Benjamin Ashwood Box Set 2

by A. C. Cobble

  Then, the eyes vanished.

  The mouth opened wide, showing huge, bone-white teeth. They reflected the crimson mage-light, or maybe, they were crimson with the blood of the slaughtered. It didn’t really matter. It was enough to send a shudder down Ben’s spine and a realization about what Adrick had said earlier. When all you saw was an open maw, go for the back of the throat.

  Ben hooked one hand around the butt of the bolt and the other on the shaft to steady it. One, two, three running steps and he hurled the weapon with all of his might. It flew almost ten paces, then clattered heavily down on the stone, skidding a little further before stopping halfway to the wyvern.

  “Damn,” said Ben, crestfallen.

  The wyvern twitched. Then, its mouth snapped shut. Ben, a score of paces away, watched its eyes wobble and then focus on him. The emerald-green fire faded. Tacky, thick blood dripped out of the creature’s mouth and nostrils. The beast stretched to its full height, swayed, and slowly, like a tree falling over in the forest, toppled. The impact jarred the ground, and Ben fell to his knees. He stared at the dead wyvern, confused.

  Amelie came pelting around it.

  “Ben, what’d you do?” she exclaimed.

  “I, ah…” He looked at the ballista bolt lying harmlessly on the ground. “I don’t know. I didn’t do anything. I tried to…”

  Towaal arrived as well, glancing at Ben and then at the dead wyvern.

  Shouts of alarm knocked him out of his stupor and Ben peered down the hill to see a glowing blue wave crest over the demolished wall below them. The goblins were swerving around the corpse of the third wyvern, advancing toward the hill. Adrick must have been successful, saw Ben.

  “There are still more of them,” Amelie groaned.

  “Hundreds more, but the wyverns are dead,” remarked Towaal. She raised her hands, crackling bits of energy flying between her fingers. “I see no reason to conserve any more energy. Shall we engage?”

  They started down the hill, joining a throng of guardians who streamed toward the wall. Three wyverns vanquished, a victory that would go down in history—if anyone survived to tell it. Below them, goblins had made the wall and were forcing the defenders back. Shadows darted through the wave of blue. Ben realized there were demons down there as well, moving amongst the goblins.

  The red mage-light from the braziers began to wink out.

  “The goblins are extinguishing the lights!” exclaimed Amelie.

  “The demons will be invisible,” warned Ben.

  Towaal raised her arms and above them, and a soft glow suffused the sky.

  “I can’t hold it long,” she said through gritted teeth. “I used most of what I had to draw the wyverns. Swing fast.”

  Ben drew his blade and started a slow jog down the dark hill, afraid to move too quickly or he’d end up tripping and tumbling to the feet of one of the goblins. Amelie, rapier in one hand, the other smoking with heat, followed in his wake. Rhys came from around the side of the wyvern’s corpse and joined them. With the lizard dead, his blade sparkled with silvery smoke. The swordsman Adrick arrived as well. His weapon pulsed with blue power, shimmering in the dark night.

  “Nice work,” remarked Rhys.

  “It was easy,” responded the swordsman. “The thing was distracted by something. I just had to walk up and stick my blade in.”

  Prem appeared beside Amelie. “Glad to see you’re still with us.”

  Amelie didn’t respond. She was focused ahead.

  The swordsman, Adrick Morgan, had finished three wyverns. Ben didn’t have time to consider it. He was a dozen paces from the closest goblins and broke into a run, Amelie, Rhys, Prem, and Adrick flanking him. The goblins were forcing the guardians back along the wall, but they weren’t prepared for the storm of steel that hit their center.

  Ben plowed into two of the goblins, using his size advantage to trample them. He lashed out at one with his longsword and stomped on the head of the other. Beyond the first two, he put his shoulder into the side of a third one of the light-weight creatures and shoved with everything he had, tossing it into a mass of its fellows, knocking half a dozen more over like lawn bowling pins.

  With at least two hundred of the monsters on the wall in front of them, it was about creating a maximum shock and pushing them back, giving himself and his companions room to slice the things up.

