by D. M. Almond
“The mirrors!” Bipp exclaimed.
The Necromancer snapped his head in Bipp’s direction, releasing the lines of shadow that held Thorgar.
Bipp scanned the room, locking on a silver mirror with an intricate frame that depicted silver gargoyles grasping the glass centerpiece.
In all the other mirrors, the Shadow Stone is blurry! Bipp thought. And he was right—all except the mirror he was staring at showed the same smeared reflection, just at different angles. But the one he looked at now reflected the Shadow Stone with crystal clarity. This was the Necromancer’s secret hiding place for the real Stone, the one from which he channeled his dark power.
The Necromancer screamed and tried to stop him, but Bipp’s frying pan was already flying through the air. It hit the glass and the mirror shattered into a thousand pieces, revealing the floating Shadow Stone hidden inside it in one of Hublin’s pocket dimensions.
The Necromancer howled like a wounded animal and spun to go after his treasure. He had to get hold of it before the king! A figure jumped through the window behind him.
An ebony hand grabbed firm hold of the Necromancer’s head from behind, wrenching him back so hard that his hood fell down, exposing his rotting face. Isaac pulled even further, until the Necromancer was bent right over backward. He stared the Necromancer deep in his crimson eyes and curled his lips back.
“Go back to the pits of Hel where you belong, shadow puppet!”
The Necromancer saw the golden bracer around Isaac’s wrist and wailed in terror. The high-pitched scream quickly turned to agony as Isaac unleashed the full power of the Agimat, throwing waves of light into the Necromancer’s form.
Bipp had to shield his eyes from the brilliant display, but through clenched fingers, he could see another form crawling through the window. Logan pulled himself up over the window sill and hit the floor running.
The Necromancer desperately reached for the Shadow Stone, pleading with it to aid him, but Logan snatched hold of it, pulling it toward his chest.
The sound of reality tearing was staggering. It was like a concussive rending of air and time that threw everyone on their backs. The holy light of the Agimat was followed by swirling shadows that filled the center of the room, where Isaac held the limp shell that the Necromancer had possessed.
Outside the room, Alma’s orb of light snuffed out, and Bipp braced for the attack as dozens of ghouls and skeletons rushed into the room.
However, instead of going after the living, the undead ran toward the center of the room. As they stepped into that swirling vortex of shadows, the skeletons fell lifeless to the floor, the dim lights in their eyes fading. Bipp could see their freed souls. They glowed a vibrant green and danced away into Ohm’s light.
Hublin’s soul slowly stood up, leaving the Necromancer behind. He stared at his hands and then to the far corner of the room. Bipp followed his gaze but saw nothing.
“Forgive me, Ohm,” Hublin pleaded fearfully. “I was lost, tricked by the deceiver and his lies! Please take pity on me!”
Bipp did not know what the gnome god said, but it made Hublin cry pitifully. Light faded from the room, leaving behind a pile of still bodies once forced to be an undead legion but now freed from those bonds.
Hublin darted his glowing head back and forth, eyeing the corners of the room as the walls began to peel back.
Figures emerged from the shadows and laid hands on their Necromancer. They were the souls of those he had tormented for centuries, forcing them to continue living in dead bodies as he delighted in their agony.
Bipp had to turn away. Even as despicable as the Necromancer had become, he could not watch as they dragged his screaming soul down a long corridor, into the abyss where the Shadow Lord waited to dole out his eternal punishment.
The ghastly vision dispersed, and shadows from the center of the rift shot outward as if in an explosion, placing themselves at normal angles along the walls and outside the room. A tangible change came over the castle, a lightness of being, a cleansing of the air.
“The curse is lifted,” Thorgar said.
Chapter 26
As the shadows retreated, a well of light erupted from the center of Thorgar’s chest, blinding all of them for a dazzling moment. When the light subsided, he stood before Isaac, Logan, and Bipp in all his glory. Shimmering lights cascaded off his armor, which was a silvril so pure that it bordered on white.
“Ohm’s blessing,” Bipp gasped. The gnome god of light and order had bestowed a great gift of healing and renewed strength upon King Thorgar.
“What is going on up there?” Corbin’s call came through the window. He and Nero had been forced to watch the battle play out from the Arborium after Corbin had used his telekinetic gift to lift Logan toward the exposed common room windows. And since the bright explosion of light, they had seen nothing.
Logan walked over and threw his brother a wide smile, waving the Shadow Stone in his hands. Corbin crumpled to the floor in relief.
“Brillfilbipp Bobblefuzz,” King Thorgar proclaimed in a strong proud voice, “I’ve walked many a year alongside some of the most stout and honorable heroes. But never, in all that time, have I met one as brave and daring as yourself.”
Bipp blushed and bowed low to the king. “Thank you, Your Lordship. It is an honor to serve at your side.”
“Nay, Bipp, it is I who was honored,” Thorgar said. The king bowed down on one knee and lowered his face toward the floor. He kissed his palm and made a fist, aiming it straight forward in salute.
