What Lies Within (Book 5)

ENCHANTMENT’S

REACH

Volume Five:

What
Lies
Within

Martin Ash

Enchantment’s Reach Volume5:  What
Lies
Within
© Copyright: Martin Ash 2013
© Outside Publishing 2013

Cover design & artwork: Alexia Dima, Michail Antonellos

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced by any means without the prior written consent of the publisher, other than brief quotes for reviews.

‘One certainly has a soul; but how it came to allow itself to be enclosed in a body is more than I can imagine.’ 
Lord Byron

‘What lies behind us and what lies before us are tiny matters, compared to what lies within us.’
Ralph Waldo Emerson

ONE

i

  
'It really is very pleasant here at Glancing Memory. Please come. Urch-Malmain is preparing a celebratory banquet in your honour. He is most pleased with your success. We await you . . .

  
Harg.'

   Leth scanned the note once, twice, and again. He could hardly now doubt that Harg had arrived safely at Urch-Malmain's Tower of Glancing Memory. Harg's adjustments to the portal had obviously been a success, and the Great Sow, Ascaria, now dead, no longer interfered to disrupt the perfect functioning of the portal's delicate internal weft.

   Even so, Leth was filled with misgiving. Harg had travelled safely, but did that mean that all others would? Portals of this kind were rare and, it seemed to Leth, highly unpredictable in nature. Leth turned back to where his two young children, Prince Galry and Princess Jace, lay curled in sleep. Was he prepared to risk their lives as well as his own by stepping through?

   But what choice had he? They could not remain here, and the one other way to return - the uncertain road by which Leth had come, that descended into the Death Abyss -  was arduous and set with multiple perils. Furthermore, Urch-Malmain lacked patience and would hardly wait while Leth and the children laboured back by such a tortuous route.

   What might they find now in the Tower of Glancing Memory? With Ascaria gone, was the Portal to their own domain now clear and risk free? Could they at last return to Enchantment's Reach?

  
If they did, what then of Urch-Malmain?

   Leth heaved a sigh. Answers would not be found by standing here.

   At his shoulder Rasgul, the Abyss warrior, asked, 'Do you go, Swordbearer?'

   Leth gazed deeply into the smoky magenta haze of the portal. 'Do I have a choice?'

   As he spoke the portal sputtered briefly; a second leaf of heavy paper appeared and floated to the floor. Leth stepped forward, bent and picked it up, and read:

   'By the way, Master Urch urgently requests that you bring the Orbsword.'

    Leth hesitated. He said to Rasgul, 'You say the Orbsword is unsafe?'

   'That was my instinct. It has absorbed a phenomenal force. My concern was that it might now be unstable or dangerous.'

   'Why would Urch-Malmain want it?' mused Leth, but knew he was putting the question to the wrong person. It troubled him: might Urch-Malmain have some undeclared purpose in mind with regard to the weapon?

  
Whether I bring it or not, he will have access to it. But I am the only one who can wield it!

  
Or is that no longer the case?

   Leth glanced back down the passageway that led into what had been Ascaria's vast cavern. 'I’ll fetch it.'

   He stepped across and bent to rouse the children, for he was unwilling to let them out of his sight.

   'Summon it, Swordbearer.'

   Leth straightened. Momentarily he had forgotten. The Sword of the Orb was obedient to his command, as though it were truly his from some unrecalled existence.

   He reached out his arm.
'Orbsword,
to me!
'

   He waited. Nothing happened. With a glance at Rasgul he invoked the blade again. Still it did not fly to his grasp.

   'Perhaps more has changed than we know,' Rasgul observed.

   Leth stooped and with gentle words coaxed the two children into his arms. He carried them slowly back out into Ascaria's cavern, past the great foaming cataract and the sunken, walled enclosure where dazed children rescued from Ascaria's clutches still stood, blank-eyed and uncertain of their future. He skirted the edge of the lake that had formerly contained the Great Sow’s foul liquid substance. A few goles and Acolytes still milled shiftlessly; none offered him harm. Presently he stood before the Sword of the Orb.