  A spear darted at him, and Ben dodged back but not quick enough to stop the point from snagging on his shoulder, puncturing his flesh but not incapacitating him.

  Prem skipped around him and whipped a long knife across the attacking goblin’s throat. She reversed her grip on the knife in her other hand and plunged it into a second goblin’s side. The creature, looking the other direction, didn’t have a chance to defend itself. The simple leather armor it was wearing did nothing to stop the razor-sharp tip of her knife. Adrick, a dozen paces away, swirled through the goblin ranks like a terrible wind. His blade, blurred by the blue glow of the goblins, flashed through them invisibly, leaving dark geysers of blood in its wake. Rhys chopped down a goblin and then slid his longsword into the back of a demon which had latched onto a fallen guardian.

  Around Ben’s companions, the goblins scrambled away, their simple hunger overcome by an even more powerful emotion. Fear.

  Ben, ignoring the sting in his shoulder and wiping a trickle of blood off his forehead where the arrow had struck him earlier, waded back in. Beside him, Amelie pounded the hilt of her rapier into the face of one of the goblins. Another, thinking it had an opening, came close to grapple with her. She slapped it with an open hand, and it went back screaming, angry orange flames licking where she’d struck it.

  Ben grinned, easily parrying two spears out of the way with one stroke and then bringing his blade back, slashing through both the spears’ owners with a single blow. It was easy, the goblins were small and weak, like fighting children. Ben swung down and decapitated one of the creatures. Its body fell away, but its head remained stuck, teeth fastened on the face of a fallen villager it had been gnawing on.

  Maybe not like any children he’d want to bounce on his knee, corrected Ben.

  With the arrival of Ben and his companions, and mostly Adrick, he admitted, the guardians rallied. The goblins were broken into smaller and smaller knots of survivors. Within half a bell, the creatures were surrounded and slaughtered, no match for the superior strength, skill, and weapons of the humans.

  The blue glow vanished, fallen goblin by fallen goblin, but Ben realized with a start that he could still see. He glanced back and saw the pale, yellow light from the sun rising from behind the ridge. It was morning. They’d fought all night. He slumped, exhausted, forearms resting against a remaining section of the battlement. In the still-dark field below, half a dozen goblins retreated toward the cave. The rest of them lay dead.

  “Well fought,” remarked Adrick.

  Ben glanced at the swordsman. He was shirtless in the cool morning air, his chest glistening with sweat where it wasn’t covered in dark blood.

  “Thanks,” muttered Ben. “We’re not done, though, are we?”

  Adrick nodded. “Not yet.”

  Ben’s head fell down onto his crossed arms.

  “I’m told it was you who held the interest of the largest wyvern when I struck it, and I saw you attack the first one. I’m impressed with you, Benjamin.”

  Ben raised his head. “You can call me Ben.”

  “Without even a mage-wrought blade, you displayed a courage that is rare in this world.”

  “Rare in your world, maybe,” retorted Ben. “You have an important fight here, I can see that, but it’s not the only fight. We’ve been battling the dark forces as well and worse. Our companions have faced odds longer than this, and some of them have made the ultimate sacrifice. When I know what is out there, what choice do I have?”

  “There is always a choice,” responded Adrick. “Instead of fighting and risking yourself, you could hide or run away. That’s what the mages of t
he Sanctuary are doing, isn’t it? Hiding behind their walls, not venturing out to face the true threats in the world.”

  “Hiding is not something I’m inclined to do,” Ben responded. He paused, thinking, and then plunged ahead. “What will you do when this rift is closed? Will you face the darkness in the world or hide in the forest?”

  Adrick grunted and turned from Ben. He didn’t respond.

  Shouts rang out on the ridge behind them. Ben turned and saw a procession of villagers making their way toward the wall. The mages. Two dozen of them, the elders and a score of younger ones as well, nearly every talented man or woman in the village. From what Ben heard, they had already said goodbye to their friends and family.

  “That’s courage,” remarked Ben.

  “On that, we agree,” responded Adrick.

