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Mel Keegan OnLine
Mel Keegan OnLine
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Category:
Gay/Lesbian/Bi
Publisher: DreamCraft
ISBN-10: 0975088467
Type: Fiction
Pages: 284
Copyright: May, 2004
Jack Leigh is a soldier of fortune, far from home. He's a brilliant 'sword for hire,' but in the dangerous Riverlands dukedom of Rhondia he gets much more than he bargained for. Historical fantasy on a vast canvas from a long-time favorite author.
Treachery, treason and dark magic form swirling, powerful undercurrents in Rhondia. Along the canals and in the menacing heart of Nimmenwald Forest lurk unimaginable threats — the bo'zhe, the Lappai ... barbarians from the wasteland of Saihabara and the dark, unknowable forces of Nimmenwald Deep itself.
At the crux of the vortex of magic and treachery is the heir to Rhondia, Michael Sebastian — 'Seb'— d'Astaghir. Haughty, moody ... haunted by the goblins of memory, Seb is in terrible jeopardy. It's only luck when his old friend, old lover, Luc Redmayne happens upon a streetfight in a tavern yard and a 'hired sword' enters the fortress of Rhondia as Seb's bodyguard.
With the fresh eyes of an 'outlander,' the shrewdness of a soldier of fortune from Yulminster ... and the help of a young gypsy shaman ... Jack Leigh uncovers the pitch-black, treasonous magic which is simmering beneath Rhondia.
And when Jack and his companions finally lay their hands on the Basilisk ring, the symbol of the great houses of Rhondia, they unleash the very forces they have feared.
From page one, it's mystery, action, gay romance — and more than a dash of the sensual in this new and entirely original fantasy novel.
Excerpt
The muted sounds of revelry still echoed from the great hall, but the minstrels were quiet now and the troupe of Zaparasti entertainers had long since returned to their camp, on the east side of the fortress. A few die-hards would carouse until dawn, but most of the Citadel’s guests had retired an hour before. Stewards and maids were yawning as they cleaned and tidied, and the passages which led deeper into the maze of the ancient building were quiet.
A clock somewhere far off struck the hour as Jack lifted a brass lamp high overhead and peered into the wine cellar, intent on the movement he had half-seen up ahead. One of the o’clock. Wine casks branded with the name of Saint Rosa Abbey Winery, racks of bottles, stacks of crates, empty barrels and hand-barrows filled the gallery before them, and this was the fourth stone-buried chamber through which they had crept. Each was further underground than the last, and by Jack’s reckoning they were twenty or thirty yards under the dungeon where he had been imprisoned. Tunnels and passages branched off at regular intervals, each leading up at a sharp angle, and three were wide enough to admit a cart. The tunnels led up to doors and gates where the cellarmasters and cheesewrights passed in and out. Saint Rosa Abbey stocked this cellar; on the level above was the Brackenwood Vines cellar; and above it, yet another. Jack had never even imagined this part of the Citadel, and was as daunted as impressed.
A light flickered back from the other end of the enormous cellar, and he dropped his voice to a whisper. “There’s someone up ahead. How many more of these basement levels are there?”
“I didn’t know this one was here,” Sebastian admitted. “I thought Saint Rosa Abbey was the second cellar down, not the fourth ... I’ve never been this low in the fortress. I never cared to come down here — I only ever visited the lockup twice before tonight.”
Jack gave him an amused look. “No urge to explore?”
“Not where it’s dank and freezing and reeks of mold and mildew,” Sebastian retorted. “Is that Ragnar?” He raised his hand. “Sergeant! Is Redmayne here?”
“We’re all here, y’grace,” Hauk said testily from the shadows. “We’ve been freezing our bloody bollocks off for the last ten minutes, waiting for you!”
“The clocks just struck one,” Jack protested. “We’re not late.”
“No, well, the sorcerer wanted to get us together early,” Hauk allowed. “He wanted to hand out these ... I’ve been holding them. One apiece, and keep them close, so he says.”
The gelfaea were new enough to shine, with none of the patina of long use and anxious fingers. Two were slapped into Jack’s hand, and he passed one to Sebastian. Each was threaded onto a strong chain, and without a word Sebastian hung his own around his neck and dropped the charm inside his shirt. With a frown Jack followed his lead, and smelt the herbs, the acrid tangs of some magic he did not recognize. Janos did: his nostrils flared and for several moments he chanted over his gelfaea before he would slip the chain over his head.
“We’re all to wear them and Master Porteus warns, maybe they’ll be necessary,” Hauk advised. “Hurry, now. The sorcerer’s been busy examining yon gate marker, and he said he’s almost fathomed the secret of it.” He looked Jack and Sebastian up and down and nodded. “You’re armed, I’m pleased to see. It feels bad down here.”
