WULFRAM

Part I.

The events chronicled herein take place in the year 260 A.L., 44 years prior to the tale of Makarria, as told in Dreamwielder.

 When despair reigns supreme, when defeat seems near, stand by your brothers, follow orders, and even in death we will be victorious.   -Sargothian military verse, circa Dreamwielder War

WULFRAM PADDED TO A HALT and pulled the folds of his black turban aside to sniff the pile of piss-sodden garbage in the alleyway. There was a hint of something familiar interlaced within the ammoniac odor. Before he could be certain, though, a stifling gust of wind whipped past him like a furnace blast, carrying off the scent and pelting his snout with the maroon sand that seemed unavoidable in this cursed city. Khail Sanctu, he snarled inwardly, and his tongue lolled out of his mouth of its own accord. He was stooped forward over the garbage, practically on all fours, he realized, and he willed himself to stand upright again and tuck his tongue back behind his teeth. When lost in a task, he still had a tendency to forget what form he was in-not a problem when on the battlefield, but the war was over now and the battlefield some three thousand miles away.

He had been searching the sprawling city of Khail Sanctu for three weeks and had detected nothing of his quarry. Until now, he hoped. He protruded one bare foot out from beneath his robe-a bisht style over-garment commonly worn in the ancient city-and rooted deeper into the pile of garbage, using his elongated, black toenails to dig past the rotten fruit rinds, the dried feces, the picked-over rodent carcasses. He stooped forward, despite himself, and picked up a feculent rag, stained with dried blood. He held it close to his fur-covered face and inhaled deeply. He was not mistaken-it was Guderian blood he had sensed.

Wulfram tucked the rag into a pocket in his bisht and looked up at the two buildings towering above him to either side of the alley. He had grown accustomed to seeing tall structures in the Five Kingdoms, but those were castles, fortresses. These were tenements in the slums, ten stories tall. Whether constructed of wood or stone, he could not tell, for the walls were spackled over with stucco the same maroon color as the desert sands east of the city. The walls facing him were pockmarked with shuttered windows, trash chutes, and the jagged edges of clay drain pipes. The rag must have come from one of them. He chose the southernmost building and strode through the arched entryway into a dank corridor. The air inside was stagnant, placid. It was hotter than outdoors, if that was possible, but the still air was all the better for using his nose. He ascended the first flight of stairs to his left, then walked the entirety of the second floor hallway, sniffing at each flimsy wood-panel door and sensing nothing. The third floor was the same, as were the fourth, fifth, and sixth. On the seventh floor, he caught the scent. He followed his nose and stopped in front of a doorway halfway down the hall. It was silent inside, but Wulfram could sense people within. Guderian was here.

It did not occur to Wulfram to knock. He simply shoved the door open, wrenching the locking mechanism from the wooden door frame with a squeal, and stepped inside the small chamber. A man Wulfram vaguely recognized stared back at him, his face terse. He was a sorcerer: a stormbringer. Standing behind him was the boy, Thedric Guderian, a curved knife gripped in one fist. He was much taller than when Wulfram had last seen him.

"Stay back. Who are you?" the stormbringer demanded, his nose scrunched in concentration, his eyes staring unblinking at Wulfram. "What are you?"

Wulfram remembered he'd forgotten to replace the folds of his turban over his face. It was of little consequence now. "Calm yourself. I'm from Sargoth. My name is Wulfe. Or at least it used to be."

"The Queen's page?" the stormbringer replied. "Lightbringer's arse, what have they done to you?"

At hearing word of the Queen, young Thedric tried to push past his protector. "You come with word from my mother?" he asked, but the stormbringer held him back from Wulfram protectively.

"I said calm yourself," Wulfram growled. "I'm no page any longer and if you don't release your thauma, I'll set it loose inside your entrails. I'm here to help, not to be attacked by some half-witted stormbringer."

The man flinched at Wulfram's insult. "And why should I trust you? The Queen entrusted me to protect the boy, not you. How do I know you don't mean to kill him?"

"If I wanted him dead, he'd have been dead thirty seconds ago, two seconds after you. Your choice is simple, trust me or die. It's of little consequence to me. I'm here to serve King Guderian, not you."

"King Guderian?" Thedric asked, pushing his way from behind the stormbringer again, this time encountering no resistance from the man. "But I'm only a prince."

"No longer, I'm afraid," Wulfram replied. "I am sad to inform you that your mother is dead." Wulfram knelt down before the boy and bowed his head. "I am Wulfram, and I place myself at your service, Your Majesty."

"Thank you," Thedric said in little more than a whisper, his eyes falling to the floor as he took in Wulfram's words. The knife in his hand hung forgotten at his side.

"You're certain she's dead?" the stormbringer demanded. He had released his thauma, but he was still on guard.

"I'm certain," Wulfram said, not looking at him. "I saw her corpse."

"And the war?"

"Over. But the Five Kingdoms are in turmoil. Three of the monarchs are slain, the guilds have gone underground, and Trumball has taken it upon himself to kill every dreamwielder who participated in the war, as well as their creations."

"That's what happened to you," the stormbringer said, "the dreamwielders. What did they do to you exactly? You were a sorcerer, I know, ripe for their machinations, but I've seen nothing like it before."

Wulfram ignored him. His attention was on Thedric, who seemed stunned into a silence. The boy had a purple bruise under one eye and a barely scabbed-over contusion on his cheek. "What happened, my King?"

"He got in a fight with one of the older boys in the building," the stormbringer answered for Thedric.

"And you didn't protect him?"

The stormbringer laughed, seeming to relax finally. "It wasn't Thedric who needed protecting. He beat the poor boy within an inch of his life before I pulled him away."

Thedric looked up from the floor and took in Wulfram's gaze. "He made fun of me, called me 'milk-skin.' He deserved to die."