by Dan Allen
“That’s it!” Gork dropped the sword into a bucket of water where it gave a loud hiss. “Mysteries of Arcadian Rune Work for Really Bored and Relatively Advanced Readers! I read it not three years ago during a snow-in. That’s where I’ve seen this rune work before.”
At the mention of the excruciatingly boring text, Gamfir’s face made an expression not unlike the one Gork had made after tasting his mother’s attempt at making a gourmet goulash from giant cave snails and bark beetles.
“It makes sense,” Gork said. “The Dark Consul began his descent into darkness in Arcadia.”
“Ancient magic,” Gamfir said. “There are none who still practice it in Crystalia. Only the Dark Realm keeps those secrets now.”
Gork grinned. “But that doesn’t mean we can’t learn it.”
Gamfir stroked his beard. “Reverse engineering rune magic is a matter of trial and error. You would need dozens of artifacts, perhaps hundreds.”
“But if it could be done,” Gork said, “we could match the strength of the dark army’s weapons.” A grin stole across Gork’s face. “Imagine blades that grow stronger with every strike—but also as incorruptible as our dwarven armor, never tarnishing, never corroding.”
“A pipe dream,” Gamfir grumbled as he lit up his pipe with a sparker.
“Goddess knows we need the help.” In the flickering light of the forge fire, Gork’s trimmed blond beard showed only the faintest indications of soot. His white smock was immaculate despite hours passing the steel between fire and anvil.
“But the Goddess is . . .” Gamfir started, unable to finish the sentence.
Gone. Defeated. Gork looked into the yellow and blue flames of the furnace. The fires of Dwarfholm Bastion burned night and day, as eternal as the Goddess herself. In her last act for Crystalia, she had bound her essence to the Dark Consul, driving him out of Crystalia. Both had vanished. Though neither had returned, the Dark Consul’s influence was very much alive. And whatever the Goddess’s present state, she was not strong enough to keep the armies of the Dark Consul from crossing into Crystalia through their spawning points.
Gork turned away, hung his smock in its place, and re-buckled his elegantly embossed belt, with twin spear-tipped hand axes hanging from the holsters. As he slung his short halberd over his shoulder, the beginnings of an idea flickered in his subconscious. He turned to face his former mentor. “Gamfir, I think the Goddess has given us this revelation as a chance to protect ourselves.”
“I’m getting hungry,” Gamfir said. “And your ideas are making me dizzy. We simply don’t have enough artifacts of ancient Arcadian origin.”
“That’s it!” Gork cried, suddenly catching hold of the ethereal thought that had been haunting the shadows of his mind for weeks.
The answer was as chilling as it was obvious.
Gork spoke in a voice barely above a whisper, “The Blasted Tombs—the burial place of the great Arcadian warriors and kings. It’s got to be full of enchanted artifacts.”
Gamfir shook his head, his beard wagging vigorously. “Madness. Nobody who goes in ever comes out.”
Chapter 3: Find Ruby
Terras burst from the cover of the trees and slid to an arm-swinging stop, his bare toes dangling off the edge of an overhung cliff. Bits of earth crumbled from the edge, falling hundreds of feet to the valley below. He spun around at the sounds of crashing in the underbrush behind him, just as an ear-splitting roar bellowed from the thicket.
Terras checked the color of the single loop of vine coiled around his wrist. It was an experiment—unauthorized, of course. Deeproot Druids channeled their magic only from the fae—the green woods, the deep blue springs, and the sacred places. But Terras needed access to fae magic beyond the borders of the life-giving forest. He had to bring the Deeproot power with him.
The plant curled around his wrist was no ordinary vine. It was a splice from the Deeproot Tree itself, into which Terras had stored as much magical energy as possible. It was now a brilliant green with odd red veins tracing its length.
Full charge.
Terras gave a wry smile as the trunk of an oak tree cracked, sending its lofty branches crashing to the ground.
