Soul Forge Saga Box Set

by Richard Stephens

  Silurian released Melody and grasped the edge of the fount as a vibration rattled the pillar.

  Letting the tremors subside, Silurian put a hand up to shield his eyes from the light filtering through a layer of cloudy white vapour. He squinted. There was something substantial lodged in the centre of the urn, half submerged in a gelatinous blue substance—the size of a human head.

  The tremors in the cavern ceased, along with the constant shrieking. The sound of bubbling liquid came from the wellspring. Silurian waved a hand above the mist to clear it away enough to see what appeared to be an egg lying within.

  Melody’s complexion and loose strands of blonde hair were basked in the blue glow as she peered into the urn. She swallowed and returned his glance, a new fear written on her face as the relevance of what they were looking at washed over her.

  She backed away, her eyes darting around the cavern. “Wow. Do you know what that is?”

  Silurian shrugged, his mind whirling, trying to fathom the egg’s significance. What could have left an egg that size at the top of this pillar? It would have to be something huge.

  The silence in the cavern screamed at him as comprehension gripped his features. He searched the cavern. The serpent was nowhere to be seen.

  His wide eyes matched his sister’s. Together they leaned outward, stretching their necks to afford them a view of the column rising up from the cavern floor.

  Massive claws dug into the irregular surface of the pillar as the serpent placed one massive paw over another, pulling itself up to the fount.

  Karvus and Tygra doused their torches, quietly laying them aside. Both men pulled their weapons from their back slings and crept into the cavern. Using hand gestures, Karvus directed Tygra to go back until he was out of sight and then to cross over to the right side of the tunnel.

  The great wyrm uncoiled itself from the pillar of rock, its eyes focused on something in the shadows along the left side of the cavern.

  Karvus held the tracking ring in his gloved hand, the talisman uncomfortable to hold onto. The Serpent’s Eye followed the serpent’s gaze to the dark wall.

  Tygra appeared moments later across from him. Karvus motioned him to proceed into the chamber, behind the serpent. As expected, his faithful servant did so without protest. Most men would have run the other way.

  Crouching low, Karvus edged deeper into the cavern, his eyes never leaving the head of the serpent.

  The serpent concentrated on a soft orange glow that had sprung to life against the wall. The wizard! Perhaps his job wouldn’t prove too difficult after all.

  The serpent lifted its head into the air, its tongue flicking between its teeth. It reminded Karvus of a snake poised to strike.

  The wizard’s longhaired companion grabbed the concentrating mage and pulled him out of harm’s way just before the serpent’s head lunged forward, smashing into the wall behind the ledge where the wizard had just stood.

  “Hey! What are you doing?” A female’s voice rose above the noise of the serpent.

  Karvus’ first thought was that the voice belonged to the wizard’s longhaired companion, but Helleden’s scout had reported that a man travelled with the wizard. The emperor searched the shadows for anyone else that may be in the cavern but didn’t see anyone. He frowned. There was no doubt the voice had been a woman’s.

  Halfway across the cavern, Tygra crouched against the far wall.

  Karvus made hand gestures, asking his aide whether he saw anyone else in the cavern. Tygra’s hand signals indicated that he either did not, or that he didn’t understand Karvus’ silent query.

  The creature let out a tooth-rattling, spine tingling screech and launched another attack, this time hitting the ledge directly below the wizard’s companion. The cavern floor rumbled beneath Karvus’ feet. He marvelled at the amount of damage the serpent affected on the wall as great volumes of loose rock fell to the cavern floor and splashed about the pillar.

  High above, the wizard and his companion scrambled to get out of the leviathan’s reach.

  The serpent rose higher and higher upon thick, undulating coils, moving about the rear of the cavern, tracking the wizard’s progress. It struck twice more in rapid succession, each time missing its mark by a growing distance.

  Karvus’ eyes followed the ledge’s ascending path. His quarry was getting away.

  The lower end of the ledge terminated close to where he stood. Not taking his eyes from the enraged beast, he inched his way to the beginning of the ledge. He placed his battle-axe on the ledge and prepared to pull his bulk onto the loose surface.

