As the knife came shakily closer and closer down towards her face, May let out a scream of frustration. The man atop her sprayed spittle onto her face as he snarled at her, “Prepare to die, lass.”
Suddenly a straight-bladed knife appeared at his throat. He and May both ceased in their life-and-death struggle and looked to the side. Nythee, her two white braids framing her tan face and fierce orange eyes, held the dagger firmly against the man’s throat and she snarled, “Leave my friends alone.”
At that she slid the blade quickly and forcefully across the man’s throat, opening a bloody rift. As blood began to spray onto May she kicked the gagging prophet from atop her and rolled away from him as he squirmed and tossed about in horror at his demise. She looked at Nythee and reached out to take the knife. The little Wendlithian girl placed the weapon into May’s palm. Kraegovich came forward and took up the little girl in one arm, as she began to sob, and he helped May to her feet with his other thick arm.
Then they all turned to Marros, his bloody stump of his right wrist draining his lifeblood upon the bridge to join that of his bleeding companions’ corpses, and that of Ethan. His pale sweaty face twitched in anger and pain as he snarled, “I will live through this! I will heal! The prophets will regroup! We will survive!”
Kraegovich handed Nythee to May and picked his blood-soaked sword up from the bloody stones of the bridge. He advanced at Marros as the prophet continued, “I will find you! I will hunt you and your Wizard-blooded infant to the ends of the Three Baronies! I will not rest until you are dead just as your lover! The Prophets will always protect this land, as we have always done! Wizardcraft will again die, but this time it will be at our hands!”
Kraegovich brought his sword down, but at the last second Marros vanished from the bridge and the Old District of Greenwell City in a brilliant flash of emerald light as the last of the light faded from the west. The Vharian’s blade bit into the stone rampart of the bridge, casting up stone chips and sparks, where once the prophet cowered.
Holding the whimpering child in one arm, May reached down and rubbed her belly with the other. Kraegovich turned to her and stated with determination, “As long as I still draw breath, you and Nythee will be safe. And your child, born of you and Ethan, will remain safe as well.”
May’s eyes welled with tears as she nodded her silent thanks. Kraegovich knelt down next to Ethan’s lifeless body, and tears brimmed the old Vharian’s brown eyes as he reached down and lifted the Wizard’s head from the spreading blood upon the stones of the bridge. Ethan’s face, shrouded in bisymmetrical blue swirling tattoos, stared blankly up into Kraegovich’s face, and the warrior used his other hand to close Ethan’s eyelids forever.
“Be at peace, storyteller. The Axe Maiden would be proud of you. Join her and the rest of your kin in the Ancestor Lands,” whispered Kraegovich as a tear dropped from his square weathered face.
The Vharian looked up at the sobbing May, Nythee in her arms, and then he looked stoically back down into Ethan’s peaceful features. “Your child will be safe, Ethan. As will May and Nythee. They will be my wards. No harm will come to them, neither from the Prophets nor from the monsters that prowl the countryside of this changing land. I will take them back to our homeland, to the Vhar Mountains, to look after them and keep them safe. You have my Vharian oath, my friend.”
At that Kraegovich gently laid Ethan’s head upon the crimson stones of the bridge, and he stood. May handed Nythee to him and she went to Ethan’s side. She fell to both her knees and embraced his torso with both arms, sobbing into his chest.
Eventually she looked up from his chest, his crimson blood smearing one of her cheeks, and through tears she looked into his thin tattooed face. “I love you, Ethan,” she said softly.
She bent over him and kissed his cold blood-flecked lips. With her long kiss concluded, May separated from Ethan and she whispered to him, “Our child will bear your name, my love. The child will carry the surname of Skalderholt.”
May Kinsley stood then, taking one last look at the face of her dead lover, the Wizard named Ethan Skalderholt, and she stumbled into the firm one-armed embrace of Kraegovich. As she shuddered with sobs, young Nythee even reached her skinny tan arms around May’s neck and embraced her lovingly. Night had completely fallen by the time the embrace and shared tears ended.
Kraegovich looked towards the west, screams and snarls splitting the quiet night air, and he stated, “We had best be going before the worst comes to Greenwell City, before the worst comes to the Three Baronies.”
May nodded in agreement and whispered, “Let us be off then.”
Epilogue
The Crumbling of Baronies
Soon after the fall of Greenwell City and the other settlements of the Three Baronies, the First Age came to a dark and violent conclusion, ushering in the Second Age. This new age was a time of isolation and darkness, ruin and fear, as the Three Baronies fell into destruction and despair. Wizardcraft-warped monsters swarmed the wilds and overgrown roads of the land, and even the Woodfolk were pressed into desperate times to survive, going so far as to set aside tribal differences and unite under a single leader. This leader was Férfa.
This new land that once was called the Three Baronies became known as just the Fallen Baronies, a single borderless stretch of monster-haunted wilds marred only by ruins and abandoned roadways. From the vast Ice Wilds to the southern shores of what was once the Barony of Wendlith, all of the settlements and their inhabitants fell except for two. Lumberwall, ever hardy and resilient, remained standing behind its high timber stockade wall. Baron Ruauld gave up his title and mantle of leadership, and power was given to the Lumberwall Guardsmen as defense and survival of the community became the sole important need of the people.
