by Dixon, TJ
“Yes, sorry, I thought you had another plan.” I say.
“If Sor hadn’t still been recovering we could have used her to get back. That wasn’t an option though, so we sent her back. The only other option is to remove the curse from me. I am linked to my mother’s home, so I can open a portal there without the need to go through Portalis. Perhaps the dwarves can help with removing my curse, but they’d definitely want something in return.” Lucy tells me.
“So how far are we from the dwarven city?” I ask. Lucy looks at Kai.
“Probably about an hour if we don’t encounter any monsters, but we will encounter monsters.” Kai answers.
“So an hour plus however long it takes to defeat whatever monsters we come across. That’s not too bad.” I say and then ask Lucy. “How is Elucia doing?”
“She’s been asleep most of the time since David left her body. She needs proper rest but she can’t get that here.” Lucy tells me.
“Then let’s get moving.” I say.
“Are you ok to walk?” Lucy asks dubiously.
“As long as we take it slowly at first. Hopefully I’ll be able to walk faster once I get used to walking again. Don’t count on me in a fight though.” I say.
Kai gets up with Lucy still on her shoulder. Dairon walks to her left and I walk behind them both. My magic feels almost completely drained so I will be relying on them entirely to defend us. I keep my senses open though, so I can at least still warn them of danger. It isn’t long before I sense something but Kai senses it at the same time and seems to recognise it.
“Goblins.” Kai says and raises a magical shield around us. Moments later fireballs hurtle towards us and explode as they hit her shield. Dairon throws lightning at the five goblins and quickly overpowers their shield. The goblins are all fried as soon as the shield falls. Kai laughs and says. “That was quick.”
“Elves have been hunting goblins since goblins were first created.” Dairon says with a shrug. Then he can’t help but add, “By a dwarf.”
“A mad dwarven outlaw. Words like that are unwise though, given how close we are to the city gates.” Kai says glaring fiercely at him. Dairon just shrugs. “Let’s move on.”
So we pass the goblin corpses and walk on. Again it isn’t long before we encounter more trouble. This time though Kai senses it first and I didn’t have a clue until she warns us.
“Ants!” She shouts, but I can’t see or sense anything. She raises flames around us and I see a sharp yellow bone claw about a foot long pierce the flames. It falls to the floor by our feet though, because whatever it was attached to didn’t survive the flames. Nothing else tries to pierce the flames and after a few moments Kai says. “They’ll pass us by as long as we keep the flames up.”
It is probably five or six minutes later when Kai sighs in relief and drops the flames. She doesn’t say anything. She just starts walking. We walk for a while this time without getting attack again. I must admit I let my guard down but Dairon was thankfully more alert.
“Enemy!” Dairon shouts and throws up a quick wind shield. A kind of goo is thrown back by his shield. I don’t see what threw the goo at us, but after a moment I sense it. No sooner have I done so than a flame has enveloped its head. Now I see what we are fighting. It is a huge caterpillar about a hundred foot long and three foot wide. I don’t know how many legs it has, but lots would be a fair description.
It seemed to use some sort of magic to hide from us, but now it is using every bit of power it has to resist the flames. After a few seconds it fails and its head is reduced to ash. The body thrashes about for a few moments and then lies there unmoving.
“Something will be here soon to eat it, so we should move quickly.” Kai says and then looks at Dairon. “Flight magic would be good.”
“Ok.” Dairon says and throws us through the air.
“That’s enough.” Kai says after about a minute. “We don’t want to go past the city gates.”
As it happens we don’t encounter anything else for some time and when we do it is just a couple of stray goblins. They fall quickly to Dairon’s lightning. Shortly after that Kai stops suddenly.
“This is it.” She says with a relieved smile. I look all around and can’t see anything unusual.
“This is what?” I ask confused.
“The city gates of course. Now we just have to wait here until they decide to open them and let us through.” Kai says sitting down on the ground staring at a section of the wall with a big smile on her face.
“We just wait for them to open? Isn’t there some way to open them ourselves?” I ask.
“What kind of city gates open from the outside?” Kai laughs.
“Well, I suppose that makes sense.” I say, but just waiting here… I sigh and shake my head in frustration, but there is nothing I can do. As it happens it isn’t long before the wall just disappears like it was never there. It doesn’t feel like it was ported though. Behind it is a small black chamber with no obvious exit.
There are two short men with more muscles than anyone I have ever seen before, even without taking into account their height. They have shiny golden beards down to their knees and wear black stone armour. Their hair is a matching golden colour but only down to their shoulders. Their skin is black and matches their armour perfectly. They have brown eyes. Neither hold a weapon but I sense a strong aura from both. They are certainly mages, and powerful mages at that.
“Who are you, and what do you want?” The one on the right asks gruffly. He is the slightly taller one and almost as tall as I am. That isn’t very tall of course, but the other one is about half a foot shorter. I look to Kai who answers him.
“My name is Kai and I am a half dwarf. My dwarven father is Jar, son of Sheek and Bakara, former apprentice of the smithy lord Blake Two-Hammers. I seek shelter in the magnificent dwarven city Nirvali, for myself and my comrades.” Kai says confidently.
