Dark King Of The North (Book 3) Page 23

  “What do you want of me?” Verkain asked. “Do you want to know why I killed your brothers and sisters? Do you want to know why I slew you, sticking the blade in myself? I should be asking the questions. How do you live?”

  “You know the truth of my identity.”

  “What does that mean?” Verkain asked. “It’s a nonsense statement. Of course I know who you are. You are Kerwin Verkain!”

  “Only in this life!”

  Verkain slumped back in his throne, his face registering surprise at the yelled words.

  “I am much more than Kerwin Verkain or Randall Tendbones, and you know this,” Randall said, taking a determined step nearer the throne. “You have lied to me all my life. Even before!”

  “You speak insanity.”

  Randall turned away.

  “They say I am mad,” Verkain went on, “and if so, I believe I have passed it on to my only surviving child.”

  Randall spun back to glare at his father. “Do you deny who I am? What I am?”

  Verkain shot out of his throne. “I do not know what you are talking about!” he screamed, standing still at the top of the stairs, his face quivering.

  The two glared at one another for long seconds, each set of eyes seeming to dare the other to look away in a contest of wills.

  Eventually a calmness took control of Randall’s features. “When I was your prisoner, you told me I was more powerful than I knew. I took you at your word. The night you murdered me ... the night you cut my life away ... I whispered a healing spell just before your blade opened my throat. I had hoped the spell would heal the wounds you gave me as they were being made.”

  “I had placed nullifying magic about this room,” Verkain said.

  “I know,” Randall continued, “but as I said, I took you at your word. I surmised if you were speaking truth, then my own spell should counter yours.”

  “It seems it has worked out that way.”

  “Not as intended,” Randall said. “My body was damaged greatly, and the spell did heal, but my soul had already fled.”

  Verkain eased back onto his throne.

  “I died,” Randall said.

  “Then you are the most powerful mage of all, to bring yourself back from the grave.”

  Randall smiled. “Your words may be true, but you know this. Why deny it?”

  “I owe you nothing,” Verkain said.

  Randall chuckled again. “I believe you do. If nothing else, you owe me your thanks. If not for me, you would not—”

  “I would not what?” Verkain interrupted. “Did you conquer Kobalos centuries ago? Did you lay out my plans, crafted over the last sixty years to bring the East and West back to the brink of war? I think not.”

  “When I was beyond death, I saw much,” Randall said. “I learned much of the past, and the present.”

  Verkain sneered. “Then please inform your hateful father of what you believe I already know.”

  Randall ignored the evil look and the tone of the words. “I went back ... to the beginning of all things.”

  “Did you speak with the gods?”

  “I know nothing of any gods,” Randall said. “I did not see one, but there was a ... presence. It was warm, in a spiritual sense. It filled my soul with joy.”

  “How droll.”

  Randall’s eyes flashed on his father. “There was also darkness and light. There was a mighty crash that filled the heavens with fire and a sound like trumpets and screams of anguish.”

  “I do not understand what this has to do with us.”

  “I saw mankind in the earliest days, feeding off the land, learning to hunt and grow, and eventually creating languages and skills and cities.

  “Then I saw you.”

  “Me?”

  “You were a king then, too,” Randall said. “You had a wife, and a child.”

  Verkain was silent.

  “I was that child,” the healer said.

  The dark king scoffed, bringing a hand to his lips as if to hide his laughter or curses.

  “You were jealous of me,” Randall went on. “You were ruler of all, but it was not enough. The only magics you knew then were the low magics, the little magics of sacrifice, with your powders and animal bones and skins.”

  Verkain rested his hands on the arms of his throne.

  “It was I who had the high magic,” the healer said. “It was I who was the natural mage ... the first natural mage.”

  Verkain’s bare hands bit into the arms of the throne, pressing his flesh white in black rock.

  “You learned the high magics from me,” Randall said. “You stole them from me.”

  Blood began to seep from Verkain’s fingers as they continued to dig into the dark stone.

  “Then I escaped, ran away,” Randall said. “I grew to a man in a land far from you, where my skills were appreciated for the help they brought others.”

  “I should have been the one!” Verkain screamed. “Not you! Not my son! I should have had the high magics first!”

  “You did not appreciate what was offered!” Randall yelled back. “For too long you had depended on the souls of others to perform your feats! You had to steal the high magic from me to learn the value of your own soul’s strength!”

  Verkain raised his bloody arms and wrapped them around himself. He sank deeper into his chair, as if hiding from the light of the moon impaling his white face.

  “But even when I ran away, you followed,” Randall vented. “You chased me across nations until you finally caught up with me.”

  Sobs stretched forth from the throned lord. His body shook, his hands trembled as they covered his face.

  “Then, two thousand years ago, you had me killed.”

  Verkain flung out his arms and glared with red, wet orbs of hate. “And what else did you see from beyond?”

  “I saw a book,” Randall said. “It was filled with words about my life, written by simple men who wanted something to believe in.”

  “Yes, the Book of Ashal,” Verkain said, “and where was I in your precious book?”

  “You were not mentioned by name.”

