Stretching his legs, the spellcaster ambled to the edge of the clearing to stare out into the shadowy wood. Four weeks of deliberation renewed his purpose. Omelchor had been dictating the show lately, running events his way. The advantage of determining the opening move in the unavoidable race war looming belonged to him, meaning he could orchestrate the crucial first plays of the game. Maldoch opted to redress that, by taking the fight to his nemesis.
"Time to assemble the team,” he instructed himself. “But first I need a word with the coach."
Garrich woke grumpy. He had not slept well and was subsequently up at the crack of dawn. The forest bird life eagerly warbled in the new day, much to his annoyance. What right did woodlarks have to be so damn happy this early in the morning?
Parndolc lay curled up asleep in his bedroll, sucking his thumb like a 200 lb baby. Throwing off his blanket, Garrich looked for Maldoch and found the wizard kneeling under a guardian elm. Recognizing that special tree, the Goblin came close to weeping. Forcing himself to walk over, he was amazed to discover Maldoch tending Tylar Shudonn's gravesite. By necessity the old soldier had been hastily laid to rest in a shallow, unmarked grave. Only now the wizard was placing a bunch of wildflowers at the base of a wooden headstone sculpted to resemble a shield, inscribed simply with Tylar's name and relevant dates.
"Surprised?” said Maldoch, standing when Garrich joined him.
The emotional Goblin could only murmur, “When?"
"Last year,” the wizard gave away. ‘I commissioned a woodcarver over in Haston to do the honors. I wasn't about to let my old friend's final resting place be marked only by weeds."
Garrich was shamed by Maldoch's earnestness. “I didn't mean to leave father like that."
Maldoch patted the youth's shoulder. “I was setting things right, for the both of us."
Garrich felt better. “Any more surprises in store?"
"Nothing that can't keep, boy."
When Parndolc finally stirred around midmorning, the Goblin was banking the cooking fire. The frowning technical wizard scratched his hairless head and mumbled, “I'll never get used to waking up without a hangover. Where's magic man, Garrich?"
"Running an errand. He'll return in a couple of weeks and said for us to sit tight meantime."
Parndolc flopped down. “Here's hoping Mal brings back a flagon of ale. A wizard could die of thirst out here."
Maldoch slowed.
Draesdow Hollow lay dead ahead. A fortnight of hard walking westwards saw the spellcaster reach Tarndeth Ward in record time, shaving two days off his standing best. Though the day shone gloriously sunny, the path taking him off the scrubland into the hill country was shrouded in black fog. Maldoch pressed on without a lunch stop. Every so often he revisited this region sensibly avoided by all, and every time he started out on this trail he got goose bumps. Draesdow was an arena-like depression squatting north to south between two bleak hills. Ringed by low cliffs of obsidian forming the enclosing walls of this natural amphitheatre, access to the Hollow was gained by either gate of orangey sandstone set at the western and eastern ends. But only wizards, witches, and fools dared those portals. Any mortal rash enough to try those entrances died of fright or lived what was left of their vastly shortened life a gibbering, insane mess.
Clammy tendrils of black vapor snaked around the ankles of the journeying wizard as he undertook the short climb into the foothills. The pathway was overgrown with waist-high thistles Maldoch could not detour around lest he wade through pockets of equally prickly gorse adjoining the trail. Luckily for the spellcaster his thick leather boots and coarse cloak provided ample protection from the thorny vegetation. By midafternoon he completed his ascent, though you could scarcely tell. The clouding, inky mist obscured everything from view, bar the gate directly in front of him.
The slab of red ochre rock barring Maldoch's passage was three times man-height and bore the dire runic inscription:
—
ENTER THOSE NOT FAINT OF HEART
FALTER ONCE AND I BEG DO WAIT
COURAGE STRONGEST FROM THE START
MEET YOUR DOOM BEYOND THIS GATE
—
"A simple Keep Out would work just as well,” the wizard said of the chiseled warning sign. Pushing on the gate with the palm of his hand, the unwieldy stone swung easily inwards with a faint grinding sound, balanced perfectly on the balls of blue metal hinging the block at top and bottom on its right hand side. The unheeding wizard strode beneath the Dwarfmade steelwork framing the sandstone door to enter oblivion.
