its normal hues. The Karjan was visible too, and around him was a pile of dust. Hanroy ran over to him, knelt down beside him.

“He’s dead. The wound is from a flaysword. It missed his heart and his lungs at least. They used a mechana so we couldn’t find him. Until it was too late. Not that anybody can usually survive a flaysword anyway...”

 

Hours later, when the sun was beginning to rise, Hanroy followed Rolan into Rolan’s room, and his face was grim. “Eilann was right about this too,” he commented. “The gruntags have mechanas. They used a hiding crystal on Arghak. They caught him unaware, I think. His book and his glass were still there on the table.” Then responding to Rolan’s questioning expression, “What a hiding crystal does is scatter light. You can only see things because light bounces off of them. A hiding crystal makes a fine dust. It bounces light in all directions. And it surrounds things. So whatever it surrounds becomes nearly invisible. And if you’re surrounded, you can’t see well either. Anyway I used a finding crystal to find him. And to make sure that he wasn’t something else, like a gruntag. A finding crystal gives off a strange light that usually you can’t see. It makes invisible things visible. You can see the air. And those little lights like stars, those are animals far too small to see. There are millions of them everywhere. Anyway, then you used an unhiding crystal to dispel the dust and make it fall to the floor. So he became visible again. Hiding and unhiding crystals are always used together. Except that the gruntags probably meant to leave him like that. So nobody could find him. Or find his body. Until they tripped over him. Anyway, I don’t have any more of those crystals.”

He sat down on the chair next to Rolan’s bed. “And that explains how the gruntags got in here too. They had a hiding crystal on themselves. I don’t know how they could see. Maybe they don’t need to see. Anyway I think Arghak saw them, or part of them. He tried to stop them. So they killed him. Probably used something else to put him asleep at first too. He didn’t start screaming until after they were gone from here. Or maybe they put the crystal on him later. Anyway we still don’t know why they came. Let me have a look at that hand, Rolan.”

Rolan showed him his infected hand. The skin had peeled away from the green patch, which seemingly had grown from within; it stuck out slightly and was toothy and metallic.

Hanroy swore. “This is all beginning to make sense,” he said grimly. “And it’s worse than I had thought. Worse than Eilann had thought. Though I don’t really know how much he knew. Anyway we have to get to Ai-Leena as soon as possible. Before you become dangerous yourself. Get your pack ready now. We’ll have to leave for the Tower of Dawn immediately.”

Rolan stared at him. “What is it? What is happening...?”

Hanroy only replied, “I don’t think I could tell you all. Anyway you want to try to rescue Arnul. Get your pack ready or there won’t be any time.” And he went out the door.

 

Misty dawn in Dzokra-Krtsng. The air was already hot and heavy, and the red light of sunrise stabbed through the clouds. There were a few people about; going about their business of setting up the market or going out to the fields to work; few had any idea of the horrors that had occurred in the inn the night before. Hanroy gave the innkeeper an extra several days’ worth of pay for their room as apology for not helping with the funeral preparations for Arghak. Then he led Rolan and the others on their burros out of the town.

Rolan was beginning to feel sick, and he rode sullenly. The horror was still fresh in his mind: the misshapen monsters, the patch on his hand, the screams and the gaping bloody wound in Arghak’s chest. Like the wound had been caused from the inside, from something exploding outward. Hanroy had mentioned a flaysword; Rolan had heard rumors of that horrible weapon, of fiendish Karjannic design; a single blade went in, one pulled the handle and the blade opened into four, and you pulled it back out. The gruntags had such a weapon, and they had mechanas. And they were trying to attack him, or, it seemed, get him to attack them. At the thought of that, there seemed to be some unknown dark fury welling up deep within his mind, wanting to break out and cause destruction. He swallowed hard and tried to ignore it. He looked at the green patch on his hand; it was darker now, almost black, but it had not grown or changed shape.

There was a peal of thunder overhead and the rain began. Pouring down on Rolan’s face, it refreshed him somewhat and chased away his darker fears. A moment later they stepped into the thick vegetation at the side of the town, and were once again plodding through the seamless jungles of the Imperium. The road went along straight again for a few minutes, then made a sharp turn to the right and began to descend rapidly. The vegetation opened up again after a few more minutes, and they were standing at the edge of a river.

And what a river! The surface was dark blue and black, and flowing silently with a hint of unimaginable power. Rolan strained to see the far side through the mist and rain; it looked as if it was a mile or more away.