  “Why was your father ... your creator ... not named?”

  “Because you were unimportant.”

  Verkain seethed, drawing air between clenched teeth.

  “You spread nothing but hate and fear and death,” Randall continued. “There was plenty of that already in the barbaric world Ashal found himself thrust into. Those writers sought something better.”

  “And they found it in Ashal, the first of mages, the living god,” Verkain said with spittle flying from his lips.

  “Yes.”

  Randall’s head dipped for him to stare at the black marble beneath his feet, the mineral veins running through it fluorescent in the moon’s glow. Yes, he was Ashal, the man worshiped by thousands as their savior, the living god. Randall corrected himself. No, he was not Ashal. He was Randall Tendbones. Ashal had been his name in another life.

  Verkain’s right arm dipped to the side of his throne, into the darkness of shadow.

  “I did not ask holy men to write of me,” Randall said, his eyes still on the floor. “I was dead before the first pages were inked.”

  “They thought you a god,” Verkain said, “with your abilities to send away disease, pain, wounds and madness.”

  “I am no god.”

  “Two thousand years of history says otherwise,” Verkain asserted. “The churches revere you. Would you destroy their illusions now?”

  “Men changed my words, or misunderstood them,” Randall said. “I only meant to rid the world of pain.”

  Verkain stood once more, lifting his right hand to show he clenched his heavy mace, the black weapon still layered in Markwood’s crusted blood.

  The healer raised his eyes and stared at the weapon of iron. “What do you mean to do? Slay me? Again?”

  Verkain moved down one step and halted, his body quivering with anger.

  “I’ve seen death
already,” Randall said. “More than once, in fact. If you kill me, I will only return. I will make sure of that.”

  “Not if I pulverize your bones and burn your flesh to ash.”

  “You brought me back after I had been dead thousands of years,” Randall said. “Do you not believe I could be reborn again, at a time and place of my own choosing this time?”

  Verkain sneered and raised the iron mace high, as if he were going to charge down the steps and swing the weapon at his son. Then he brought his right arm back and swept it out, flinging the mace away, far across the long hall where the weapon crashed into a stone pillar and plummeted to the floor.

  “I see I should have been more careful when I summoned your soul,” Verkain said.

  “You placed me in the womb yourself,” Randall said, “pulling my essence from the nether, where I had watched and waited for years. I knew eventually the time would be right for my return, and I felt it drawing near, but your spells interfered. You caught me unsuspecting, cleared my memory and birthed me in a place and time of your choice.”

  Verkain nodded.

  “Whom is my mother?”

  The king’s eyes went wide.

  “I learned much after my most recent death,” Randall explained, “but that was not revealed to me.”

  Verkain grinned an evil grin and sat once more, a look of triumph on his face. “Her name was Serera.”

  “Who was she?”

  “A slave girl, nothing more. I bought her from an Eastern noble.”

  “What became of her?”

  Verkain’s grin grew wider. “I had her killed as soon as you drew breath.”

  The healer’s hands tensed into fists at his side.

  “You want me dead,” Verkain said.

  “No, father.”

  Verkain spat on the step beneath his feet. “You always were weak!”

  “What is weakness?” Randall asked. “Does it take strength to kill a man because he has done you wrong? Or does it take strength to allow him to live?”

  “What does it matter what happens to these mortals?” Verkain shouted. “We are eternal.”

  “I can die.”

  “And you can return.”

  “When I so choose.”

  “And I the same.”

  “You value your own life, but not that of your fellow man,” Randall said. “That is absurd.”

  “Our fellow men exist to serve, nothing more!”

  “What gives you the right?” Randall asked.

  “I give myself the right,” Verkain said. “You yourself have said there is no god! There is none to answer to! My strength, my magic, my immortality give me the right to do as I wish with these gnats. We are the true gods!”

  “I never said there were no gods,” Randall corrected. “I said I have not met one, and that I myself am no god.”

  “You speak foolishness,” Verkain said.

  “It was foolishness for you to bring me back,” Randall said. “Did you believe I would be weaker than before, or more controllable?”

  “I made my plans,” Verkain said, “but they have been thwarted. I should have been better prepared. Next time I shall be.”

  “You think there will be a next time?” Randall asked. “You know the prophecies. Ashal has returned. The end of days are near.”

  “The end of days will be what we make them,” Verkain said. “As for myself, I plan to rule with an iron fist.”

  “To what end?” Randall asked. “Even if you conquer all, what good will it do? You could have every gold coin, every concubine, every nation and man and child at your feet, but what good will it do you? Eventually you would become bored with existence.”

  “I will only know when I succeed.”

  “I will not allow it,” Randall said.

  “Yet you won’t kill me.”

  “No, I will not,” Randall said, “but what I can do is love you.”

  Verkain’s top lip grew back to reveal teeth. “What madness is this?”

  “You are my father,” Randall said. “You have slain my mother, my brothers and sisters. You have slain me on at least two occasions of which I recall. You draw magical strength from souls of slaves stuffed in the dungeons beneath your castle. You have done untold evils to others, people who did not deserve their fates. But still ... I will love you. I will show you the power of love, and that you cannot defeat.”