The gate thudded unpromisingly shut behind Maldoch. He stood on the lip of what could only be described as a bowl perhaps a third of a league across at most. The pervading black cloud roofed Draesdow Hollow, plunging the stadium into perpetual darkness. The arena was far from being unlighted however. At its precise center a conical mound thrust skywards from the plain, and perched on the apex of that steep-sided hummock jutted a thirty-foot tall obelisk of glowing jade bathing the basin in its emerald luminosity.
Descending to the floor of the sink, Maldoch encountered the skeletal remains of the few adventurers who stupidly ignored the portent on the gates to their own detriment. The bony corpses belonged mostly to prospectors, lured to Draesdow by the fabled wealth of the vertical rectangle of jade. It was reputed a whole nation could be bought and sold with that single piece of pale green hard stone. The creeping wizard came across rusting picks and shovels, tattered scraps of moldy clothing, and the larger bones of pack animals felled by starvation. The greedy came seeking fortune, only to be rewarded with madness and death.
Maldoch paused beside a more recent cadaver. He was recently killed, dead for no more than a day judging by the fresh state of his olive skin. Kneeling, the curious wizard rifled the body. This victim was no exploring miner but a Goblin scout. Unseeing eyes stared upwards above a mouth agape in a mute scream of terror, his raven locks changed to shocking white from exposure to whatever outlandish horror assailed him. The westerner was scarily otherwise unmarked. Deadman hands gripped the leather-strapped hilts of twin swords, the curved blades unblooded by lack of contact with his tormentor.
The body of the deceased swordsman jiggled while Maldoch searched for identifying clues. He found them after snatching a leather pouch from about the neck of the Goblin and emptying the contents into a cupped hand. Prodding the single bear claw with a curious finger, the wizard did not waste time examining the tufts of golden-brown fur that dropped out of the pouch along with the bruin nail. The charms were proof-positive of the wearer's identity.
There were other bodies further on, splayed on the ground in a similar posture to the first. Maldoch checked every one, searching their pouches and discovering the furred and feathered, antlered and clawed charms of wolf and elk, otter and lynx, wolverine and raven. Goblin warriors wore the symbols of their respective clan concealed on their person, making recognition straightforward if you knew your taxidermy.
Maldoch moved on to the eighth and final Goblin corpse sprawled ten paces away from his compatriots and about double that distance from the mound. There was no real need to loot this fellow. The conclusion the wizard was drawing from these searches merely confirmed his assumption that Omelchor had worked his magic to finally unify the Carnachian bands.
Priding himself on being thorough, Maldoch rolled over the prone Westie and jumped back when the Goblin's insensible shriek pierced the silence. A smart slap and quick grapple restored order, and divested the raving mad Carnachian of his pouch. The wizard undid his booty and triumphantly pulled out the barred, rufous goshawk feather he rightly guessed the last Goblin to be carrying in his consecrated throat pouch.
Tossing the quill aside, Maldoch gestured to the demented Goblin blindly crawling away on his hands and knees gabbling nonsense, addressing the jade obelisk in a defaming tone. “Soran, you missed one of the suckers!"
No reply came back.
"I know you're in there,” shouted Maldoch, mounting the sharply
inclined knoll.
Still nothing.
The wizard persevered. “Don't make me come in and get you,” he threatened, rapping the giant greenstone with his staff.
Veins of yellow formed on the surface of the obelisk. Throbbing with flashes of life, they pulsed faster and faster until a shower of red and white sparks cascaded from the top of the rectangle of rock, showering Maldoch with magic light as the wizard sprinted down the cone. Those sparkles bounced high off the rocky ground to swirl purposefully above his head, spiraling upwards to coalesce into the vague outline of a vast manifestation. A bolt of blue lightning flashed from the ceiling of black vapor to energize the display with a rumbling discharge of brilliance.