“It seems you speak true, so there is no need to cut out your tongue.” The dwarf who spoke earlier says with a grim nod. “You may wait inside the city jail until the Council of Elders decides your fate.”
“Thank you.” Kai says bowing deeply and looking pointedly at us. I follow her lead and after a moment so does Dairon. I assume Lucy probably does too.
“Follow me then.” The dwarf says gruffly and leads us through the wall at the back of the chamber as if it wasn’t there. We are in a long empty black tunnel, but I hear sounds of people talking in the distance now. “Don’t talk to anyone. Keep your eyes on the ground. Especially the elf.”
So we walk through the tunnel and then the city not seeing anything other than the black stone ground and each other’s shoes. Kai seems to be wearing two very different shoes, one formed of black stone and one from brown leather. The whole place seems to be lit with a dim magical white light that permeates the whole place. Kai has dropped her own magical glow that she was using to light the way in the tunnel.
With my air sense I can feel the moment we enter a huge chamber with buildings all around, each carved into the stone. After a while walking we enter a small stone building and then what must be a jail cell. I hear the door creak as it opens to let us in and closes behind us.
“You can look around as much as you want now.” The dwarf says with a laugh and then leaves us.
I look up and there is a bored looking dwarf sitting by the door in a small stone chair. He is probably slightly shorter than me, but it is hard to tell whilst he is sitting. He is wearing the same black armour and has the same black skin as the guards at the city gate. He also has a golden beard down to his knees and golden shoulder length hair like the other dwarves, though his eyes are green. Unlike the other dwarves he doesn’t have shoes. His feet are covered in short furry hair and I can smell them from here. It really isn’t a pleasant smell.
There are stone bars and a stone door in front of us forming a jail cell. There is a solid wall and door beyond that. Behind us is a solid stone wall that feels like it is the outer wa
ll of the huge chamber we were in. There are bars between our cell and the cell to our right and left. There only seem to be three cells in total.
Everything is made from the same black stone other than a small white stone circle on the wall, with twelve black markings equal distance from each other. I can’t read the markings. There are three small stones, one black, one red and one blue that seem to be moving around the edge of the circle. The blue stone is closest to the centre and moving fairly quickly, though still not that fast. The red stone is slightly closer to the edge and barely moving. The black stone is right at the edge and I can only tell it is moving because of a small tremor in the air.
“The Council of Elders is due to meet in a week, so you’ll be in here a while. You may as well make yourselves comfortable whilst you wait. No magic though. Meals are twice a day and we don’t do fussy eaters. You get what we give you and you’d better be happy, or you’ll get nothing for your next meal. Try anything and you’ll lose your head for sure.” The dwarf tells us. He then leans back against the wall and closes his eyes. He then sticks his smelly feet out towards us and soon I hear snoring.
I turn and see Elucia is now lying on the floor and looks a bit more peaceful than when she was on Kai’s back. The floor is cold hard stone but she is at least able to stay still now rather than being rocked about as Kai walks and fights. I look up at the roof and wonder when I will see the stars again.
(Elucia)
I wake as if from a long nightmare. I have vague memories but they are just a blur. The last thing I remember clearly is tidying the workshop for Rin’s mother. So why am I now lying on a cold stone floor lit only by a dim white magical glow? Where am I?
“Awake at last.” An unfamiliar voice says from above me. I look up and see a blur that eventually settles down. When it does I see a tall woman that I don’t recognise.
“Who are you?” I ask in a raspy voice. It actually hurts to talk so I wince as I say it.
“I’m Kai, a half dwarf and half human mage. I carried you here for your friends.” She says and looks past me. I slowly turn my face to follow her gaze and see Peter, Lucy and Dairon. So Lucy is awake now. That’s good. Rin and her mother were really worried about her. I am glad she is awake again.
“Welcome back Elucia.” Peter says with a warm smile.
“Where was I, and where am I now?” I ask with another wince.
Lucy smiles and says. “Right now we’re in a dwarven jail cell hoping the dwarves are going to protect us from an army of elves instead of executing us for being outsiders.”
I open my mouth and close it three times. I just don’t know what to say to that. After a moment though I ask, “So where was I and why are my memories a blur?”
“You were possessed by a servant of the Fallen Angels.” Lucy says with a frown.
“Why? How?” I ask but every answer seems to raise more questions than it answers.
“As for how, he was a spirit, and a strong one at that, so possessing people was easy. He’s dead now though. As for why he possessed you, he was escaping from us so he needed a new body.” Lucy explains. I don’t dare ask anything else. “Do you remember anything from the time you were possessed?”
“Only very vague memories. It’s a bit like a blur. The odd face or smell. An awful smell like burning meat seems very familiar, but I don’t know why.” I tell her.
“Well, don’t worry.” Lucy says with a shrug. “For now all we can do is wait.”
“Is everyone else safe?” I ask praying that they are and not sure it is a wise question to ask.
“Everyone in the whole of every world?” Lucy asks with a grin.
“No, Rin, her mother and her friends.” I say with a nervous frown.
“As far as we know they are all safe.” Lucy says. It is the best answer I could hope for so I am relieved, though I would be even more so if I knew for sure they were safe.