The road split into two directions, and they went left. Almost immediately there came the sounds of people talking and of the splash of waves, and some other musical thumpings. The mist was thicker so Rolan didn’t see at first that they had stepped out onto a wooden platform (though he could hear the buro’s feet clattering on it).

The rain cleared suddenly. They were standing on a platform from which jutted many piers out into the river; tied to some of the piers were open boats, made of wood and decorated with carvings of sea monsters. There were Karjans in all of them, some sitting by the oars, others merely stretched out, relaxing. They didn’t seem to mind the rain. Four men in one of the boats were playing on musical instruments; one on a set of bamboo rods like Rolan had seen before, one on a similar instrument made of wood, one on a large upright stringed instrument (that would be a harp) and one on a kital. Their music was of the same type as that of the border guards, if somewhat fuller because of the four instruments; a rhythmic music, out of tune in such a way that it was actually in tune (even the kital was tuned like that!), and, Rolan suddenly realized, the four parts didn’t actually match. They were in the same rhythm, and stopped and started at the same time; but the notes didn’t harmonize. As if trying to be the opposite of Fyorian music, where the parts always matched harmonically but were not necessarily on the beat.

Hanroy went over to the nearest large boat. The man at the front jumped up and then bowed, the same way as Rolan had seen. He was dressed in loose-fitting white and grey robes, tied about the waist with a rope and an enormous buckle. Hanroy repeated the bow.

“Boat to Hwatsats Hondrakch. How much? Less if I trade burros?” asked Hanroy in simple Fyorian.

“I’ll take your burros, but we can’t go now,” the Karjan replied, fluently in the same language. “There’s a boat from there coming here; we see it over there on the river. It’s a royal boat; we have to be here to greet the hrakezh lords when they get off.”

Rolan gazed across the river to where he had pointed. A large boat, painted bright red, was approaching from upstream.

Hanroy turned back to Rolan. “Well, of all the luck. They had to come now. We need to hurry... Wait,” He wheeled back to the boatman. “Where did you say they were from?”

“Can’t be certain, but it’s a royal boat, painted red, you know, and there’s only one place upstream there where a royal boat would be likely to come from. That’s Hwatsats Hondrakch, the Tower of Dawn. The place you said you wanted to go to anyway.”

“And indeed I did!” said Hanroy, almost laughing. “We were going there to see the hrakezh. But if they’re coming here... They might not stop, though. Why are they coming?”

The boatman replied, “If I knew that, I could make a fortune in reading peoples’ minds, you know.”

Hanroy turned back to Rolan. “So there’s nothing to do but wait,” he said, and sat down on the wood.

“Play you a game of háru-kándis!” said Ranti to Andreya, and rummaged through his small pack. “What is… Eww, moldy.” He pulled out a fuzzy piece of áyushaa bread and threw it in the river.

“It goes bad quickly in the wet Karjan air,” commented Hanroy.

“It was bad to begin with,” said Rolan.

They waited while the red boat approached. Rolan watched it closely; it was much larger than the boats here in the harbor and it had a covered cabin in the center. There were several Karjans riding on it, four tall men with their dark hair tied up in those strange stiff tufts, and four tall women, with longer dark hair pulled back in pony-tails and held in place with golden rings; all were dressed in the loose-fitting Karjan robes (but much more colorful than Rolan had seen before), and most were wearing large bracelets and chain necklaces. And they were all carrying curved Karjan swords. At the front of the boat, painted in white on the red background, were two large square characters of some kind of scribbly writing, different from the Karjannic scripts Rolan had already seen.

At a command from someone on the boat, the riders sat down and put oars out into the water (Rolan suddenly realized that he hadn’t seen anything to move the boat...!) and the boat turned and began to head for the piers. There was a rush of water as it docked, and one of the men at the front produced a thick rope and tied it up. Hanroy bowed in the Karjan manner as the people stepped off, and everyone else there at the pier bowed too, except for the four musicians, who began to play a slower and more solemn tune (or four slower and more solemn tunes; Rolan was still not sure if the parts actually fit together.)

The Karjans from the boat formed two lines on the pier, the men on one side and the women on the other, and they raised their swords in a salute. The man closest to the boat proclaimed some consonant-rich words in Karjaneic (“Pfreshtakj Hwatsats Hondrakchi ‘rajkezh!”) and then, apparently noticing Rolan and the others among them, in Fyorian. “Make way for the hrakezh lords of Hwatsats Hondrakch!” And then all were silent.