  The serpent’s sudden movement made him jump. For the briefest of moments, he thought it had turned its attention on him as its head swung around, but instead of coming for him, it made a wide sweep, untangling its massive body to face the pillar. Without another sound, the great creature began to climb.

  Karvus’ jaw dropped. The serpent’s body elongated and lifted off the ground as it began to scale the pillar.

  Tygra splashed across the middle of the floor to Karvus’ position, and whispered between rasping breaths, obviously more afraid than he let on, “What now, my emperor? Surely the wizard is done for. I need to get you out of here.”

  “We can’t let them get away.”

  “They aren’t going anywhere, my emperor. That ledge spirals around the top of the cavern. It ends at a bridge that crosses to the pillar. I could see them from over there.” Tygra pointed to where he had just come from. “I can’t tell what’s up there, but they are standing on a platform at the top of the pillar, looking at whatever casts that blue light.”

  Damn that finger-wagger, Karvus thought. Helleden wouldn’t be satisfied unless he had possession of the wizard’s staff. “We need to go up there.”

  If he expected an argument from Tygra, he didn’t get one. His faithful aide swallowed and bent down with cupped hands, awaiting his emperor’s boot so that he could hoist Karvus up to the ledge.

  Once on the ledge, Karvus offered Tygra a hand and pulled him up, the man having to hold his head to one side to avoid being touched by the dangling Serpent’s Eye ring.

  The serpent’s progress up the side of the column was slow but determined. Only its long tail still slid across the ground now.

  Karvus looked up the winding trail. Where the serpent had first bashed it, the ledge was almost non-existent. He took a deep breath and lumbered up the uncertain slope, leaping the damaged section with ease. Tygra’s scraping footsteps followed on his heels.

  Reaching the height of the climbing serpent’s head, Karvus and Tygra nearly tripped over each other as the creature stopped climbing the tower and turned its eyes on them.

  Silurian and Melody pulled back from the brink and stared at each other. The serpent climbed the pillar beneath them!

  “Quickly. Immerse your sword in the well,” Melody said, panic evident in her voice. She ran back across the bridge, almost losing her balance along the way. Her momentum carried her sideways, but she was close enough to the ledge that she was able to jump over thin air to avoid plummeting to her death.

  “What are you doing?” Silurian asked, his mind clouded with the knowledge of the creature climbing beneath him. He was afraid he already knew what her intentions were.

  The darkness around Melody lit was pushed aside by her glowing staff.

  “Mel, no!” Silurian shouted at her. “You’ll destroy the pillar!”

  She mustn’t have heard him. Her staff pulsed brighter and a fist-sized ball of fire shot from its tip.

  The deafening shriek of the serpent gave evidence that her attack had been accurate. As did the startling vibrations wracking the platform he stood on. Grabbing the edge of the urn, he thought for sure he was about to fall to his death.

  “Mel! Stop!”

  Illuminated by her staff, Silurian noted her eyes had rolled back into her head. Great. If she missed, she might very well bring the entire wellspring crashing down. He wanted to run to her and shake her ou
t of her trance, but if she destroyed the pillar before he stopped her, his only chance at reclaiming his sword’s enchantment would be lost. Yet, if he tried to reclaim the power while she shot the pillar out from underneath him, all would be lost anyway. At least as far as he was concerned.

  He pulled St Carmichael’s blade free of the baldric and turned to face the urn. His shoulders slumped. He had forgotten about the egg.

  The egg! It all became clear to him. The egg belonged to the serpent. That explained why it went insane seeing them on the ledge.

  He gazed into the wellspring, remembering a day long ago when Saros instructed the Group of Five to immerse their bodies within a bog. At the time, they had no idea what was being asked of them, nor why they were doing so. They were impressionable young men lusting after adventure. Adventure that led three of them to an untimely death and destroyed the lives of the other two.

  The egg dominated the interior of the misty urn. He couldn’t see a way to immerse his sword without damaging it.