“The bigger they are—” Terras put one knee down and touched the ground with his palm, unleashing a powerful dose of magic bound within the Deeproot vine. Few would dare imbue a Stranglethorn spell with this much magic for fear the sprouting vine would consume them as well as the target. Terras only had a few seconds to get clear of the area. “The harder they fall.”
A Treant stomped clear of the forest foliage. The gargantuan footfalls of the deranged creature of living wood sent even more dirt sliding from the edge of the cliff. Dripping with slimy moss, its gaping, leafy mouth stretched wide enough to swallow the head of a moose—with antlers.
Well . . . maybe a small moose.
Terras, with his back to a thousand-foot drop, was weighing his options when the spawn of the Dark Realm grasped the fallen oak trunk in claws of sinewy bark and lifted the entire fallen tree off the ground.
“That’s it. Just a bit farther . . .”
There was no escape from the outcropping. Far off in the plain below lay Crystalia Castle, but he was too distant to expect help from King Jasper III, and even if he’d been close, the king’s resources were already stretched to the limit.
The Treant’s sap-coated black eyes shone with pure hatred. It raised the tree over its head and swung down with a blow that would have crushed Terras had he not already stepped off the edge of the cliff.
The rocky cliff face flashed past as Terras accelerated downward. As he fell with his back to the rapidly approaching ground, Terras was unsurprised to see that he was not the only thing falling. The edge of the overhung cliff cracked under the Treant’s monstrous blow. The earth sheared away from the cliff, hauling after it the tree and Treant, all bound together by rapidly spreading Stranglethorn vines.
Satisfied, Terras tucked in his arms and spun in the air to face the ground, now only two dozen yards away. When he flung his arms out again, they were covered with feathers of golden brown—all but the primaries he needed to fly. His vision shifted. Suddenly he could make out every parapet of Crystalia Castle—and in two additional colors not visible to the human eye.
The rush of the eagle transformation was disorienting. Terras fought to recall where he was—it was urgent that he do something. Much of his sense of self vanished, a hundred worries erased in mid-thought. His body shrank, growing lighter. The muscles of his chest massed as his legs drew in, sprouting long talons in their place. Finally, the wing-tip primary feathers took shape, erupting from his skin in a burst of pain. His disoriented mind seized one thought.
Fly!
As the ground rushed up to meet him, Terras beat his wings hard, turning downward speed into forward momentum as only an eagle could.
Terras gave a cry of delight that sent bunnies for miles around scurrying for their burrows.
Perhaps the eagle’s call would even be heard in the king’s court.
Tucking his clawed feet and flapping his wings to gain height, Terras avoided the malodorous green splatter from the Treant’s final impact.
As an eagle, he couldn’t laugh or even smile. His beak was shaped into a permanent frown, but the proud stretch of his wings hinted at more than a modest measure of self-satisfaction.
With the Treant gone, the Druids of the forest would be able to quickly subdue the remaining dark creatures and destroy the nearby spawning point.
Technically, he could have just flown over the forest and avoided the problem altogether. But what fun would that have been?
He did have a reputation to keep up, after all—not all Druids did. None, actually . . . except him.
Terras’s reputation for doing things that were thought to be impossible was likely why he had been summoned to King Jasper III’s court, although he had no idea what the king needed him for.
I
t would not please the Druid Elders when they found out Terras had been summoned. None of the ruling nine of his order approved of his brand of mingled magic.
It is not dark magic, Terras told himself. It merely combines the light and the dark, as we all do.
Terras glanced up at the sun high overhead, gauging the time. Nearly noon. He imagined the worried mumblings of the king’s advisors.
“He said he would come.”
“Nobody is late to a summons from the king!”
Crystalia Castle approached, rising on a hill above a picturesque city. Varied buildings sprawled in all directions: human houses, elvish sanctums, a few gnomish and dwarvish keeps built into the hillside, and even a centaur paddock among the manors and festive markets. The sound of industry rang out from the shops of smiths, armorers, and fletchers. This was the capital of all Crystalia, the last hope for all the races.