The door in the cabin in the middle of the boat opened and three men stepped out. Not Karjans, to Rolan’s surprise. The first was a large man, as tall as the Karjans but much broader, with brown skin darker than that of a Fyorian, his wavy black hair combed neatly and lacking in any kind of adornment. He wore a Karjan robe, but not as elaborate as the others, and a wooden amulet around his neck was carved into rounded, flattened characters that appeared to be yet another style of Karjan writing. The second man was of very curious appearance, wearing a bright green robe that appeared to be made of leaves but there were no seams visible in it. He wore no jewelry or amulets. His skin was about the same color as that of a Fyorian, his face was youthful, without lines or wrinkles, but there was the look of great age and wisdom in his eyes. Those eyes were... some other color. Rolan was sure that it was a color, but it was not a color that he had seen before, anywhere. There were no words in his mind for that color.

The third man was a Fyorian, bearded, a little older than Hanroy, and dressed in the heavy flowing robe of a high-ranking ahíinor. As if to complete the appearance, he carried a crooked árukand walking-staff, topped with a four-pointed star. He also had a sword strapped to his waist, Karjan-style; its golden and silver handle was plain and undecorated. His nose was long, like many a Fyorian; he was shorter than anyone there, and quite stocky and muscular. He regarded the scene with thoughtful (and, Rolan thought, somewhat fearful) dark brown eyes, and then he suddenly spotted Hanroy, and bowed in the Fyorian manner.

Hanroy bowed back like an ahíinor. Rolan tried to do the same bow, and nearly fell off the burro. There was some scattered laughter, suddenly cut short. The man with the green robe and the strange eyes had seen Rolan, and then his face changed to an expression that Rolan had never seen. Horror, perhaps, or a sadness that could not be fathomed. He said something in Karjannic to the Fyorian.

The Fyorian turned and looked at Rolan, and his eyes narrowed. He turned back to the others, barked an order in Karjannic, and they went back on the boat.

“What’s... what’s happening...?” asked Rolan.

The ahíinor from the boat turned back to Rolan and the others. “I’m sorry for being rude,” he said. “Things are happening too fast. Allow me to introduce ourselves. This is S’Tam, son of S’Tai, of the Emb Lands. He is a visitor to Hwatsats Hondrakch, but he asked if he could come along on the boat trip.” The man with dark skin bowed again. “...And this is Nammar the Taennishman.” The man in the green robe bowed again. “And my name is Tayon Dar-Táeminos, ahíinor of West Rohándal, presently serving as underlord to Hrakezh Tngp’hl Yathknchul Queen Ai-Leena of Hwatsats Hondrakch.”

He went on the introduce each of the Karjans in the boat, who took a moment to stand up and bow as they were getting the oars ready. But Rolan was not listening any more. Taennishman? One of the Immortals, those who dwelt in Taennishland, the City that Moves? And Tayon Dar-Táeminos? The Tayon Dar-Táeminos, who had forged the Circle of Shining in the ruined Tower of Kings? It was as if legends had suddenly sprung up out of the river. No, that couldn’t all be correct, though; the legend clearly said that the Tayon Dar-Táeminos who had forged the Circle of Shining had been destroyed by its power, so this had to be another man by the same name. There were many Fyorians named Tayon; and Táeminos was a fairly common surname as well, with or without the Dar- for the Fyorians of the West.

He was explaining something when Rolan’s attention returned to the present situation. “...So when we saw the flyfires land in Dzokra-Krtsng last night, we got the boat ready and came. We had seen some on the mountains the night before, and a few in the sky, northwards, before that. Nammar was afraid that they might be gruntags.”

“They were gruntags,” Hanroy answered. “They attacked us. They killed a man in the inn. With a flaysword. And they put a hiding crystal on him. Then they went to Rolan’s room. Show him your hand, Rolan.”

Rolan held up the hand with the dark green patch. Tayon looked at it gravely, and the Taennishman inspected it too. “Dog feathers! This is worse than we feared,” said Tayon at last. “The gruntags came with a reason. And they will come again tonight, or I’m a Karjan. He may not...” His speech trailed off. He turned to the others, yelled another order. Two of the men got off and ran off of the pier down the road into the forest.