  The swordsman turned and called up and down the wall, rallying the warriors to form at the base of the structure where the wyverns had breached it. Amelie and Prem joined Ben, and they climbed down to meet the others.

  “Why do we need the warriors?” asked Amelie. “Didn’t we kill all of the dark forces last night?”

  “We don’t know what’s in that cave,” answered Prem. “No one’s ever been in there.”

  The light of the sun was peeking over the ridge, and Ben tried to ignore what it showed him. He tried to ignore what he was stepping on. Goblins and demons lay like a thick, squishy carpet below the wall. The stench of their death was impossible to ignore. Bodies were torn apart, viscera splattered everywhere. Blood puddled in ankle-deep pools at the bottom of the pile. Ben grimaced and tried to step over a particularly disgusting corpse of a goblin. He winced as he nearly set his foot down on a human hand that poked out from under the pile.

  “Do they bury the dead humans?” asked Amelie.

  “No,” said Prem, pinching her nose between her fingers. “They’re burned, just like the dark forces. The risk of disease is too high to go rooting through these piles.”

  “People’s friends, family,” murmured Amelie.

  Prem shrugged. “There’s nothing to be done about it.”

  Three-dozen paces from the wall, the corpses thinned out, and it was possible to walk without stepping on one. Before them, a quarter league of devastated landscape spread out until it met the towering cliff at the end of the canyon. From the ground, Ben couldn’t see the cave, but he knew it was there.

  One hundred guardians spread out across the field, the warriors taking point, the mages walking in a cluster behind them. Ben and his friends walked with the warriors. Shattered ammunition from siege weapons was strewn near demolished bodies, goblins and demons, thousands of them.

  “This was just from the last few weeks when they didn’t spare the energy to burn them,” said Amelie, shaking her head.

  “Why do they come?” wondered Ben.

  “One of the mages explained it to me,” said Towaal. “Their world has very limited life that these creatures are able to feed upon. The wyverns consume our magic, somehow using a practitioner as a funnel for pure energy. The demons consume our lifeblood, and the goblins eat our flesh. The guardians believe there may be other sources of sustenance for the dark forces at home, but in our world, they survive off of us. You saw through the Purple’s rift, their world is dead. They’ve stripped it bare. There’s no sense of conservation. Our farmers, they water the earth and fertilize it. Human farmers swap crops to ensure they don’t suck all the nutrients from the soil. The dark forces do nothing like that. They only consume. They only know hunger. The dark forces are drawn to the abundant life in our world like you would be drawn to a well-laid buffet after years of deprivation. They can’t help themselves. They’re driven to come here and feast.”

  They trudged on until the cliff rose in front of them. Near the cliff, the ground was soft from countless feet pounding over it every night, but there were no bodies. Those were clustered closer to the wall, where the siege weapons and archers could reach.

  “Beware of anything coming out of there,” yelled Adrick, his voice drifting over the quiet field. “If we drew the wyverns last night, it’s possible they may sense us again. They could come for the magic.”

  Ben gripped his sword, but he didn’t draw it. There was nothing but mud between them and the cave. Above it, pale gray granite soared into the sky, the cave loomed in the cliff face like an open mouth. Inky black filled the maw, impenetrable by the morning sun. One hundred paces away, the group stopped and clustered together.

  “Do you sense anything?” Rhys asked Towaal.

  She shrugged, eyes fixed on the cave.

  Adrick turned to the elders. “Shall we precede you, or...” The man trailed off, clearly unsure how to suggest the elders go in alone.

  “There is nothing you can do to assist once we begin,” responded the old man, Adrick’s father.

  Ben frowned. They had never learned his name.

  Wordlessly, the old man shuffled forward. Around him, the rest of the mages walked as well, all of them marching slowly toward the cave. From the warriors, several others peeled off. Mages who had martial skills, guessed Ben. A dozen of them, total, only a handful of mages staying behind. Adrick stepped up to join them, but the old man shook his head.

  “You will be needed here, son.”

  Thick muscles tensed. “I may be needed in the cave.”

