The Shield of Weeping Ghosts - James P. Davis [26]
As the last of the undead were left in pieces on the ground, several Rashemi howled in victory. Ohriman and his sellswords celebrated less vocally and found places to sit and rest their weary sword arms. Thaena attended to the wounded, and no one acknowledged the lone vremyonni or his efforts in their victory.
Bastun sat near the shattered blocks of the portal archway and studied the relic and the unfamiliar magic carved in its surface. The portal was to have been the ancient Nentyarch s prize, a gateway to the far south and expansion of the empire, but this portal was only a shadow of that which Shandaular had contained. The roots of the city's destruction lay in the shattered portal's dark elven runes, yet the full purpose to which they had been put, the scrolls had hinted, still lay ahead of him, within the Shield's defenses.
The rustle of robes behind him disturbed his thoughts. Turning, he found Anilya regarding him coolly from behind her dark mask-not the mask he had hoped to see. He sighed at his own foolishness, once again happy for his own mask and the emotions it hid.
The durthan crossed her arms and tilted her head.
"Yes?" he asked, wondering what she was thinking.
"Well done, vremyonni," she answered and winked at him before turning away to join Ohriman and her men.
Bastun resumed his study of the portal stones and tried to appear nonplussed by the durthans attention.
Chapter Six
Grunts of Pam echoed softly in the hall as the warriors bound their wounds with strips of cloth or leather. Thaena saw to a few of them, but mostly they worked on their own injuries, leaving the ethran to speak words of peace for the spirits of three warriors who had fallen to the weeping undead. She prayed that they might find their way home and strengthen Rashemen in death just as they had in life. The traditional benediction felt awkward within the cursed city.
The others sat by and told tales of the warriors' lives, honoring their memories in the tradition of the berserkers. Duras stared hard at the bodies of men he had led into death. Bastun stayed close to the portal, away from the others, but listening closely and respecting the warriors' sacrifice in his own way.
Though weary, Bastun could not force his eyes away from the broken archway. He had tried several times to unravel small bits of the old runes, to decipher their meaning, but their makers had worked the spells in a time of old and secret magic.
With the vremyonni, he had studied what little history had been available about the Ilythiiri, an ancient nation of elves lost to their own power millennia ago. Though the Ilythiiri had left the surface of the world, bits of their sorcery still remained in places like Shandaular. The shattered portal, like all the city's dead, had little resemblance to what it had been in life, yet in death it had also refused to lay quiet.
Fearful of surrounding enemies and the growing darkness in the western forests, King Arkaius had used knowledge gleaned from the Ilythiiri runes for his own ends. Just as a city had grown around the portal, Bastun feared others might also gather around the table of time to steal scraps they neither earned nor fully understood.
From the corner of his eye Bastun noticed Anilya watching him. Her interest in the portal was no mystery. A durthan could always be counted on to seek out possible power or advantage over the wychlaren, but the way she studied him was unnerving. Closing his eyes, he shut out the world, alone behind his mask and preparing himself for the last trek to the Shield. There he would find more of the Ilythiiri runes, twisted by a desperate king, and he hoped time had molested them with naught but dust and ice.
Hearing footsteps approaching from behind, Bastun sighed and opened his eyes. Syrolf knelt beside him with a cold