  An orange light flared up behind him. A thunderous detonation reverberated throughout the cavern—the wellspring platform bucked beneath his feet. The serpent screeched louder. Closer.

  “Mel! No!” Silurian yelled, not taking his eyes off the fount. When the concussion subsided, he laid his sword at the base of the well and reached into the urn-like structure. The gelatinous liquid was surprisingly warm, but not hot. He wrapped his fingers around the bottom of the egg and carefully hoisted the heavy object free of the bubbling fount.

  The column shook rhythmically, the serpent’s angered progress now perceptible beneath Silurian’s feet. He was afraid to look sideways in case the beast’s fanged maw appeared over the platform’s lip. He needed to focus on the task at hand.

  “Melody, stop! You’ll destroy the wellspring,” Silurian pleaded. As gently as he could in his panicked haste, he placed the egg between his feet and the urn’s base to keep it from rolling away. He didn’t know what would happen if the serpent’s egg fell from the platform, but he suspected that as enraged as the creature was now, its reaction would be catastrophic—to the point of tearing down the pillar itself.

  The air flashed orange. The pillar lurched and the beast screamed in pained fury, so loud that it had to be near the top.

  Silurian gasped as his sword rattled to the brink of the platform and tipped. Time slowed. St. Carmichael’s exquisitely wrought hilt slipped over the lip, ever so slowly. The shiny blade followed, ringing as it rubbed against the intricately carved platform and disappeared.

  Silurian’s eyes bulged. His skin went cold as he tried to come to terms with the ramification of that simple act. The rank smell in the cavern threatened to gag him. Every sensation flooded him at once. Disbelief, denial, despair. Doom.

  The unmistakable clank of his weapon striking the cavern floor jarred his brain like he’d been walloped with a warhammer. He had to retrieve it. There was no other choice. He turned to face the bridge. Melody stood across the span, her eyes rolled up, oblivious to what had just happened. Her staff pulsed, on the verge of releasing another fireball. He couldn’t see her pupils, but it seemed clear to Silurian that she concentrated on a spot near his feet.

  He swallowed. The creature must be right below him. He took a step toward the bridge, but the sight of a scale covered foot reaching up to clutch the middle of the span stopped him.

  Silurian’s breath caught in his throat. The serpent’s head emerged from below, its forked tongue sensing the air. He watched in horror as the beast focused on Melody.

  A second clawed foot crunched the edge of the ledge along the wall beside her, the force of its grip crumbling layers of shale. Its head lifted above the bridge deck and brushed the cavern’s ceiling.

  The serpent shrieked, drawing its head back in preparation for a strike.

  Silurian screamed, “Mel!”

  Her staff flared orange.

  The entire chamber convulsed.

  Alignment of Wizards

  Helleden sensed it. Everything transpired better than he dared hope. He had finished with his preparations and awaited what must surely come. Wizard’s power.

  According to his northern spy, the Kraidic emperor had entered a serpent’s nest, chasing the Wizard of the North to wherever the magic user had snuck off to.

  Far to the south, his demon shadow, Barong, reported that the Sentinel had entered the Chamber of the Wise and was dealing with King Malcolm while Barong prepared itself for the imminent arrival of the second Wizard of the North.

  Helleden was a man of little emotion. Almost five centuries tended to strip those feeble weaknesses from a person. Hundreds of years of solitude and slavery, bound to the demented whims of the Soul, had flogged any lingering sentiment Helleden might have associated with the people he sought to subjugate. If, indeed, he had possessed such a thing as a soul himself, his master had sucked the life from it long ago.

  His conquest of Zephyr had been a long time in coming. Several kings later and the assignment he had been tasked with so long ago by his recently deceased master was finally within his grasp. The irony of where it would be orchestrated from made him smile. High atop the Wizard’s Spike, amidst the ruins of Castle Svelte, he stood within the very chamber denied him five centuries before. Now he stood in that very room, on the cusp of delivering the final killing stroke, eliminating the few bastions of organized civilization left in the realm. Gritian, Songsbirth, and everything below the Undying Wall.