“Food.” A gruff voice says and I can smell something rather unpleasant.
I slowly turn my gaze and see a couple of bare hairy feet at what must be the bars of our jail cell. Near his feet but this side of the bars is one large dish with something stringy hanging from the side and resting on the floor. I can’t see any cutlery. It looks like we will be sharing and drinking directly from the dish. Everything just seems to be getting better and better!
(General Karina)
The Council of Elders has met yet again and yet again the cowards are unwilling to give me the order to attack the elves. Instead we are relying on secrecy and flooded tunnels. So my forces are still waiting around, ready for the order that will probably never come.
In the meantime I have been given the unusual task of welcoming a damned elf and his friends to Nirvali. One of them is a half dwarf, but she is the worthless daughter of a human and a dwarven coward who fled from Nirvali to escape punishment for his crimes. Why the council couldn’t have just given that order to the head of the city guard I don’t know. Running the prison is her duty. I’m a general, not a lowly messenger.
“General!” The guard says jumping to his bare feet and saluting.
“At ease.” I say with a sigh and look into the cell through the stone bars at the odd group. The half dwarf is taller than most humans. There’s also a human boy with just one arm, a small elf and a human girl. Most interesting of all though is a human woman under a curse that has shrunk her body and sealed most of her power. They all seem to be asleep even though it is the middle of the day. Glaring at them I shout, “Get up!”
I watch in amusement as they wake and jump to their feet. The human boy and girl bump into each other as they get up. I wait until they appear awake.
“So what is it to be?” The cursed woman asks sounding fearless and I sense no deception in her words.
“You are to be given one small home to share whilst you remain here as our guests. You will have to earn a living whilst you are here. There is always plenty of work for those willing to do it, but if you are lazy you will starve. You cannot leave the city without permission from me. If you do leave without permission you will be considered our enemy. If you cause any trouble whilst you are here you will be punished.” I tell them.
“Are there dwarves skilled in removing curses?” The cursed woman asks.
“Yes, but they don’t work for free. There are dwarves who could remove your curse, if you were able to pay them enough. There’s no way you could afford it though.” I say with a shrug. “I will show you to your new home as I have been ordered to do so, but after that I don’t want to have anything to do with you. Especially with the elf. Now follow me.”
I release the magic locking the door and swing it open with earth magic. Then I lead the way through the streets to their home. It is just one room carved into the outer wall very close to the prison so it is not a big problem to lend it to these outsiders, but I would still prefer to chop their heads off. We literally leave the prison, walk around the prison and walk three doors down the street. I then point at the open door and say, “This is your home for now, so don’t forget it. Now I hope to never see you again.”
As I walk away I hear the boy whisper, “She really does look like a human girl.”
I resist the urge to incinerate him. The council would be annoyed if I did that and right now I need to convince them to let me do my job. Annoying them would be unwise.
Epilogue (Peter)
I am glad I am finally out of that jail cell. The home we have been given really is tiny, but at least it doesn’t have bars and we have the opportunity to earn enough to eat properly now. We also have now had a chance to wash. We were starting to get really smelly, not having washed for a weak. Most importantly though, we aren’t going to be executed. That is a weight off my chest, or I suppose more to the point a weight that I can keep above my shoulders.
My magical reserves are back to normal, though they are only normal as opposed to the strengthened powers I have when I take magic from other people. We need to find someone capable o
f removing Lucy’s curse, and find out how much it will cost. We also need to find work both to pay for food and so that we can work towards being able to pay them to remove the curse.
I am surprised by how much difference there is between male and female dwarves. I have only seen one female and three male dwarves, but all three male dwarves looked like strong black men, only really short and really, really strong. The female dwarf looked like a girl perhaps Elucia’s age, so thirteen or fourteen. She was really thin and childlike. She also had the same pale skin with a golden tint that Yu Kii and most of the humans we freed in the mines had. Her hair was white like Yu Kii too. Her eyes were a bright blue a bit like a Contractian though.
I don’t expect to return home quickly, but at least it isn’t hopeless, and we are safe. As long as the elves don’t take Nirvali that is. It has survived for this long though, so I don’t see that happening. I certainly hope it doesn’t happen!
Author’s Afterword
I hope you enjoyed reading the third book in The War of Contractia, which is part of The Chronicles of Contractia. Peter’s story will be continued in Peter of Dwarven Stone, the next book of The War of Contractia. I hope that you continue to follow Peter and his friends as they strive towards their dreams.
In addition to the main series I will also be writing short side stories as well, which will among other things give you additional background and understanding for some of the characters. These stories will not impact the main plot so you will still be able to just read the main series if you wish. Unlike the main series however, these side stories will mostly either be free or just cost cents (or cents converted into your local currency of course) as they will mostly be much shorter than the books in the main series.
I anticipate the release of book four between September and November 2014, but this could change. If you wish to know when my future books and stories are released as soon as they become available, please note that you can sign up for email alerts on my author page. You can reach my author page from any of my books’ product pages on Amazon.com and at least some of the other amazon websites such as Amazon.co.uk. I also post occasional updates for future release estimates on a forum on my amazon.com author page.
