Read Online Death Angel's Shadow by Karl Edward Wagner - Free Book Online Page A
Authors: Karl Edward Wagner
Tags: Fiction.Dark Fantasy/Supernatural, Collection.Single Author, Short Stories & Novellas, Fiction.Fantasy
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two doors: one to the tower stairs which was locked, and the other which opened into the hallway at that end of the castle. This latter door was now bolted from the outside, and five armed men stood guard beside it, keeping close watch over the sleeping astrologer. No one could enter or leave the tower chambers except through that door.
A few others were still awake in the great hall. A fire was burning lustily, and those who did not feel like sleep sought its companionship. It had been agreed that for some men to stay awake through the night was an obvious precaution, as well as having guards patrol the hallways in pairs. More would have been better, but the castle's strength had been dangerously cut by the previous attacks.
So Kane sat awake beside the fire, sipping larger quantities of ale than seemed wise and moodily listening to the minstrel. The albino sat in the shadow of the beams as usual, evoking strange melodies from his lute and from time to time singing along to these rare works of departed genius. He was an unusual man, Kane mused, his performance and repertoire displaying fantastic sensitivity and skill. He wondered what made Evingolis content to attach himself to a country bumpkin like Troylin--perhaps something in the minstrel's past had barred from him the richer, more appreciative patrons of the southern nations.
Scent of delicate perfume and sparkle of pale gold hair in the warm glow. Breenanin sat down beside him in the hearth light. Kane remembered her face as it had first formed in his vision. Only a few days before was it that he had come so close to frozen death in the storm. Time had no meaning to Kane. A dozen years or as many minutes--once past both fitted into the same span of memory. Either a century ago or just that morning he had fled across the northern wastes--and for how long? It was nothing, for it was past and beyond him. His life was only a minute focus of time, an instant of the present balanced between centuries of past and an unknown duration of future existence. He felt a moment of vertigo, as his mind hung poised over time's chasm.
"I couldn't sleep with all this on my mind, so I came down to the fire where it would be cozier," she told him, feeling it necessary that she offer some reason for her presence beside him.
Kane stirred. "It's a haunted night. There's a certain tenseness in the air as before a battle. Death hovers near, and man is reluctant to sleep because he knows an eternal sleep may be his fate within a few hours more.
"Some ale to soothe your thoughts perhaps?" She nodded and Kane rose to pour a cup.
She accepted it with a slight smile, uncertain of her feelings toward the other. He was so strange--huge and brutal, every inch a machine of destruction, she sensed. Yet he was civil of speech and manner--and far more erudite than any man of her experience, other than those learned fossils and simpering dandies of the court. There were many contradictions embodied in the big stranger, nor could she hazard a guess to his nationality or even his age. He seemed so inhumanly aloof and alone. He gave her the same sort of eerie thrill that some of Evingolis's strange songs created.
"You never say another person's name when you speak to him," she commented.
Kane favored her with one of his uncanny, penetrating stares. "No," he admitted. "I don't suppose I do."
"Breenanin," she prompted softly.
"Breenanin."
In silence they shared the fire and the minstrel's song.
I saw her in winter's silent cold light
Clearly, with her warmth upon the sparkle
Of that magical, crystalline night.
And love I knew unspoken passed,
Its timeless warmth, one frozen instant,
Eternally encased in infinite amber.
But what I sensed I could not return;
The instant vanished in that crystalline storm.
In vain do I call through this dancing myriad
Of relinquished emotions, frozen fragments of time.
For the moment has passed, now lost in that swirl-Splintered shards of time's
A few others were still awake in the great hall. A fire was burning lustily, and those who did not feel like sleep sought its companionship. It had been agreed that for some men to stay awake through the night was an obvious precaution, as well as having guards patrol the hallways in pairs. More would have been better, but the castle's strength had been dangerously cut by the previous attacks.
So Kane sat awake beside the fire, sipping larger quantities of ale than seemed wise and moodily listening to the minstrel. The albino sat in the shadow of the beams as usual, evoking strange melodies from his lute and from time to time singing along to these rare works of departed genius. He was an unusual man, Kane mused, his performance and repertoire displaying fantastic sensitivity and skill. He wondered what made Evingolis content to attach himself to a country bumpkin like Troylin--perhaps something in the minstrel's past had barred from him the richer, more appreciative patrons of the southern nations.
Scent of delicate perfume and sparkle of pale gold hair in the warm glow. Breenanin sat down beside him in the hearth light. Kane remembered her face as it had first formed in his vision. Only a few days before was it that he had come so close to frozen death in the storm. Time had no meaning to Kane. A dozen years or as many minutes--once past both fitted into the same span of memory. Either a century ago or just that morning he had fled across the northern wastes--and for how long? It was nothing, for it was past and beyond him. His life was only a minute focus of time, an instant of the present balanced between centuries of past and an unknown duration of future existence. He felt a moment of vertigo, as his mind hung poised over time's chasm.
"I couldn't sleep with all this on my mind, so I came down to the fire where it would be cozier," she told him, feeling it necessary that she offer some reason for her presence beside him.
Kane stirred. "It's a haunted night. There's a certain tenseness in the air as before a battle. Death hovers near, and man is reluctant to sleep because he knows an eternal sleep may be his fate within a few hours more.
"Some ale to soothe your thoughts perhaps?" She nodded and Kane rose to pour a cup.
She accepted it with a slight smile, uncertain of her feelings toward the other. He was so strange--huge and brutal, every inch a machine of destruction, she sensed. Yet he was civil of speech and manner--and far more erudite than any man of her experience, other than those learned fossils and simpering dandies of the court. There were many contradictions embodied in the big stranger, nor could she hazard a guess to his nationality or even his age. He seemed so inhumanly aloof and alone. He gave her the same sort of eerie thrill that some of Evingolis's strange songs created.
"You never say another person's name when you speak to him," she commented.
Kane favored her with one of his uncanny, penetrating stares. "No," he admitted. "I don't suppose I do."
"Breenanin," she prompted softly.
"Breenanin."
In silence they shared the fire and the minstrel's song.
I saw her in winter's silent cold light
Clearly, with her warmth upon the sparkle
Of that magical, crystalline night.
And love I knew unspoken passed,
Its timeless warmth, one frozen instant,
Eternally encased in infinite amber.
But what I sensed I could not return;
The instant vanished in that crystalline storm.
In vain do I call through this dancing myriad
Of relinquished emotions, frozen fragments of time.
For the moment has passed, now lost in that swirl-Splintered shards of time's
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