Whatever King Jasper III had in mind for Terras, it would be perilous. And much would depend on him succeeding. Perhaps with the fame of his next great success, the Elders would finally be forced to admit that mingled magic was the only path forward for the Druids of the Deeproot Tree.
Children in the streets below pointed excitedly at his stately form gliding overhead. An eagle was a good omen.
Terras couldn’t resist tucking a wing and twirling three times in an acrobatic display before pulling out of a dive and kicking the top off a wagon load of hay with his outstretched claws. As the yellow stalks of hay fell away, they revealed a very surprised teen couple who had been cuddling.
Two boys loafing in the high street pointed at the embarrassed boy and girl and howled with laughter.
Terras echoed the sentiment with a shrill cry as he soared over the castle siege wall.
Sentries turned from their posts on the battlements as he flew over the courtyard, heading straight for an open window in the castle.
Terras tucked his wings and dove through the window, entering a great vaulted room with gilded pillars and tapestries stretching from the arched ceiling to the polished white marble floor.
There was only one man in the room. In the moment before his claws and eyes began to reshape, Terras considered the figure slumped on the throne, head bowed low.
This was a man at his wit’s end.
Terras’s bare feet touched the cool marble softly. His arms came to his sides. The golden feathers covering Terras’s body merged and twined themselves into an elegant fabric of the same color, winding into fitted short trousers and a loose long-sleeved shirt of silken weight, the likes of which would command a kingly price in any circle.
The ringing of the tower bells sounded from the open windows.
“Noon,” said King Jasper III from his throne. He looked up and gave Terras a once-over. “You’ve still got a feather in your hair.”
Terras grinned. “I’m aware that his majesty has a talent for jest.” He imagined the corner of the king’s mouth turned up at this, but he couldn’t tell. His human eyes were still adjusting to the light and shadow of the room and the decreased perception—he could only make out three primary colors now, not five as he had as an eagle. So much of the world’s nuanced detail was lost to him.
He glanced at his left wrist. The Deeproot was dried and brown, like a grape vine after the fall harvest.
Wormspit. I’m drained.
He expected as much after using the Stranglethorn spell against the Treant and making two transformations in only a few minutes.
With no potions to replenish his magic, he would have to walk out of the castle after his meeting.
How humiliating.
Terras gave a short bow. “I am Terras, servant of the Deeproot. I answer your summons.”
The king nodded approvingly, a sudden smile appearing at his lips that had an utterly disarming effect. Terras felt as if he was in the company of an adoring uncle rather than the most powerful ruler in Crystalia.
“You look much like your father,” Jasper said. “He served me well for many years—it was he who urged me to strengthen our alliance with the Deeproot Elves. I have never regretted following that counsel.”
Terras swallowed. His human father, Cornwall Ungred, had famously eloped to marry the Glimmerdusk Ranger Tiasa of the Deeproot Elves. For much of his young life, Terras had been an outsider to human society. As he’d grown older, King Jasper III had graciously invited Terras to join the Royal Academy, but Terras, in his pride, had declined. He ran away and had spent his short youth in the Fae Wood with his mother’s people.
Now, it seemed, his flight had brought him back. With his appearance at the request of the king, Terras had put to rest, at last, the final ember of that once-raging fire of his youth. His eyes, too, had changed, for the man that stood before him did not look like an enemy but perhaps the truest ally he could ever hope for.
He chose me, Terras thought, over all the others in the kingdom.
I won’t let him down.
King Jasper III took in a breath as if he were about to speak but held it as if considering what he was about to say. A long minute passed as the king stared at five empty seats near the throne.
Tangled locks of grey hair hung over the gems in his golden crown. The wrinkles of his face seemed to deepen as his expression took on a look of pain.
Pain of the body Terras could heal with herbs. This was a different sort.
Finally, the king asked a single question. “Do you know the prophecy of the five?”
Oh boy . . . this can’t be good.
Everyone knew the prophecy—five princesses would destroy the Dark Consul.
The king waited for his reply.