“It’s just the mildew,” Jack growled, “it sets a man on edge.” He held up the lamp and led the way between huge, hulking barrels which seemed to crouch like gargoyles, ready to pounce.
“I hope you’re right,” Sebastian murmured as he shouldered through the shadows.
“So do I,” Jack admitted, mocking himself with a crooked smile.
The walls were wet, some of them actually running with water. More than likely, this cellar was directly under one of the canals, Jack thought. He had lost his orientation some time before. He recalled which way to turn, which steps or ramps to climb to get out, but he had no idea which direction was north. Porteus might know, if it was important. The whole region under the Citadel was honeycombed, and the ‘delvings’ were much more ancient than the fortress itself. Natural caves had been opened up with side-shafts, like a mine, and from somewhere Jack felt a breeze on his face, cold as the wind off a glacier. He looked up, expecting to see pipes or chimneys, set into the very walls of the Citadel to let in air, but all was gloom overhead.
In the intense darkness far behind the last of the massive casks, the sorcerer was intent on a slab of rock set into the last possible wall of the cellar. Twice the width of a man’s shoulders, and half as tall again as a tall man, it seemed at first to be featureless, hewn of the same gray stone as the rest of the wall. But Porteus had scrubbed its edges clean, and, drawing nearer, Jack saw he had been able to thrust a knife in between it and the next rock. Like every other stone back here, the surface was mottled with blue-green moss, the koboldlichen, and Jack’s nose wrinkled at the odd smell.
“Is it a door?” Sebastian asked softly as he came to a halt between Jack and Janos, and Redmayne, who was holding Porteus’s lanterns.
“It must be.” Redmayne’s dark eyes glittered in the lights. “There’s no mortar, you see? Whatever this slab is, it was not cemented into the foundations, which is strange.
“Not strange at all,” Porteus scoffed, though he did not look up from his work. “Who in his right mind cements a door shut, if he wants to be able to get back through it?”
“Then Roald d’Orizon wanted access to ...” Janos began.
“Yes.” Jack stepped forward, set a palm against the stone, felt the intense cold of rock which had not seen sunlight in so many years, and shivered. “But Orizon never wanted anyone else to know it was here.”
In the lanternlight, as Redmayne shifted it about, he saw the face of the Basilisk carved into the rock. The dense blue-green moss had overgrown it, thoroughly hiding it, and it must have been centuries since it was last seen. Porteus was going over it, inch by inch, with his bare fingertips — looking for what, Jack had no idea. The sorcerer was in heavy velvet and brocade, a muffler about his neck, fingerless mittens on both hands, and his breath plumed in the heavy, icy air. Jack shuddered, deep as his marrow. Hauk was right. This place felt bad.
“Ah!” Porteus’s exclamation, too loud in these confines, made them all start. “Here, you see? I should have known!”
“What, where?” Redmayne leaned in to watch as the old man applied the flat of his hands to both the carved eyes of the Basilisk, and shoved with the full weight of his body.
Stone rasped and grumbled, and behind the wall they heard the ringing metallic clanking of a chain. Porteus stood back, blew on his frozen fingers and tugged a pair of deerskin gauntlets under the fingerless ‘inners.’ “It’s counter weighted, like a portcullis. See?”
He had pushed a lever, which moved a weight, which moved a larger weight, which dropped out of a cradle and fell, and as it went down the mechanism lifted the slab of rock on which was carved the gate marker. The gate itself went up only a few feet and stopped, but there was space enough for a grown man to crawl under. Janos stooped to look through, angled his lamp, but the darkness beyond was uterine, dense. Jack was right behind him, peering into the gloom. From the gaping maw of the earth came a smell he could not name, a waft of cold, damp air and the steady, rhythmic sound of dripping water. Janos whispered an old, old mantra for protection, and Jack saw him shiver.
“Are we under the canals?” he asked, hoping Porteus at least had his bearings.
“No. We’ve been heading north, away from the canals, with every passage and stairway we descended. This water is seeping in from Wyrrbank. There’s always been a legend about an underground lake, and I’m inclined to believe it’s be true, if this amount of seepage occurs even in high summer.”
“Wyrrbank?” Jack echoed. “Forgive me, I don’t know Rhondia.”
“The creek on the way to Caith Garach, on the Brackenmoor road,” Redmayne said gruffly while the unlikely gateway rasped again, as if it protested the disturbance of mortals. The space widened, just enough to permit a man to walk underneath, if he did not mind bending his back. Redmayne beckoned Janos to his side to take one of the lanterns. The gypsy was glad to go to him. With his free hand, Luc drew his sword.
Sebastian hesitated and his knuckles whitened on the handle of his lantern. “We must be halfway to Caith Garach!”
“Not quite,” Redmayne judged, “but we’ve been going in the right direction. Porteus?”