  It rested in the air at the rim of the lake, held there by some unknown force. Its blade no longer emitted its former bright roseate light, but was now tarnished and dull in appearance, the metal crawling with a mottle of variegated reds and blacks.

   Once again Leth set his children down. He stood before the Sword and stretched out his hand.
'Orbsword, to me!'

   The Sword of the Orb shivered, as though straining against something unseen,
then grew still. Leth took a breath then stepped across, reached up and grasped its hilt. He drew the Sword down. He felt a slight resistance. There was something . . . it did not feel quite as it had done before. Leth knew a moment of sudden, severe self-doubt. He glanced about him uneasily, then sheathed the blade in the scabbard which was still buckled at his waist.

*

   Back before the glimmering portal with his two children, Leth paused to say farewell to Rasgul. In a strange way he had come to feel respect and even a measure of affinity for the Abyss warrior. Rasgul was not his own man; as Urch-Malmain's bound slave he could be capable of anything. Yet he had fought bravely and Leth believed he had glimpsed in him an unusual character and resourcefulness of spirit. No matter that Rasgul was controlled, Leth felt that he had looked deep inside the pallid warrior and seen something indomitable, noble and essentially good residing there.

   And yet, at a word from Urch-Malmain, Rasgul would become Leth's bitter enemy.

   'Are you charged to return to Glancing Memory?' Leth asked.

   Rasgul gave a nod, his features set. 'First I will do what I can for those who remain here.'

   'Then we’ll meet again.'

   'I think so.'

   Leth smiled, releasing Galry's hand, and held out his own to the Abyss warrior. 'Go well.'

   Rasgul seemed faintly surprised, then his features creased and he grasped Leth's hand and squeezed it firmly.
'And yourself.'

   Leth bent and picked up the sapphire helm which lay at his feet, and placed it over his head, raising the visor. Holding the children again he faced the swirling flux of the portal. He swallowed; his throat had turned dry. Then he steeled
himself. . .  and stepped forward.

ii

   There was a brief tingling upon the skin, a prickling of the small hairs on his arms and spine.
Scarcely anything more. The air seemed to fizzle and pop briefly; Leth's ears were momentarily clogged. Then he was standing in a familiar low chamber enclosed by dark stone walls. His ears picked up the low murmur of strange machinery; his eyes were momentarily bedevilled by colours.

   Leth glanced down and smiled reassuringly at Galry and Jace. The three of them stood beneath the complex silver arch of Urch-Malmain's living artefact, their feet on the bright geometric forms etched upon the floor. To one side was Urch-Malmain, bent and twisted, garbed in a long black
robe. He was examining a skein of fibrils set within the apparatus. Against the opposite wall Count Harg lounged upon a bench. He had washed the grime and blood of battle from his skin, and changed out of his combat gear into a loose-fitting cerise coloured velvet blouse, baggy black pants and floppy, calf-length leather boots. In one hand he idly swung a small whitish object on a leather thong. He had been toying with this thing when Leth had first come upon him in the Tower of Glancing Memory, just before they set out for the Death Abyss and the Fortress of the Dark Flame. During the journey Leth had noticed that Harg wore it around his neck.

  
'Ah, Leth!' Urch-Malmain exclaimed, swivelling with an expression somewhere between a cynical smile and a scowl. 'King Leth! Leth the Swordbearer! You have returned, and with your two precious cherubs, safe and sound after all. How marvellous!'

   Galry and Jace were blinking and gazing about them in some wonder. 'Father, where are we?'

   Count Harg was regarding Leth with some interest. '
King
Leth? I was not aware. King of where?'

   'Oh yes, k
ing indeed!' Urch-Malmain replied with a chuckle. 'But his land is far from here. Or perhaps not so very far now. Well, we shall see. We shall see.'

   Leth stepped with the children from beneath the arch. They clung to him, fearful.