The other surviving settlement was the high-walled Old District of Greenwell City that contained the Castle of Greenwell, the Grand Cathedral of the Ancestors, the College of the Three Baronies, museums, expensive inns and shops, and the manors of the nobility. This new walled community of sages, scholars, priests and nobles became known as Fernhollow, so named for its savior, Baron Reynard Fernhollow. He retained his title and authority and reassigned the remaining Greenwellian Knights, now called the Fernhollow Guard, strictly to the defense and protection of his new community. True to his hopes and wishes, Fernhollow retained the history, faith and lore of the Fallen Baronies.
The use of coinage and money quickly fell out of practice, and was replaced by bartering and trade. Food and supplies quickly surpassed the value of a meaningless silver coin. Currency became weapons, clothing, food and drink, supplies, or service.
The exotic pale-haired and tan-skinned Wendlithian people were almost completely vanquished and annihilated except for young Nythee, the ward of Kraegovich. She became the one of the last of her people. True to his word, Kraegovich escorted May, Nythee, and Ethan’s unborn child that grew in May’s womb north to Lumberwall and relative safety and seclusion. May passed away during childbirth, but the babe was born healthy and safe. The baby girl of May Kinsley and Ethan Skalderholt was born with one amber eye and one turquoise eye and a head of blond hair. She was named Ethyl May Skalderholt. She was born with Wizardcraft, and her power became evident as a young girl when she began to create vibrant green light out of nothing. Her constant use of her Wizardcraft, used to create light in her dark room or temporarily blind her friends in jest with swift bursts of emerald light, quickly enveloped her body in bisymmetrical swirling green tattoos identical in shape to those that her deceased father had come to possess.
Kraegovich taught Ethyl May to always be wary and hidden from wanderers in white robes and the symbol of an open eye in a palm. The Prophets were still out there. Their one-handed leader that had killed Ethan was still out there. They had waited a thousand years to strike Wizardcraft from the face of the land, and they had failed. They wouldn’t give up until the child of the Wizard was slain. And so Kraegovich waited.
Ethyl May, the only Wiza
rd in all of the dark and terrible Fallen Baronies, a young girl at that, was taught to be ever watchful and tense, hiding her power from those that she didn’t know or trust. She was taught to be clever. She was taught to be wise. She was taught to be cautious.
But above all, Ethyl May Skalderholt was taught to be brave.
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Table of Contents
Copyright
Prologue
Chapter One A Storyteller Hears a Story
Chapter Two The House of Chronicles
Chapter Three Between Baronies
Chapter Four Scarlet
Chapter Five Tests of the Wilder Sort
Chapter Six A Monster in Deephollow
Chapter Seven O’Dell the Troll Hunter
Chapter Eight The Streets of Greenwell City
Chapter Nine Joining the Ranks
Chapter Ten In Honor and Duty
Chapter Eleven Two on an Errand
Chapter Twelve And Wizardcraft Returns
Chapter Thirteen A Deep Wolf’s Burning Bite
Chapter Fourteen When a Wizard Awakens
Chapter Fifteen Words with the Troll
Chapter Sixteen An Inspiring Yarn before Bed
Chapter Seventeen To Counsel Barons
Chapter Eighteen Battle of the Flowered Vale
Chapter Nineteen Resolve Ankle-Deep in Dead
Chapter Twenty A Dangerous Reception in Vhar
Chapter Twenty One In the Company of Savages
Chapter Twenty Two Without Solace, Darkness
Chapter Twenty Three The Night Taedroke Burned
Chapter Twenty Four The Riddle of the Troll
Chapter Twenty Five Naught but Ruin to Rule
Chapter Twenty Six The Priory of Prophets
Chapter Twenty Seven Lost Love and Bloody Blades
Epilogue
Table of Contents
Copyright
Prologue
Chapter One A Storyteller Hears a Story
Chapter Two The House of Chronicles
Chapter Three Between Baronies
Chapter Four Scarlet
Chapter Five Tests of the Wilder Sort
Chapter Six A Monster in Deephollow
Chapter Seven O’Dell the Troll Hunter
Chapter Eight The Streets of Greenwell City
Chapter Nine Joining the Ranks
Chapter Ten In Honor and Duty
Chapter Eleven Two on an Errand
Chapter Twelve And Wizardcraft Returns
Chapter Thirteen A Deep Wolf’s Burning Bite
Chapter Fourteen When a Wizard Awakens
Chapter Fifteen Words with the Troll
Chapter Sixteen An Inspiring Yarn before Bed
Chapter Seventeen To Counsel Barons
Chapter Eighteen Battle of the Flowered Vale
Chapter Nineteen Resolve Ankle-Deep in Dead
Chapter Twenty A Dangerous Reception in Vhar
Chapter Twenty One In the Company of Savages
Chapter Twenty Two Without Solace, Darkness
Chapter Twenty Three The Night Taedroke Burned
The Azure Wizard Page 25