“Yes, sire,” Terras said crisply. “I know the prophecy.”
“Druid,” said the king. His face returned into the shadowed expression he had worn as Terras arrived. “The prophecy is in jeopardy. Amethyst, my youngest daughter—the fifth princess of prophecy—she is missing.”
Only an idiot would not know that. Even Druids who rarely ventured from the deepest woods knew of the missing princess. There had been no sign of struggle. No ransom note. She had been gone for over two years. There were many disappearances these days, but Amethyst’s was by far the most baffling and consequential. The prophecy—all their hopes—depended on her return. The mystery had attracted the imaginations of everyone from the gossipers in bars to songwriting bards.
The king flexed his right hand, as if to grip a scepter that wasn’t there. “One by one, my other daughters have left, seeking Amethyst: Sapphire to the Frostbyte Reach, Emerald to the Fae Wood, Citrine to the Glauerdoom Moor, and Ruby . . .” The king’s voice trailed off.
“Where is the Princess Ruby?” Terras was impatient of long pauses.
“That is why I have summoned you. Ruby has ventured beyond the sight of my mages. I fear for her safety.”
Ruby—the prissy princess of pretty pink perfection herself—on her own? Terras’s eyes widened. His heart suddenly beat faster than it had when he had transformed into a rabbit to escape a very obnoxious relative. He hadn’t been surprised that the king had summoned him for a quest. Terras was the obvious choice for a mission to find someone lost—he was a Druid and part human. He owed his loyalty to Jasper as much as the Deeproot Elves. But this was not the usual sort of adventure.
Terras swallowed again. This wasn’t a quest. It was the quest. The king was placing the future of the entire world of Crystalia in his hands—a half-elf. And it wasn’t even to track down his rambunctious daughter Emerald. She could hold her own against almost any foe in the realm. He had to find Ruby. In the wild, her bobbing blond braids would attract trouble faster than an untended cart full of cinnamon buns in a beggars’ market.
“Forgive me your majesty, but Ruby is not an adventurer,” Terras noted. “She is . . . a lady of the court.”
“Her magic is powerful, Terras, friend of the Deeproot,” Jasper said. “Her mind is uncommonly keen. Long has she sought an answer to
the darkness invading our realm.” The king’s eyes became distant as if searching for his daughter among his memories—a laughing child, then a precocious teen.
Terras could only wonder how Ruby’s absence stung her father. Of the five princesses of prophecy, Ruby was the only constant in his life. The others were far too adventurous. Perhaps the king blamed himself—had he expected too much of her?
Jasper spoke again, his voice echoing in the vast throne room. “Ruby is following the path of the Dark Consul, seeking to uncover the madness of his ruin and the cause of our peril—seeking a balm for the ill that floods our realm from the Midnight Tower.”
“The Dark Consul’s origin.” Terras shook his head. “But his fall began in Arcadia—the cursed land.”
The king nodded. “Precisely. I therefore commission you, Terras, friend of the Deeproot, citizen and subject of my dominion,” said the king, his voice rising with a regal power the Druid had not imagined possible. Terras’s entire body seemed to fill with desire at the words. Fealty flowed in his veins. A sense of duty he had never known possessed him. Was it the king’s rumored magic? Or was it love—the king’s own love for his daughters, somehow passing through the intervening space and growing inside Terras like a great rose blooming?
“Find my daughter Ruby. Save the prophecy.”
“Your will is my own.” Terras folded his arm across his chest in a salute. “I accept this commission.”
“Even unto death?” the king asked, his regal voice causing Terras to shake.
He glanced to his wrist, where suddenly the vine was green and writhing with a level of vitality he hadn’t experienced since his last encounter with the sentient Deeproot itself. He looked up, meeting the king’s shining eyes and gave his answer, echoing the words with eternal conviction. “Unto death.”
The king gave a single nod, granting his blessing. “May the Goddess smile on your journey.”
Despite having thought he was out of magic, Terras felt strength. Something in the king’s eyes stirred latent magic within him.