   'It’s all right, little ones. You have nothing to fear from me,' said Urch-Malmain, eyeing the children as though not quite certain what they were. His gaze shifted back to Leth. 'You have brought the Orbsword, I see. That is good.'

   Leth was wary. 'What do you intend to do with it?'

   'Simply dispose of it where none might ever find it again. The Great Sow is within the blade. I wish to ensure that she never gets out - or if she does, that it is somewhere where she can do no further harm.'

   Leth considered the irony of these words, coming as they did from a creature such as Urch-Malmain.

   'Do you wish to hand it over?' Urch-Malmain asked.

   Leth hesitated. 'Perhaps I should be the one to dispose of it.'

   'What? You intend to transport it back to your own domain? Ah, Swordbearer, and what then if she should by some means escape? How would you live with yourself?'

   'You are holding to our arrangement, then? I am to return?'

   'Why, yes. You have performed so well, and I am grateful.' Urch-Malmain hobbled across the chamber and examined a flask of bubbling green fluid. 'I have no use for you here, after all. There are still some fine adjustments to be made to the Portal, but when all is done you will be the first to step through. But surely you don't want to risk having the Sow as a travelling companion?'

   Leth's apprehension grew. Harg watched him with coldly amused blue eyes.

   'Daddy, I'm hungry,' protested Jace, tugging at Leth's hand.

   'Ah, yes, food,' declared Urch-Malmain. 'I have prepared a celebratory banquet upstairs. Well, banquet is perhaps a slight exaggeration, but there is plenty for all. I regret I will not be joining you. I find your company distasteful. Children especially incline me to nausea. But I hope you will partake fully of my hospitality. A chamber has been prepared for you
also, as I am sure you must be tired. Please bathe and refresh yourselves. Perhaps you are not aware, but you are filthy - all three of you. Unsightly and quite malodorous. Then eat your fill. Keep the Orbsword with you for now, if you wish, but do consider what I have said. It is no longer useful to you, but if it fell into the wrong hands in the wrong time or place, well, heh-heh-heh, one hardly dares imagine!'

iii

   Leth and the children bathed, then ate alone. A generous selection of meats, fish, vegetables, fruits and puddings had been laid out upon the table in the main chamber upstairs. A silent, aged servant attended to their needs, and all three tucked in heartily. There was no sign of Hellia, Urch-Malmain's beautiful consort, and though Count Harg looked in on them at one point, he stayed only to pick an orange from a dish, comment acidly on the weather, and then depart.

   When they had eaten and drunk their fill the servant showed them to their chamber. Exhausted, all three curled up in the single large bed and within moments were sleeping a long, deep and dreamless sleep.

*

   When Leth awoke the Orbsword
was gone. He had unbuckled it before sleeping and placed it in a rack beside the bed. The sapphire armour and helm, which for comfort he had also removed, lay where he had left them. 

   He rolled from the bed and strode to the door, only to find it locked from outside. With sudden fury he struck the door with the side of his fist.
'Urch-Malmain! What duplicity is this! Urch-Malmain!'

   There was no reply. Leth turned back, mindful that Galry and Jace still slept. He preferred not to wake them. He paced the room, back and forth, silently seething and wondering at himself that he should have been tricked so easily.

   And yet, why the subterfuge? Urch-Malmain could have made Leth hand over the Sword had he so wished. Leth was in no position to refuse him.

   Leth stood at the high window and gazed impatiently out across the bleak landscape beyond the Tower of Glancing Memory. The bright and enigmatic Orb of the Godworld hung shining in the mysterious sky. Its smaller sister, the World's Agony, was not visible. Had it vanished now, with Ascaria's passing? Some distance away to one side was another enigma: the Shore of Nothing. Its strange sands shimmered hazily in the
Orblight, and beyond it . . . Leth looked away, his mind still unable to deal with the awful mystery that was the End of the World.

   Directly beneath him the Death Abyss yawned, its depths veiled in chill mists.

   Leth felt a weight of frustration settle upon him.