“We have.” The sorcerer frowned at Sebastian. Better than anyone, save perhaps Jack, Porteus knew Sebastian’s mind. “Do you want to go back, your grace? I know how the specter of Caith Garach haunts you.”
But Sebastian licked his lips, deliberately squared his shoulders and shook his head firmly. “That particular hobgoblin has been exorcised. If I’m a little ... twitchy, bear with me.”
“There can’t be anything down here to fret about,” Jack reasoned. “The door hasn’t been opened since before Porteus came to work here, which must be — how long, Porteus?”
“I came to Rhondia the winter after Rohase was exiled,” Porteus said quietly. “I wasn’t a young man even then.” He gave the others an almost apologetic look. “When one is blessed with uncommon Gifts, life is long, you understand. Orizon and Zoltan lived centuries, and as for Rohase, no one ever knew where he came from, or how old he was! More than six decades I’ve worked in the Citadel, yet I never discovered this. The koboldlichen overgrew it so completely ... and if I didn’t need the moss for my work, I’d never have found it at all. No one would. Roald d’Orizon was almost too clever. Give me the lamp.”
“Careful.” Redmayne passed it to Janos, who passed it to Porteus. Luc shifted his grip on a short sword that had been whetstoned so recently, Jack could smell the oil on it.
Porteus was already through, and his voice echoed hollowly from the other side as he said, “It’s not another cellar ... Swordmaster, can you hear me? Not a cellar, nor even a mineshaft, but a natural cavern. It looks to have been eaten out of the rock by an underground river!”
The hairs rose on Jack’s nape, and Sebastian took a breath, but it was Tomas Hauk who said, “The Deep.”
“We’ve always known the hills were honeycombed,” Sebastian said bleakly. “Most of the Citadel’s cellars were not excavated, just walled with granite and shored up to support the weight of the fortress above. Damnit, we’ve been sitting on Nimmenwald Deep all along.”
“And now we’re open to it,” Redmayne added. He stooped down to look under the gate. “Porteus, do you see any sign of Orizon?”
The sorcerer answered, but he was speaking in the other direction and his words were muffled, the voice already oddly distant. Sebastian swore lividly in several Riverland languages and then raised his voice to a bellow: “Porteus!”
No reply issued from the cavern now, and Redmayne echoed Sebastian’s curses. “Janos, stay behind me, for gods’ sakes! Seb, go back, if you like. No one will think the worse of you. Jack, stick to him like a coat of glue, no matter where he goes! Ragnar, Hauk, with me.” Luc glared at Sebastian for a long moment, and then Janos stuck close enough to bump into him as he stooped and eased his tall frame through into the cavern.
Half a pace behind the gypsy were Ragnar and Hauk, leaving Jack and Sebastian alone in the cellar. Jack grasped Sebastian’s arm tightly. “Turn back if you want to. Luc was right in what he said with that glare, even if he wouldn’t put words to it. You’re the blood-heir to Rhondia, Seb, you shouldn’t be here at all.”
“Think again,” Sebastian said acidly. He drew his sword deliberately before doubling up to follow the others into the well of freezing darkness, and did not even glance back to see if Jack was behind him.
With a lantern in one hand, sword in the other, Jack went through after him, crab-fashion, wary. His hackles were up, his belly knotted, yet nothing he actually saw or heard warranted the reaction. The weight of rock overhead made him feel as if he were being crushed, and cold sweat beaded his face as he straightened and found himself in a long, narrow, natural cavern.
The floor sloped gently away; a stream of the water that seeped endlessly through the roof and down the walls trickled through a shallow trench, to the right side of which Porteus was marveling over rock paintings which could have been a thousand years old.
Scenes of war had been lovingly detailed — they were unmistakable, though the costumes and weapons were strange indeed. Here were soldiers in austere garb, drably colored, with featureless helmets obscuring their faces. No crests or shields or bright cavalry banners, but muddy green-gray, or gray-brown livery. The dead lay strewn at their feet, puddled in blood. To one side, orange-yellow billowed from a shattered shape that might have been a building, and Redmayne swore as he touched the ancient painting with his fingertips.
“Do you remember the night of the fire on the lamp-oil wharf? This looks just like it. The fire lit up half the sky, and barrels burst in the heart of the blaze, with a roar like a thunderclap.”
“I saw it, we all did,” Porteus said gravely. “These paintings have been here since well before the Citadel was built. These are warriors of the tribes which struggled before our forefathers were born. It seemed they used the fireburst as a weapon. By gods, what evil.”
“But effective,” Sebastian added. “What enemy could stand against it, or would even try? With such a weapon, war would be obsolete.”
“Would it?” Jack was less sure. “Or would both sides get their hands on it and use it on each other? All is fair, so long as they both have it, and Hel take the innocent bystanders who get in the way.” He shuddered and passed on along the painting. “Speaking of wickedness, Seb, look at this.”
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