  If both Wizards of the North put up a strong enough fight, he might gain enough power to destroy Madrigail Bay once and for all. According to rumours filtering into his camp, a sizable force had landed in the bay area a little over a fortnight after his most recent firestorm. If the reports could be trusted, a new race had sailed across the Niad Ocean—one sounding strangely akin to the pesky Voil.

  Nevertheless, Voil or not, if Helleden didn’t miss his guess, one of the two Wizards of the North was none other than Phazarus—the most powerful wizard to practice the arts since Thunor Carmichael—his arch nemesis from days long past.

  Helleden’s smile slid from his face. Thunor Carmichael had been favoured over him when the ancient king of the newly founded kingdom of Zephyr had believed in magic users, and used them to safeguard his people from the encroaching Kraidic Empire. King Hammaspaul had held a tournament of the arcane at a time in history when all magic was considered a dark art. To be a practitioner of the mind, five hundred years ago, meant one did so on the pain of death if they were discovered. King Hammaspaul’s decision to entertain the notion of housing a royal wizard at Castle Svelte had been seen by many of his peers as his eventual downfall, but not before he had enlisted Thunor Carmichael and driven the Krakens out of northern Zephyr. Aside from sporadic sea raids and two failed land assaults since, the Kraidic Empire’s ambitions to take over Zephyr had been quashed by the maverick king’s inspiration.

  Helleden nodded at the distant memories, their details clouded over the centuries, even to his keen mind. King Hammaspaul had also been instrumental in founding the Chamber of the Wise, but he hadn’t lived long enough to see the Chamber’s inception into the hierarchy of Zephyr’s governance. And now, all that was about to come crashing down. The throne, the Chamber and the Wizard of the North. Helleden would be vindicated as soon as the wizards struck. Instead of claiming his rightful place as Royal Wizard, he would now be king.

  The eight-sided chamber atop the Wizard’s Spike basked in the light emitted by eight towering windows. Helleden stepped away from the south facing window, its outside surface covered with dirt and ash, matching the other seven. He paced to the middle of the wide room, furnished with various sized tables buried beneath ancient scrolls and dusty tomes. Candle stubs of differing heights and thickness were interspersed amongst the mounds of clutter—pools of melted wax coagulated around their bases staining the parchment they held down.

  An octagonal pedestal sat precisely in the room’s centre, its flat sides geometrically co
rresponding with the windows. The dais’ top consisted of a concave brass bowl—a map’s compass hammered into its surface—submerged beneath what would look to a novice as water. In each of the eight compass directions, the spokes pointed to a distinctive rune etched along the bowl’s outer rim. It was here that Helleden set himself to wage the last campaign in his war against the kingdom that had forsaken him. If King Hammaspaul had only taken the time to realize who he had messed with.

  No matter. Helleden had to concentrate on the semantics of the alignment of the wizards. Usually, when he performed the ritual allowing him to tap into the magical powers employed by another, he only had to concern himself with one source—one direction. Today, however, if everything went as planned, he would have to divide his concentration. The resulting power absorption would be worth the trouble. What complicated the matter was the sources of magic occurred in opposite directions. The extreme distances involved were problematic.

  He entertained using just one of the sources so he could centre his ritual on one place and ensure a smooth skimming of the power involved. However, he wasn’t confident that either of the wizards were adept enough to provide him the power he needed to enact the spells he required to create his firestorm. If the wizard in Gritian were indeed Phazarus, he might be willing to chance it.

  Helleden’s biggest dilemma was that if he failed in his enterprise, the resulting dormancy his body would retreat into—a direct result of commanding such power—would leave him utterly defenseless until his body recovered from the ordeal. Depending on the power he commanded, he might remain catatonic for days.

  He no longer hid on a mountain summit. He wasn’t naïve to the fact that many people, and creatures as well, would take great pleasure in killing him should the opportunity arise.

  Concentrating on one of the wizards should provide him with enough of a power draw to unleash his firestorm, but he needed the power of the second wizard to cement the defenses he employed around the Wizard’s Spike—the safeguards vital to prevent anyone, or anything, from stumbling upon him during his subsequent period of unconsciousness.