He wondered if Lord Azaar had got his letter yet, telling of the power of the green light. Doubtless that would cause a sensation in the camp. His next missive concerning the Nerghul would cause a greater stir. It was the first evidence of what they had all suspected, that the Easterners were prepared to use the most despicable of magic in the pursuit of their goals.
For the first time he paused to consider that Talorea really might lose this war. He believed with some certainty that the Scarlet armies were better trained, better motivated and better equipped than their Purple opponents, but that was only part of the story. Such magic as the Easterners possessed might well tip the battle in their favour. If they were prepared to use necromancy, then they would be able to send Nerghul assassins and field regiments of the walking dead against the armies of the West. Would his own men stand their ground in the face of such things?
Sardec believed the answer was yes. They had held their ground beneath Deep Achenar in the face of Elder World horrors. They had stood firm in the face of the Nerghul last night. In both cases they had bought victory with their own blood, and his people were not without their own magic. Who knew what Asea was capable of when she put her mind to it?
None of this was getting him anywhere and there were matters at hand that needed his fullest attention. He needed to make sure the defences were reinforced, that the sentries were redoubled. He had sent Corporal Toby off to find a supply of truesilver bullets. They would be handed out to every man. The money would have to come from his own pocket, but it would be worth it. He intended to see that they were properly prepared if another creature of darkness came at them out of the night.
He glanced up at the Tower. A greenish glow flowed through its walls, dimly visible even in the daylight. Its ominous spire glared down at them; reminding him that there was nothing at all he could do, if Ilmarec decided to sweep them from the face of the earth. Something was going to have to be done about that but for the life of him, he could not think what.
Rik looked up from the maps. He was sick and tired of studying them, of running over all the details of the preparations for the attempt on the Tower. And he was nervous now that the event was almost on top of them. Weasel and the Barbarian had been dispatched to finalise the preparations with Black Tomar. If all went well, he would be making the attempt on the Tower today. It seemed too soon, but they had run out of time. None of his arguments swayed Asea. She feared the build-up of power within the Tower. The effort had to be made now, before Ilmarec got a chance to carry out his threat against Azaar’s army.
Asea had chosen to entrust Weasel and the Barbarian with some of the secrets of the mission. Even though she had made it clear to them that the threat of the Inquisition hung over their heads too, Rik was not sure he liked that. He told himself that they were reliable, that it was just his ingrained habit of secrecy that made him nervous about it, but it did not help. His nerves were badly on edge. He wanted a distraction, any distraction.
“What was that thing last night — really?” Rik asked Asea. He was still troubled by what he had seen, and that made him curious.
“It was a Nerghul,” she said, staring at the collection of items that lay on top of a silk sheet in front of her.
“That helps,” he said. “I already knew the name. If only I knew what a Nerghul was, I would be fully informed.”
“Curiosity about such things is an error,” she said. He considered this. He was tired, and he was short tempered, but it would not do to forget himself in her presence.
“Please indulge me, milady. I want to understand a little about the thing that almost killed me.”
“You would do better to concentrate on those maps, and the nature of the compounds I have provided you with.”
“If I do not know these things by now, I never will.”
She sighed. “Nerghul are creations of the darkest sort of necromantic sorcery. Grown from the tissue of corpses, mingled with essences drained from certain demons and the blood of humans and Terrarch. They grow in vats of alchemicals, saturated with energies created by sorcerous engines.”
He asked the question that was on his mind. “How do you kill it?”
“You can’t. It’s already dead.”
“How would I stop it then, end its existence?”
“Very strong magic. Enormous amounts of damage. Fire usually harms things of darkness, particularly those that cannot stand the light. Truesilver would help. It would disrupt the flow of necromantic energy through its body. The truth is, though, that Nerghuls are very difficult to stop.”
“There must be some way.”
“Some grimoires, Pusad’s Treatise on the Hounds of Shadow, for one, claim you could stop them by sawing off their heads. It would not break the enchantment, but since the intelligence is in the brain, it would leave the body a mindless animated thing.”
“So all I have to do is ask it to lie down while I saw off its head? That sounds easy enough.”
“By implication, massive damage to the head might have a similar effect. It would have to almost destroy the skull, I would guess and even then it might not work.”
“Why?”
“Other grimoires claim the animation is provided by a dark spirit trapped in the corpse. If that’s the case, then beheading the creature would have very little effect at all.”
“Wonderful,” said Rik. “Those old books don’t seem terribly helpful.”
She smiled. “It’s often the way with such things. Sorcerers fumble in the dark, and write down as certainties what are, at best, theories.”
“So you’re saying that chopping off the head might have no effect whatsoever?”
She considered this. “The animating spirit would still be present but it would lose any mortal senses the head might provide.”
“It would be blind.”
“In one way, yes.”
“In another way, no. Am I right?”
“I have already told you, Rik, that demons see with other senses than the physical. They sense spirit and the flows of power.”
“But I might be invisible to that, if the rest of what you told me is true.”
“Very good, Rik. I see you have worked out a solution.”
“Only if I can convince a near invulnerable demon to lie down and let me perform surgery on it. It does not seem likely, does it?”
“No.”
“Who would create such a thing? How did they come to be? They strike me as being things that the Inquisition would forbid.”
“They are forbidden, Rik, at least in the West. They were originally created in the darkest period of Terrarch history, in the dying days of our civilization on Al’Terra when some of our sorcerers sought to use the methods of the Princes of Shadow against them.”
He considered this. It was information that was never mentioned in the scriptures or testaments, never taught in the schools, never mentioned in books, but he saw no reason to doubt her. She was, after all, the expert in such things.
“Even to me that does not seem the cleverest of plans,” he said, hoping to draw her out. Her hand toyed with one of the trinkets in front of her. She gazed into the mid-distance, remembering.
“It was not. Some of those who tried it were desperate, others merely wanted power and would do anything required to grasp it. There are always such ones in any time, but an age of chaos provides them with the excuse they need, and reasons they could not find in less dark times.”
Rik thought if that were the case, such men would be crawling out of the woodwork now. He supposed they were.
“Many sorcerers experimented with the darkest of arts, trying to find a way to overcome the Princes of Shadow. They created things like the Nerghuls and armies of the living dead to fight their wars for them. Some of them ended up joining their enemies, and became Princes themselves. But there were many who remained loyal to the Queen-Empress and still used their lore in evil ways, to fight fire with fire, they said. Such knowledge was preserved by them and their students and found its way to this world when we passed through the Eye of the Dragon. In the East there are many remote estates where the Lords can practise sorcery and no one asks any questions. Jaderac has just such an estate. I fear this and other forbidden lore will find its way to the battlefield in the coming war.”