House of Chains
Towards the centre of this flat lay the wreckage of a trader’s wagon, surrounded by scorched ground where white ashes spun in small vortices that seemed incapable of going anywhere.
Pearl leading, they strode into the strange burned circle.
The ashes were filled with tiny bones, burned white and grey by some intense heat, crunching underfoot. Bemused, Lostara crouched down to study them. ‘Birds?’ she wondered aloud.
Pearl’s gaze was on the wagon or, perhaps, something just beyond it. At her question he shook his head. ‘No, lass. Rats.’
She saw a tiny skull lying at her feet, confirming his words. ‘There are rats of a sort, in the rocky areas-’
He glanced over at her. ‘These are-were-D’ivers. A particularly unpleasant individual named Gryllen.’
‘He was slain here?’
‘I don’t think so. Badly hurt, perhaps.’ Pearl walked over to a larger heap of ash, and squatted to sweep it away.
Lostara approached.
He was uncovering a corpse, nothing but bones-and those bones were all terribly gnawed.
‘Poor bastard.’
There were four additional heaps similar to that which had hidden the chewed bones. Lostara walked to the nearest one and began kicking the ash away.
‘This one’s whole!’ she hissed, seeing fire-blackened flesh.
Pearl came over. Together, they brushed the corpse clear from the hips upward. Its clothing had been mostly burned off, and fire had raced across the skin but had seemed incapable of doing much more than scorch the surface.
As the Claw swept the last of the ash from the corpse’s face, its eyes opened.
Cursing, Lostara leapt back, one hand sweeping her sword free of its scabbard.
‘It’s all right,’ Pearl said, ‘this thing isn’t going anywhere, lass.’
Behind the corpse’s wrinkled, collapsed lids, there were only gaping pits. Its lips had peeled back with desiccation, leaving it with a ghastly, blackened grin.
‘What remains?’ Pearl asked it. ‘Can you still speak?’
Faint sounds rasped from it, forcing Pearl to lean closer.
‘What did it say?’ Lostara demanded.
‘No argument there-’
‘And then he became an undead porter.’
‘For Gryllen?’
‘Aye.’
She sheathed her tulwar. ‘That seems a singularly unpleasant profession following death.’
Pearl’s brows rose, then he smiled. ‘Alas, we won’t get much more from dear old Clam. Nor the others. The sorcery holding them animate fades. Meaning Gryllen is either dead or a long way away. In any case, recall the warren of fire-it was unleashed here, in a strange manner. And it left us a trail.’
‘It’s too dark, Pearl. We should camp.’
‘Here?’
She reconsidered, then scowled in the gloom. ‘Perhaps not, but none the less I am weary, and if we’re looking for signs, we’ll need daylight in any case.’
Pearl strode from the circle of ash. A gesture and a sphere of light slowly formed in the air above him. ‘The trail does not lead far, I believe. One last task, Lostara. Then we can find somewhere to camp.’
Whatever signs he followed, they were not visible to Lostara. Even stranger, it seemed to be a weaving, wandering one, a detail that had the Claw frowning, his steps hesitant, cautious. Before too long, he was barely moving at all, edging forward by the smallest increments. And she saw that his face was beaded with sweat.
She bit back on her questions, but slowly drew her sword once more.
Then, finally, they came to another corpse.
The breath whooshed from Pearl, and he sank down to his knees in front of the large, burned body.
She waited until his breathing slowed, then cleared her throat and said, ‘What just happened, Pearl?’
‘Hood was here,’ he whispered.
‘Aye, I can well see that-’
‘No, you don’t understand.’ He reached out to the corpse, his hand closing into a fist above its broad chest, then punched down.
The body was simply a shell. It collapsed with a dusty crunch beneath the blow.
He glared back at her. ‘Hood was here . The god himself, Lostara. Came to take this man-not just his soul, but also the flesh-all that had been infected by the warren of fire-the warren of light, to be more precise. Gods, what I would do for a Deck of Dragons right now. There’s been a change in Hood’s… household.’