Cover by TJ Lomas.

[Sorry this one is late. Holiday weekend, and all. :-)]

I’m posting a chapter from my latest fantasy novel for free every Monday and Friday (click Zervakan above for a synopsis and to start from the beginning). It’s in a “pre-published state,” meaning you might find the occasional spelling/grammar mistake. If you do, please leave a comment below or email me at robsteiner01 [at] gmail [dot] com.

If you’re uncomfortable getting something for nothing, you can hit the PayPal Donate button in the Tip Jar section to the right. If you donate more than $3, I’ll send you a non-DRM ebook once the book is published (summer 2012). If you donate more than $20, I’ll send you a printed copy.

Thanks, and I hope you enjoy it!

ZERVAKAN

by Rob Steiner

Chapter 14

Karak sat in his carriage watching the cargo ship Hutina float toward a deepwater stone pier at Yaro Docks.  The time was close to midnight, so gas lamps hung on hooks above the pier, providing the four longshoremen with enough light to gather the Hutina’s lines.  The longshoremen securely tied the ship to the dock within a minute.  As soon as the gangplank was lowered, Karak watched the crew and the longshoremen haul a large crate off the ship.  A Compact customs official—someone Karak had bribed dozens of times before—approached the crate, stamped it with the Compact seal without even opening it, and waved it on toward the nearby wagon.  The longshoremen threw oiled tarps over the crate, concealing it from the curious eyes of unbribed authorities and other onlookers.

Karak smiled.  The whole process took less than five minutes.

Karak knocked three times on the interior ceiling of his coach.  His driver turned the horse to follow the wagon transporting the crate.  They wound their way through the Low City, the quarter of Calaman that most respectable citizens declared immoral and filthy, but where they all ended up at one time or another in their lives.  It was Karak’s home and place of business.  He knew there would always be a flourishing trade of gambling, whorehouses, and opium dens, no matter how many laws a government passed against them.  Karak understood human nature, understood that even in the darkest times there were certain businesses that would always prosper until humanity faded from history.

Once the wagon reached the Low City, Karak knew they were safe.  Most of the people wandering the dark streets were alone, with hoods over their heads or wide-brimmed hats pulled low.  Karak knew of several Parliamentarians who frequented his establishments, along with many powerful merchants and military officers.  None would comment on anything they saw here, for that would only raise questions on what they were doing in the Low City to begin with.

Businesses in the Low City did not advertise their wares like the “legitimate” businesses in the rest of Calaman.  Whorehouses and opium dens were illegal in the Compact (though it was relatively easy to bribe an official here and there to look the other way), so they could not post signs above their establishments.  Word of mouth was the only advertisement these places had.  All of the buildings along the winding cobblestone streets would have looked deserted had it not been for the people walking—usually stumbling—in and out of their doors.  Most of the gas lamps on the streets were dark, for the city government had ceded de facto control of the Low City to its denizens…which Karak controlled.  Though he had the power to order someone to keep the lamps lit, he knew the Low City’s clientele preferred the shadows.

After a twenty minute ride through the Low City, the wagons arrived at the rendezvous point inside a complex of abandoned grain silos.  The night outside was moonless and cloudy, the only illumination coming from the glow of thousands of gas lamps in the city.  Once Karak’s carriage passed through the doors, they closed behind him.

Crane, dressed in an impeccably tailored blue suit and matching blue tri-corner hat, stood in the center of the silo holding a torch.  Five cloaked and hooded men, all holding torches, stood behind Crane.

Karak stepped out of his carriage and approached Crane and his men.  The cloaked men gave Karak an uneasy feeling, like when he saw what Crane had done to his plant several days ago.  Every bit of their skin was covered, and they stood unnaturally still, holding the torches above them with cloth-wrapped hands.  The horses harnessed to Karak’s carriage and the wagon pulling the crate snorted nervously.  The drivers got down from their seats and patted the noses of each horse, soothing them with soft words, though the drivers looked as uneasy as the animals.

“Your package is delivered, Mr. Crane,” Karak said.  “Now I believe we have a transaction to complete.”

Crane walked around to the wagon, swinging his walking cane as if on a noonday stroll along the waterfront.  He used the cane to lift the oiled tarp and inspected the crate.  He leaned in, closed his eyes, and took a deep breath through his nose.

He smiled.  “You are a man of your word, Mr. Frost.  But there is one more task I must ask of you before our transaction is complete.  You must kill your drivers.”

This drew shocked gasps from the drivers, and the horses began to whinny, sensing their masters’ fear.

Karak laughed.  “These men are Klahdera.  They are sworn to me and I to them.  They would sooner slit their own throats than talk to the authorities.  Don’t worry, your secrets are safe.”

Crane shrugged.  “Very well.”

