The Burning Stone

The cauldrons swing out and a searing waterfall pours down upon the enemy. It spreads into the enemy ranks, spattering on flesh and wood like the wet hot heart of the earth itself, as fierce as the molten rock that runs in the veins of the earth. As the ships scrape each other, his own warriors press the attack where panic erupts among the enemy.



One ship begins to burn. The shield line breaks, and Skelnin’s warriors scatter as his own press their advantage, leaping across the gap and striking with their axes to clear the ship. The dead and wounded are thrown into the sea, as he had promised: when he surveys the waters, he sees the ripples that have followed in his wake boil to life as the merfolk net the feast he has promised them.



So the battle runs. Three of Skelnin’s ships blaze into fiery death; four are cleared and taken; three try to bank away into flight, but his own ships, those left to guard his flanks, race after them. Four fight on as though courage itself may bring victory.



But he knows better. Fortune favors the bold, and the cunning.



The last of Skelnin’s ships are grappled in by three of his own ships, and their crews overwhelmed. The ships of the fisherfolk are of little account. Most have fled already and those that attempted to join the melee were sunk with rocks. But caught in the middle of the battle, Skelnin’s chieftain roars on, his own picked warriors fighting beside him with the blind fury of berserkers. That they will lose is evident to all. Now the last dozen of them press forward, and with a great roar of hopeless rage they beat down the shields on the steerward side of his own ship, thrust somewhat out before the others by the tide of the battle. With a stunning leap the hugest of them—Skelnin’s chief himself—forces his way over the side. The ship rocks wildly behind him, tipping one of his own men and one of Rikin’s into the water. Their heads bob, white as tiny icebergs, and suddenly Skelnin’s man is dragged flailing into the depths.



Skelnin’s chief shrieks out his fury and knocks aside two of Stronghand’s crew as though they are feathers. With a curse on his lips, he charges Stronghand.



Such strength is a weakness. Reliance upon it makes one’s mind weak.



As Skelnin’s chief bashes his way toward the aft of the ship, clubs and spears and axes rain down upon him. His boar-tusk helm shatters, and the bone of his head shines through his torn scalp like snow upon a peak, but he still comes. Is it possible that fury can transcend the limits of flesh? Poised in the stern, hand upon his own iron-tipped spear, Stronghand watches with interest as Skelnin’s chief staggers on. But in the end even the greatest will bleed, and flesh becomes dust just as the great cliffs that loom over them will become sand in the end to be scattered in the breeze—or so the WiseMothers say.



Struck behind the knee and pierced through his throat, Skelnin’s chief collapses a spear-length from Stronghand’s feet.



A roar of triumph lifts from his warriors, a shout that shudders the air and echoes off the distant dark cliffs. Now they will believe in him. Now others will flock to follow his standard. He surveys the carnage without pleasure, but also without pain. This is the way such things are accomplished. For other tasks, other methods will prevail.



Those of the wounded who seem minded to surrender, and to live, he lets pledge loyalty to Rikin fjord. Those of his men who flounder in the sea are fished out, untouched—it was the bargain he made. Most of the dead they tip into the water, as he promised, but he lets his own dogs, now unleashed, tear Skelnin’s chief to pieces.



The clamoring of dogs ripped Alain out of his dream. He half fell off the bed. The rug had slipped and the cold floor against his bare feet brought him fully awake.



Tallia stirred. “What is that noise?” she murmured, a soft complaint.



He wore his shift, as he always did to bed—unnatural in a marriage bed, but it was Tallia’s wish. Now he fumbled for his sword and sheath and bolted for the door, where servants rolled aside, coming awake themselves as they scrambled to get out of his way. An amulet wrapped the latch, and he got his fingers around the cord and yanked it free. He flung the door open so roughly that the ligatura—blessed and bound by the deacon—that hung from the threshold rained onto him, dried herbs and parchment scraps inscribed with verses from the holy book. He brushed his hair free of them as he ran down the stairs to the level below. The walls stank of incense from the nightly rounds the deacon made with her censer, swinging it back and forth to drive away evil creatures from within the walls. A smoky light permeated the curving stairs from below—the fire of torches.



Fear clutched his heart.



It had been so quiet for a month after Steadfast’s death. He had begun to believe that they were free, that the curse was nothing but ravings spun into being by the prince’s disordered mind.