“All of you get on the boat, including your burros and all your stuff,” he said to Rolan and Hanroy. “We’ll put you up in Hwatsats Handrak for free. It’ll take until tomorrow evening to get there, and that may be too late if they attack again.”

“Until tomorrow night?” asked Hanroy. “You said you came when you saw the flyfires. It took you only a couple of hours.”

“Seven hours, yes, going downstream. Going upstream is more difficult, and we’ll have to row. Get on the boat. You must see all Ai-Leena immediately. Sooner than immediately.”

 

Tayon paid each of the boatmen a large silver coin (for not being able to get paid by these travellers, he said), and Rolan and the others got on the boat. Rolan went first. He had never been on a boat before, and he nearly slipped on its wooden floor. One of the Karjan women grabbed him to keep him from falling over; he smiled at her and sat down on the bench next to her. Andri followed Rolan, and sat behind him; Ranti and Andreya behind her, and Hanroy in the rear. Then the Taennishman and the Emb, and finally Tayon. At Tayon’s order the other Karjans grabbed the oars and pushed the boat off from the pier onto the waters of the Great River Cheihar. The two men who had run down the road into town did not return. They had left to make room, Rolan figured, since the boat was now crowded as it was.

This part of the journey was the most monotonous for Rolan, once he got over the novelty of the boat and the new companions. Everyone was silent, except for Honroy, who informed the others of why he and Rolan were on their journey. The air was hot and heavy and began to reek with sweat from all the Karjans (and Tayon and Nammar and Hanroy) rowing. The oars slipped in the water and out again endlessly, beating out a dull changeless rhythm. The burros stood sullenly in the back of the boat. The river passed underneath with sickening sameness, grey and greenish (and sometimes black) and on both sides there was simply more and more thick vegetation. The sky clouded over again and it began to drizzle a hot, steamy rain that ran down Rolan’s hair and into his eyes, stinging like salt. He began to fall into an uncomfortable dream, again with ugly creatures flying overhead on what could be either fins or wings. Then there were hideous things standing all around, staring at him; vague shadows that writhed and boiled, things that were part man and part animal. And the grosk was there in the middle of them, and its tail coiled around and tried to sting him; he jumped up with a start.

The dream was over, but he was feeling feverish and chilled; the rain was soaking his clothes. The others were staring at him, their lips tight in grim expressions. The Taenishman stood up in the back of the boat and stretched his arms out said something gently in a strange language that was more musical than linguistic; the rains parted and the sunshine stabbed through.

“Never underestimate the Taennish power,” said Tayon.

“There is no Taennish power,” replied the Taennishman.

Tayon shrugged.

One of the Karjans released his oars and went into the cabin for a moment, returning with a tray of slices of bread and fruit. “Lunch time,” he said. They all helped themselves; to Rolan the fruit was delicious and it helped clear his mind and he felt a little better. He recognized mango and pineapple; some of the others were strange but tasty. He realized that he hadn’t actually tried any Karjan food yet, either (the Fyorian innkeeper had served a Fyorian dinner of chicken and cactus).

 

The sun was beginning to set, almost directly behind them, when at last Rolan dared to ask the question. “What is it?” he asked. “What is happening? Why all this hurry...?”

“You wanted to rescue Arnul,” said Hanroy. The others were silent.

“There is something besides that.”

It was the Taennishman who answered, and his voice was ever-so-gentle and calming. “My dear sir, do you really need to know what would cause you to despair? You are safe here with us; that is all you need to know for the time being.”

Rolan stood and faced the Taennishman with narrow eyes. “Maybe that’s all I need to know, but I would like to know something else! You’re all rowing, for much longer than I thought it was possible for anyone to row, and you’re trying to get me to see Ai-Leena as soon as possible! Well this much I wanted to do anyway; Eilann said that if there was any hope to rescue my brother I had to see Ai-Leena! But something else is happening now! I know it is dreadful, but why can’t anyone tell me!? I think I deserve to know the answers!”

He paused, looked at the grim faces around him, and back to the Taennishman. To his surprise, Nammar was weeping. Tears stained his cheeks. “Yes, Rolan Ras-Erkéltis. You and I, and Tayon, we have felt the weight of grief, perhaps we are the only ones here who have. I mourn for your brother as well, and for what may happen to you. Sit back down, Rolan, and I will try to explain.”