When the glare faded a huge dragon flapped vigorously in the greenly lit air overhead, looking every inch how that mythical beast should: 60 feet and fifteen tons of scaled grey hide; four massive taloned feet big enough to carry off the largest bullock; a muscular tail barbed at the end with stiff, feathery protuberances; airplane-sized membranous wings copied off bats; and a horned head with a mouthful of serrated teeth that might have chomped a dinosaur into pulp. An ear-splitting bellow issued from that fanged maw, and the crawling survivor of the Goblin party dropped dead from the shock when his heart gave up the ghost and stopped beating.
"Put a lid on all that pointless roaring and get down here,” chastised Maldoch, shaking a remonstrative finger at the wondrous beast. “Haven't you scared enough people to death for one day?"
The dragon came to heel like an errant puppy and landed smack dab in front of the scolding spellcaster. Slitted eyeballs larger than shields took in the enchanter. ‘Thou art not mine master, wizard!’ he thundered in protest, engulfing Maldoch in a stream of liquid fire squirting from a gland situated between the brow ridges fronting his scarlet head crest.
Patiently weathering the streaming flame, Maldoch repeated, “Oh, pipe down, Soran. We both know you're all bark and no bite."
Extinguishing his flamethrower, the dragon said in a petulant rumble, “Alack, mine voice alone hath power."
"You're an over-inflated gecko,” insulted the wizard. Foolish words, considering he was in the middle of a graveyard.
"Verily I be Sorandorallah and I hath no substance!” roared the magical lizard, his indignation trailing off into a sorrowful whimper.
A sad but true fact. Majestic and intimidating as the dragon appeared, his vast bulk was faintly transparent. The background of green monument and black cliff walls were visible through his translucent scales. He was nothing more than a colorful phantom, the ghostly echo of a previous existence.
"You are a memory, but what a regal piece of nostalgia,” consoled Maldoch.
"Begone, Maldochus!” the dragon beseeched. He sulkily laid his head between his insubstantial forefeet. “Wend thy way from Draesdow forthwith. Mine misery needs not company."
Maldoch took a seat on a boulder across from the depressed dragon. “You always were a drama queen."
"Thou art a heartless beast, wizard."
"I've been called worse."
"Papula exaspero homo hominus!"
The spellcaster was stunned to silence, not so much from the barb as the aspect that the dragon had delivered the gibe in the archaic lingo of the Ancients. It had been many moons, 1,600 years to be precise, since Maldoch heard the language of his childhood and inestimably longer since the world forsook Tanit in favor of Nglais, the Shared Tongue, which originally arose as the trading speech binding the newborn Fellow Races but ultimately adopted as the standard vernacular of the continent.
Snapping out of his shock, Maldoch responded to the slur light-heartedly. “I get called many things, but to be described as a pimple to irritate Man is refreshingly new and quite accurate. Ta very much."
The dragon could not believe his horns. Not only had his taunt failed to strike a nerve, the wizard was actually thanking him for his rudeness! He gave up and heaved a rumbly sigh of defeat.
"You seem gloomier than normal, Soran. Why so glum?"
"Tis mine death date."
"Commemorations can be depressing. How long ago today since the Gnomes sacrificed you?"
"Dahriggons doth not mark time in the way of the Two-legs."
Maldoch glossed over the obvious irony that dragons were also bipedal and asked again.
"Nineteen hundred and forty years,” was the unhappy reply.
The wizard figured as much. The death of Sorandorallah, last of the Greater Dragons, should have ended the century long Serpent Slaughter instigated by the fixated Gnomes. His demise instead worsened the killing spree, as the religious fanatics turned their sacrificial worship to the lesser cousins of their scaled gods, exterminating too the smaller Wyverns.
"Nigh on a thousand years twice hath I dwelt in this abysmal hollow,” repeated Sorandorallah. “Why shouldst mine soul suffer unending torment?"