The men in cloaks behind Crane dropped their torches.  Tentacled arms shot from out of their cloaks with sickening cracks and moist slithering sounds.  The ends of the tentacles wrapped around each driver’s neck before he had time to scream.

But Karak had a revolver in his hand aimed at Crane’s face just as quickly as the disguised monsters had struck.

“Release them,” Karak growled.

Crane laughed.  “Or what, you’ll shoot me?”

Karak pulled the trigger and blasted a hole in Crane’s forehead, spraying the cloaked men behind him with Crane’s blood and brains.  Crane’s body fell to the ground on its back.  From the rafters above, revolver fire opened up on the “men” in cloaks.  The cloaked men unwrapped their tentacles from around the drivers, the men slumping to their knees gasping for air.  The cloaked men fell to the ground as holes exploded all of their bodies from the Klahdera men Karak had posted in the silo’s rafters before Crane had arrived.

He always had a back-up plan.

The cloaked things stopped moving.  The gunfire stopped.  Besides the sounds of Karak’s men coming down from the silo rafters, all was quiet.  Karak walked over to Crane and stared at his body.  There was a small hole in his forehead and a large pool of dark blood spreading on the ground from the back of his head.  Crane’s eyes stared up at the ceiling, and his lips wore with the same grin he had just before Karak shot him.

Primas Maed stood next to Karak, while Castle, leading the rest of Karak’s men, aimed his two silver revolvers at one of the cloaked men he had killed, poking its body with a toe.

“Can’t trust anybody these days, my Lord,” Primas said, looking down at Crane and holstering his revolver.

“That’s why I keep you around,” Karak said.  He walked over to the wagon carrying the crate and whipped the tarp off the back.  “Now let’s see what’s in this thing.  Castle, those things are dead.  Come over here and help me with this.”

The large Klahdera man holstered his revolvers in the belt around his hip, then leaped up onto the wagon with Karak.  Another Klahdera man tossed Castle a crowbar, which Castle used to pry open a corner of the unmarked wood box.  Karak used another crowbar to pry open the other ends, and they soon had the lid off and leaning to one side of the wagon.  A terrible odor sprang from the box, making Karak wince and Castle begin to cough.  It was as if a thousand rats had rolled in their own dung and then died inside the box.  Through teary eyes, Karak looked inside.

The crate was filled mostly with straw, but in the center was a chest made of black stone about two paces wide and long.  The chest looked extremely old, for the white paint in the carvings on its lid was nearly gone from weathering, as were the rounded corners.

“Bloody Mercy,” Primas said, covering his mouth and nose.  “What’s in there?”

Karak pulled a handkerchief from his coat pocket and put it over his mouth and nose.  It did not help.

“My Lord,” Castle said, covering his nose with his sleeve, and looking at Karak with more fear in his eyes than Karak had ever seen before.  “This stench is supernatural.  Those men over there were supernatural.  We should leave this place now.”

Karak was inclined to agree with Castle.  Nothing about this whole job was “natural.”  He almost wished he were a good Pathist, who could simply shrug off his nervousness—and yes, fear—and leave the boxes here in this crumbling silo.

But that was a luxury he did not have.  The Klahdera Overlords would be most displeased if he happened to return to them without bringing the item for which Crane was willing to pay forty thousand han.

But that didn’t mean he had to open the box right now.

“All right, let’s get the lid back on,” Karak ordered.  Castle was only too eager to comply, practically lifting the lid and placing it back on the crate by himself.

As Karak pounded the nails back into the crate, he heard Primas say, “Lord Karak…”

When Karak looked up, he saw Crane standing in front of Primas with his same death smile.  He wiped away the blood trickling from his forehead with the back of his hand, then licked it with a nauseating slurp.

Primas fired at Crane, emptying his revolver into Crane’s chest by the time Karak and Castle were able to draw theirs.  Primas’s bullets did nothing to stop Crane, who strode over to him, stuck his fingers into Primas’s throat and ripped it out.  Primas fell to the ground, his body jerking, while Crane threw the bloody gore in his hand to the ground.

Karak’s men fired at Crane, but the bullets affected him less than a stiff morning breeze.  The cloaked men behind the Klahdera rose up and wrapped their grotesque tentacles around the necks of Karak’s men.  The Klahdera men screamed as claw-tipped tentacles began tearing at their throats.

Crane leveled his black eyes at Karak and said, “Kindly step away from my crate, Mr. Frost.”

Then his hand shot toward Karak, elongating into a tentacle with five taloned fingers.  Karak dove off the wagon and ran for the closed doors to the silos.  He did not think, could not think.  He acted on animal instinct alone, not bothering to look back as the screams of his men ended in wet gurgles, cracking bone, and rending flesh.

Karak used his shoulder to slam the doors open, and then ran until he collapsed in front of his tavern.