Rolan watched him for another moment with squinted eyes, then returned to his seat. The Taennishman faced him as the last light of the sun faded and the oarsmen lit torches. But he did not get a chance to answer. There was a sudden swarm of spiraling light from everywhere and nowhere, and Rolan found himself surrounded by unnamable malice.

“Tfashg’twa! Gruntagkshk! Beware! Gruntags!” said several Karjans at once, and they dropped the oars and drew their swords. Rolan stood up and knocked the end off of his walking-staff, exposing the hidden blade, but all he could see was a chaos of deformed monsters and weapons glinting in the light. Gleaming metallic serpentines slithered between them. And there was a lot of mist. He felt the rage welling up inside of him again, that deep fury, and it became like a physical force that he could battle, and he turned to face it. The pale light shone from his eyes and hands, stronger than before, and furious wails ripped from his mouth. He ran at the seething mass of weapons and began slashing and chopping and ripping at everything with his sword and with his claws. Something grabbed him from behind and held him tight so that he could not move; he struggled and writhed and screamed like a monster and began to kick and rip at it with his exposed toenails. His mind was a blank of cold furry and he could feel sweat pouring out of him and falling onto the floor of the boat, steaming and bubbling like acid. The thing holding him suddenly jerked him around to face it, and he cried out and tried to bite and slash it with his teeth; then he saw that he was staring into the face of Hanroy.

“Don’t attack them!” Hanroy screamed above Rolan’s yowls. “Whatever you do, don’t attack anything now! They are already gone! Rolan! Are you there? Can you hear me? Can you understand me? Don’t attack anything! They want you to attack! They want you to fight! But you must not! You must be still!”

Rolan screamed and kicked and tried to bite. Hanroy shook him.

“Stop, Rolan! Stop! You must not fight now! Do you hear me? You must not fight! You are becoming a grosk, Rolan! That is the deep venom of the grosk! That is what Nammar was going to tell you! Stop fighting! Now!”

Rolan was still. The fury vanished and the pale light went out. Hanroy let go. Rolan sank to the floor of the boat with a whimper, dropped his sword at his side. The monsters were gone.

“Is anybody hurt?” he wheezed.

“No, Rolan, no,” Hanroy replied with a relieved sigh. “The gruntags ambushed us. They were waiting by the riverbank. One of them had a flaysword again. They attacked with flyfires. But I don’t think they were expecting to meet a Taennishman. Nammar stopped them. Nobody was hurt. This time I’m sure they won’t be back.”

 

Sometime later in the night, when the pale moon was pasted high in the sky, Rolan awoke feverish. He shivered in the damp air; the others eyed him briefly and continued their rowing. There was a conversation going on behind him, a conversation of deep and worried voices.

“We can’t do it now,” said one voice, Hanroy’s apparently. “You might kill him.” Another voice, probably S’Tam, agreed.

“We’ll have to,” replied another voice. “Swords and daggers, we can’t wait another day... Nammar, what would you say?”

“The venom of the grosk continues to work its evil,” said a third voice, somewhat calmer and graver than the others. “There is a protection around the boat now, but the gruntags may attack again, even if they can’t get in. There was something else too — I think you saw them, Tayon. Mordhs. The sight of any of them may cause him to react again.”

Tayon’s voice interrupted, “Yes, I saw the dog-feathered mordhs. I have not seen them active like that since they fused into the body of Gashug-Tairánda.”

Nammar continued, “You saw what happened when they attacked! I am afraid that the decision is not ours. But I am afraid of the consequences.”

A moment of silence, and then, the first voice, “So, then... We do it?”

The other three, voices, no, there were seven or eight others now, agreed. There was a heavy sigh from one or more of them. The first voice said again, “Nammar, can your lumáaris make him sleepy?”

“I cannot use the lumáaris like that, and he’s not mine; you know that. He uses me. And he has chosen to be silent in this matter because we all know what is best to do.”

“Then I’ll use the némurath tea,” said Hanroy. There was the sound of groping carefully, and then less carefully, through a pack. “Here,” Hanroy said. “Now, are we all agreed on this? And Tayon, do you want to try the illusion stone?”

There was silence, then sounds of reluctant agreement.