Maldoch genuinely pitied the lamenting dragon. Sadly, it was Soran's lot in life—or death, in his case—to be consigned to Draesdow Hollow for all eternity or until the end of time, whichever arrived first. Fated, destined, or just plain picked out at random to be the swansong of dragonkind, he had as such a special role to fulfill in the hereafter.
The opposing deities, Jeshuvallhod and Lusfardcul, forever at odds in the timeless struggle between Good and Evil, made a pact to make the basin neutral ground for the express purpose of using it as a broadcasting dish between the realms of the living and the dead. Beneath the bowl hummed a rare junction of the unseen mystical energy strands crisscrossing the planet, producing an extraordinarily powerful magnetic field ripe for tapping by the celestial beings. Unable to communicate directly with their worshippers, lest their omnipotence overwhelm and crush the fragile mortals, the gods usually relied on imperfect dreams and visions to convey their wishes. The unique locality of Draesdow put a different spin on things. It enabled the divinities to use the undead to speak to their minions. And what better vessel than the last Greater Dragon, a figure of mythical authority whose forebears conquered the planet a quarter of an eon before all others. The fact that Sorandorallah was their unwilling mouthpiece mattered not.
"Divine will can't be challenged,” was the only wisdom the spellcaster offered. “Time to make that call, Soran."
The dragon's yellow bright eyes took on a pale blue cast and his mannerism changed. Gone was the whiny, morose shade, his dour persona replaced by a patently godly presence as the possessed spirit body of the storybook beast lifted off the ground to sit on his haunches.
Coming off his rock, Maldoch knelt and whispered reverently, “Master, I bid thee welcome."
"Don't be such a stiff-neck, my son,” Jeshuvallhod gently castigated, speaking through his ghostly host in a kindly male voice. “Must I forever remind you not to be so formal."
Maldoch awkwardly retook his seat. He had never become completely used to the laidback nature of his idol. A god should be markedly superior, aloof even. The Maker was confusingly neither.
"Why have you summoned me? I am a busy entity."
"Forgive my intrusion, master, but I have need of your counsel."
"How may I assist?"
"The traitor Omelchor raided Earthen Rise not long ago."
"An unfortunate development,” commented the Maker. Indisputably the God of Light, Jeshuvallhod could not possibly know everything the minute it happened. “That's the second castle my wayward son has trashed."
"His nature is to wreck things,” established the wizard. “Fortunate for us, he did fail in his attempt to destroy the White Grimoire."
"The twin sacred tomes cannot be destroyed. Nullified, but never obliterated. Magic is the cornerstone of the universe, Maldoch. Without it, Good ceases to be and Evil shall prevail."
"This is exactly what I'm fighting to prevent, master. That's why I'm seeking answers to a couple of questions bothering me."
"Ask away, my son."
"Is Omelchor aware of the means to render the White Grimoire useless?"
<
br /> "Your brother is no fool. He knows the Lodestone exists, but not its whereabouts."
"That explains his stupidity at trying to fry the book."
"There's more to it than that,” expanded the Maker. “Omelchor won't rashly invoke the power of the crystal that'll rob him of his own source of spellcasting, for the Lodestone will neutralize the Black Grimoire as well. I take it the gem's hiding place remains secure?"
"Stashed away safe and sound these past twenty-one centuries,” the wizard confirmed rather too quickly for the Maker's liking.
Way back in 1481 of the First Epoch, Maldoch and the Dwarf rock hound that would father the Gemfinder family set out to uncover the long lost resting place of the Lodestone, a supposed reservoir of mystical energies. The intrepid seekers indeed found the fabled crystal after months of hard searching, decades of research on the wizard's part having paved the way for their outwardly speedy success. They chose not to disturb the crystal and, in order to ensure it not falling into the wrong hands and thus be misused, kept its precise location a closely guarded secret. That proved a particularly easy task, considering the accompanying Dwarf had for ages been bones in the ground without ever revealing the find of the epoch to his descendants. On top of that, the spellcaster had utterly forgotten the site of their astounding discovery.
"What else do you want from me?” Jeshuvallhod asked His devotee.
"The other side's next move."
Wizard's Goal Page 36