  “I gave you life again to fulfill a portion of the prophecy in the Book of Ashal,” Verkain said, “then I executed you again to thwart that very prophecy. When you were dead for years, your soul floating in nothingness, I was here, wandering the world and bringing misery. I have caused more wars and famines than you can imagine. I have dealt out more death than any other who has lived.”

  “That does not mean you cannot be forgiven.”

  “I do not seek forgiveness.”

  “But I will offer it.”

  Verkain turned his face from his son, hiding his eyes in shadow, hiding the windows to emotion. “I cannot accept.”

  “Why?” Randall asked.

  The king said nothing.

  “It is a simple question, father.”

  Verkain turned his face back into the light. Wet streamed from his eyes. “I am Lord Kaywan Verkain. I am two thousand years old, and I perform what is required of me.”

  The northern lord stood, using the sleeves of his black robes to wipe away tears.

  “It does not have to be this way,” Randall said.

  “We were the first true mages, Kerwin,” Verkain said softly. “We are the most powerful beings in this world. We are their gods. We each have our roles to play, you as the bringer of light, myself as the dweller in darkness. I am, and always have been, the Dark King of the North. I will not forsake my part in our story.”

  “The world needs hope,” Randall said. “Together we could bring that.”

  Verkain wiped away the last of his tears, then lowered his arms. “Not I,” he said. “Not I.”

  Randall watched as his father moved to one side of the throne, easing away from the top of the steps.

  “It does not have to be this way.” The healer worked his way up the stairs slowly with his hands outstretched. “We could work together. I could help you.”

  “No,” Verkain said.

  “In the name of love, father, please,” Randall begged, tears falling from his own eyes.

  The king said nothing, but turned abruptly as if startled, as if he had heard something from behind the throne.

  The end of a long blade appeared at Verkain’s throat.

  “I am no offspring of yours,” Kron Darkbow said from the other end of the sword, the hidden door open behind him beneath a tapestry folded to one side. “I have no qualms about slaying you.”

  Chapter Twenty Eight

  “Kron, no!” Randall bound up the stairs, his pale robes flapping about his knees.

  But it was too late.

  Verkain snapped his fingers, and before Kron could so much as blink, the iron mace whirled across the room and lurched into its owner’s hands. The king swung the weapon up, swiping aside the sword and lashing out.

  An iron flange glanced across Kron’s forehead, splashing blood and sending the man in black reeling to the floor near the open portal. His sword went flying into shadows.

  Verkain moved forward, raising his weapon for another blow, but his son was suddenly at his side.

  Randall grabbed his father’s wrists with both his hands. “There has been enough killing!”

  “Aside!” Verkain shoved at the youth, sending the healer rolling into the throne.

  Kron pushed himself up on one hand. With blurry vision, he glanced about for his sword but found it gone.

  Verkain stood over the prostrate figure. “You have become a nuisance!”

  The king raised his mighty iron club for a killing blow.

  Kron shot out an arm, tiny darts of black bolting forth.

  The three slivers each found a home. Two embedded
themselves in the king’s throat, the third dart jabbing into his cheek beneath the left eye.

  Verkain gasped, then roared, dropping his mace to the floor with a sonorous clanging. He thrust his fingers to his face, pulling away the black shards causing him grief. Blood drained from his wounds, wetting his hands and dribbling down his robes.

  Kron saw his chance and rolled away, toward Randall. He found the healer still groggy, the king’s blow having knocked the air from the young man’s chest and leaving him shaking his head.

  Verkain bent over, the blood dripping from his face and neck to dot the black floor beneath his feet. He huffed and growled, then raised his face to the moonlight while laughing. It was a deep, evil laugh, full of vengeance and anguish and suffering to come.

  Kron knelt next to his friend and gripped him by the shoulder. “Are you alright?”

  The healer shook his head more, then his eyes seemed to clear.

  Verkain spun around, seeing his son and the warrior in black on the ground near the throne. “Kerwin, you speak to me of love while your assassin tries to skewer me from behind. I see I raised you well.”

  Randall stood, moving in front of Kron to face his father. “You know I hired no assassin.”

  Kron gripped a dagger in his belt and yanked it free.

  Verkain’s mace appeared in the king’s hands again. He pointed with it. “Already your killer prepares another weapon. You tell me of love, but all I see is opportunity to take my throne!”

  The healer placed gentle fingers on Kron’s weapon hand. “There will be no more killing.”

  Verkain chuckled while his wounds appeared to seal themselves and vanish. He wiped the last of the blood from his face.

  Kron’s hooded eyes glared over his friend’s shoulder at the healing king.

  “What did you expect, Darkbow?” the Kobalan lord said. “I am immortal. You cannot slay me.”

  “Good,” Kron said. “That means I can inflict upon you all the pain I want.”

  Verkain continued to laugh. “I should have had you working for me.”

  “No.” Randall patted his companion’s hand. He turned slowly to his father, who stood just out of reach with his mace still gripped. “No more killings. We end this here, tonight, but not with death.”