  “When we are gone, it will be your responsibility to lead those who remain. The rift will no longer be a threat, but the secrets we hold will be. You must protect the knowledge we’ve acquired and protect the world from the threats it poses. The mission remains even after this rift is closed.”

  Adrick bowed his head and stepped back.

  The mages continued toward the cave, reluctant to enter, or in the case of some of the elders, it may have been the fastest they could move.

  Ben leaned to Amelie and whispered, “Do you think they’re up to it?”

  She shrugged. “Strength of will and strength of body are not the same thing. They’ve been preparing since yesterday. This will not take long.”

  The cluster of mages entered the cave and vanished inside the darkness. Moments passed quietly. Then, people began to stir.

  “How do we know if they’re successful?” whispered Ben.

  Towaal opened her mouth to respond, but a loud snap silenced her. Above the cave, the granite split, a crack running from the roof of the cave to the top of the cliff. A shower of rock fell down, and a rumbling shudder boomed so loud that Ben almost lost his balance.

  “Back up!” yelled Towaal.

  No one needed much encouragement. They stumbled away from the cliff, the ground leaping and jolting as earthshattering concussions rocked them. Ben watched in horror as the cliff began to crumble, showers of rock dust falling first, and then larger and larger chunks of gray granite. He didn’t wait to see any more. He and everyone else turned and fled.

  Rocks bounced down around them, thudding into the mud or into people. A few villagers fell, but they were grabbed by their friends and pulled clear. In the space of a couple of dozen heartbeats, they’d made it out of the fall area and turned to watch the cliff collapse into a giant pile of tumbled rock. A cloud of dust billowed out, and Ben covered his mouth and eyes, feeling the air blow by him, moved by the impact of the falling rock.

  As quickly as it started, it was over. The villagers, stunned and dismayed, stared at the collapsed cliff. A war they had been fighting for centuries was over, but they’d lost a third of their population to finish it. The rift was closed, shutting one of the last remaining openings for the dark forces to enter the world of man, but the oldest, most respected members of the guardians had to die to do it.

  5

  Hall of the Mages

  The village was a somber place when they returned through the node gate. Ben guessed there had been three hundred villagers before. Now, there were two hundred. A hundred bodies lay in the morning sun on the other side of the gate, unburied, rotting in the open or buried under th
e cliff. Ben and his friends returned to the house they’d been in the day before, what seemed like weeks before, and sat around a small table.

  “What should we do?” asked Amelie.

  “Leave,” remarked Rhys dryly. “Today, everyone is thinking about what happened. Tomorrow, they’ll be back to protecting their secrets. The mages are gone, but I don’t think we want to fight past that man Adrick Morgan to get out of here. Did you see him last night? If he wants to, he could stop us.”

  “The elder said we would be allowed to leave,” argued Ben. “You think Adrick will betray that trust?”

  Rhys shrugged. “You heard the last words of the elder just as clearly as I did. ‘Protect our secrets’. Letting us leave doesn’t exactly accomplish that. I don’t know if he changed his mind or misspoke, but that’s what the man said.”

  “If we use the node gates, we could still gain weeks on Milo,” mentioned Towaal.

  “You think we can sneak through?” asked Ben.

  “They’re unguarded, so I don’t see why not,” answered Towaal. She frowned. “But how would we know which one to go through? There are two dozen gates down there, and they’re all marked with script I don’t recognize. We could try randomly walking through them, but even if we found a gate near the City, would we even be able to tell? If it’s on the edge of the forest, it may look the same as anywhere else.”

  “Take the gates or hike out,” said Rhys. “Either way, we’ve got to get out of here before they decide we’re a liability.”

  Ben rubbed at the scar on his arm and then finally responded. “We need allies.”

  Rhys sighed, but the rogue didn’t protest.

  “Adrick may try to convince us to stay here or he may try to kill us, but I spoke to him on the wall after the battle. I don’t think he will hinder our mission. I think he’ll understand. We might even convince him to join us. He alone could change the tide in a battle against the demons or against the Veil.”