Born of Darkness (William King) - William King Page 0,12

attack at any moment. A group of link-bearers, young men bearing torches, arrived to light their way. More soldiers joined the escort till nearly a hundred men were present.

A flight of stairs led down, curving into the bowels of the rock upon which the palace sat. Shadows danced as the torches drove back the darkness. It became colder and damper and Kormak found himself thinking of the many dungeons he had experienced during his career.

They emerged into a long corridor lined with heavy ironbound doors. One was open. Worried looking warriors stood outside it. King Aemon made to sweep past but before he could do so, his brother held out his arm to bar his way.

“Sir Kormak, if you would be so kind,” Taran said.

Kormak shrugged and stepped through the doorway. The air felt clammy and still. A robed man lay in a pool of blood. Kormak inspected the body without touching it and glanced around. The chamber was huge and filled with treasure chests. Some of them had broken open and gold and silver glittered in the torchlight. Kormak saw nothing immediately threatening but he sensed that something unfriendly watched. That sensation had saved his life in the past so he paid attention to it.

He bent over the body and checked for a pulse. He flipped the corpse over. He was looking at an old man with a shaven head and bland, pudgy face. A huge wound that looked like it had been made by rending claws gaped in his side.

Taran let the King enter then strode in himself gesturing for soldiers to form a cordon around them.

“What’s going on here?” Kormak asked Prince Taran.

“Chancellor Cetreo lies dead in this vault. He and I are the only men with the keys. The vault doors are watched by the men of the Household Guard. The soldiers heard the Chancellor scream but when they entered the vault to investigate they found nothing except his body. They felt as if something was watching them.”

“These are the treasure vaults, are they not?”

Taran nodded.

“Cargo from the fleet has been deposited here all day and for the past few days.”

“You think someone may have been hidden in the chests?”

“Something. That wound was not made by a blade.”

“No. It looks like the claw mark of a sabretooth. I think we would have noticed if one of those had been locked in a chest.”

“Cetreo served us loyally all his life,” Aemon said. His tone was mild but his expression was that of a man who did not expect contradiction. “Let us see if we can get to the bottom of what happened here.”

He gestured for the soldiers to part. Their captain looked at Taran who nodded and the soldiers let the king pass. Kormak moved to Aemon’s side, more than ever feeling as if he was under observation.

The trail of blood led deeper into the cavernous chamber.

***

Aemon strode forward, his hands clasped together as if he were praying. His face was weary and his shoulders slumped. Kormak knew how he felt. He still had not recovered from the previous night’s exertions aboard the Kraken’s Reach. He felt tired and slow.

Ahead of him a line of torch bearers drove back the darkness. Kormak kept his hand near the hilt of his sword.

They passed a towering statue made of gold. It depicted a jaguar-headed Old One. The style was unlike any Kormak had ever seen.

Mounds of coins high as a man’s shoulder loomed on either side of them, the gateway to a long passage between more chests. The red ribbon of blood flowed through it and led to a massive rune-encrusted sarcophagus. The lid had slid to the ground. It depicted a being that looked like a human with the head of a dire wolf.

“This does not bode well,” said King Aemon. Kormak inspected the coffin. It was moulded of orichalcum and inlaid with binding runes of truesilver. They were not of any type he had seen before but they contained patterns he recognised. The workmanship was old and hinted at the inhuman.

“Something was imprisoned in this casket,” Kormak said.

The king inspected the rune-work as if he had some idea of what it might be. A linkboy held the torch close.

Aemon traced the runes on the lid with his finger. “The script resembles pre-Solari ideograms from the Sunken Kingdoms. These curved symbols would seem to be binding signs. The large central rune around which they are organised looks like a name. If you spell it out phonetically it could