Tayon approached Rolan from out of the night. “Oh, Rolan, you are awake. Swords and daggers! I think you’ve been listening the whole time! How much have you heard? Well, never mind, I’ll tell you what is happening. You heard Hanroy explain that the venom of the ghrosk is turning you into a ghrosk yourself.” (He pronounced “grosk” with a menacing “red” coloration.) “Those gruntags have a mechana, we think, which they use to ‘open’ another mechana that the grosk put into you when it stung you. That mechana is embedded in your flesh, probably in your side, where you were stung. Each time it is ‘opened’, it releases venom that affects you.

“The Ancients knew that deep within each living body there is a spiral of life; it is very small but it determines what, and to some extent, who, we are. They made mechanas to affect this spiral of life, originally to correct problems such as deformities. But part of their fall was that they chose to tamper with this part of nature, this part that was created by Teilyándal’ near the dawn of time. Grosks were first made with such tampering, though they were in imitation of what the Karjans call Lijnan-Kwarhmaki—one of their most dog-featheredly gruesome concepts. The shapeshifter Gashug-Tairánda was made in the same manner, as are all of its minions such as, we have learned, gruntags. And there are others as well.”

“One of these mechanas has been placed inside your body. This is how you are becoming a grosk. Nammar and Hanroy and Andri and S’Tam and I have decided to try to remove it. Here, before we get to Hwatsats Hondrakch. If we try to go ashore, we will be amushed by gruntags. If we wait until we get there, where you can be taken care of better, you may already have faded. By faded, I mean you may be dead; your body may have become a grosk. Grosks and gruntags and so on are all counterfeits; they seem alive but they are not; they are manufactured. They have the spiral of life, but they do not have the lornáalis Breath of Life that Teilyándal’ puts into living things. If you become a grosk, you yourself will die, though your corpse will still be animated.” He paused, as if to let Rolan feel the horror of the situation. Then he continued.

“So we will try to remove the mechana here, and you will be taken care of when we get to Hwatsats Hondrakch. But first I must ask you, do you wish for us to do it? There is a chance you may die in the process.”

Rolan shivered. His eyes were going blank, probably from the fever, which was growing noticeably worse. And there was that deep fury within his heart again; he could not name it, but he knew that it was there to destroy him. He looked at his hand (what he could see of it in the moonlight through his half-blind eyes) and saw that the blackish-green patch was much larger, covering most of the back of his hand and running down one finger, down to an elongated claw.

“Will... this be gone?” he asked. “If you remove it, will my hand be... normal again?”

“We don’t know, Rolan. But the change will stop, at least.”

Rolan sighed. For a hideous moment the fury raised up into his mind and he tried to strike at Tayon, who grabbed him. Then it was gone, as if it never had been. He sat back down and shuddered again. That fury was the mind of a ghrosk, he told himself.

“Yes, do it,” he said after a long silence, then he added, “...and, if... if I die, there is a statue of a Karjan warrior in my pack. Arnul... Arnul liked it. If I die, find him and give it to him.”

“Yes, Rolan. Hanroy or I will do that. ...We will remove the evil mechana now. Hanroy, do you have that némurath tea ready?”

“Yes, coming,” said a voice in the darkness. Hanroy approached, gave Rolan a cup of the tea. He sipped at it, found it familiar from his childhood but much stronger and very bitter. He frowned.

“It won’t taste good,” said Hanroy. “But drink it. You will go to sleep. You won’t feel it when we try to remove the mechana.”

Rolan sipped some more. Tayon brought out a coin-sized round stone from his pocket, and held it before Rolan’s eyes. “This is an illusion stone. I have planned an illusion with it, which will show you my tale. That must all be told, if ever you are fight against Gashug-Tairánda and rescue your brother. For I am the Tayon Dar-Táeminos of which you have heard. I am the forger of the Circle of Shining, and yes, I was, in a way, destroyed by its powers. I am the one who caused the creation of Gashug-Tairánda. That must all be told. Do you wish to see the tale while we remove the mechana? Some parts of it are very frightening. Do you wish to see it?”

“Yes,” was all that Rolan could say; the tea was already taking effect. He lay down on the bench in the boat while the rowers kept up their incessant rhythm. He felt Tayon place the illusion stone near him, and his vision opened up into a new and strange scene. He felt the terror of the grosk lift from him as he slipped into a different world, and he prepared to watch what was to be shown to him.

To read more of this book: Tond, Book One: The Sons of Tlaen Ras-Erkéltis: Scribner, Steven E.: 9781520157573: Amazon.com: Books