Bipp did not know what to say. He shot Logan a toothy grin and fumbled his hands together.
King Thorgar strutted to the window and looked over his shoulder at Isaac and Logan. “Thank you for freeing us from this eternal prison. I misspoke before, when I said you were fools. We’ll never forget what you’ve done here this day.”
“Wait,” Logan called as Thorgar climbed onto the window sill. The king paused. “Where are you going?”
“There is one last thing to do before me and my men return to Valhalla.” And with that, he jumped down from the high window into the Arborium.
Corbin was astonished to see the king leap from the window and land on one knee in his glimmering suit of armor. King Thorgar pulled his gleaming battle axe from his back and kissed the glass blade. He rose and marched proudly past Corbin and Nero, nodding to them as he went.
Thorgar stepped to the edge of the broken glass wall, where the golem had been thrown from the Arborium into the courtyard. An army of cobolds waited for him, their eyes searching for some sign of what had happened inside the castle. Everyone for leagues could feel the change that had overcome Ul’kor, but most did not understand it yet.
“Warrior’s of Ul’kor,” King Thorgar shouted from his perch. His voice was booming and powerful, drawing all eyes to his being. “The Necromancer is no more, his foul sorcery vanquished by the Light. That puppet of the Shadow Lord has been repaid for his atrocities. All that remains now is for us to wipe out the dogs that stand before you!”
Murmurs broke out among the cobolds. Many of them began debating whether they should retreat or not.
“Join me, children of Ul’kor, Guardians of Light. Let us come forth and cut down the ranks of evil from our midst. Let us cleanse the land. Join me now, one last time, side by side in our final battle!”
From the castle gates, a battle cry rose. The cobolds looked very anxious now, listening to the sounds of marching boots and clapping blades against shields. King Thorgar roared and jumped from the third floor of the castle, landing right on top of a group of monsters with deadly swipes of his axe.
If it was not astonishing enough to see the glowing king land safely, it was dumbfounding to see the army of gnome warriors that erupted from the castle.
Each one of them was rimmed in light, glowing a pale green over sparkling armor and rippling muscles. Ohm had blessed his children, who had sacrificed everything to keep the realm safe. That glimmering army washed over the
cobolds like a wave of steel and light, cutting the dogs down left and right, and at the center of it all was the mighty King Thorgar.
The battle raged on for an hour before Thorgar worked his way through the swelling cobold ranks to stand before Burgoth.
He pointed at her with the head of his glass battle axe. “It is time you and your kin took your leave of my lands.”
Burgoth snarled and made a gurgling noise. “These cobold lands now. Fat gnome has come here to die.” With that, she shouted for her men to fall on Thorgar from both sides while she slammed the base of a withered branch into the dirt.
A vine of thorns erupted from the dirt at his feet, coiling around the King’s thighs like serpents. Burgoth’s bodyguards were larger than the other cobolds, as big as Thorgar himself. But when the first one lunged at him, the gnome slashed at the thorny trap with his axe and chopped it in half.
Thorgar fell backward as the cobold rushed in, throwing a fist out on his way and clipping the oaf in the side of the head. The blow stunned him just enough to throw him blindly into his partners path. The two brutes collided and fell to the ground, but not before Thorgar made it over to them. It only took two heavy blows to knock the pair of them unconscious.
Thorgar heard Burgoth’s branch hit the soil again and he threw himself into a headlong leap. Another swelling vine erupted from the dirt, grasping for him but only finding the cobolds instead, which it wrapped around and squeezed. Throgar flinched when he heard the sound of their bones snapping.
Burgoth did not seem to pay any notice to her fallen bodyguards as she lifted the branch for another spell. Thorgar took two great leaps forward and brought his mailed fist into the dark shaman’s midsection, knocking the air out of her.
Burgoth hit the ground on her knees and Throgar lifted his axe high over his head. She shrieked when he brought it down for her neck. Throgar’s muscles flexed as he stopped, the blade hovering just above her dirty skin, letting the keen edge of mystical glass press against her exposed neck.
“It is over!” Thorgar roared, his voice carrying over the din of war.
The cobold army stopped in their tracks, all eyes resting on their Queen and her executioner. Burgoth tried to look up at King Throgar, but light cascaded off his armor, blinding her.
“This war is over!” he howled. “You and your kind will leave my lands now.” Burgoth made a wet gurgling noise and Thorgar pressed the blade harder against her neck. “And if you ever so much as think about returning to these lands, I vow we will not rest until every last one of your kind is dead.”
Burgoth closed her eyes and nodded fervently. Thorgar left the blade there for a moment, looking up and around the battlefield so all of the cobold ranks could see his face. With a grunt he lifted the axe and kicked Burgoth to all fours. “Leave!”
That was all it took for Thorgar and his Guardians of Light to expel the cobold horde from Ul’kor. Burgoth scrambled to retreat, never even stopping to look back, and her army of fiendish monsters followed hot on her heels. The gnome warriors watched silently as their mortal enemies fled their land once and for all, knowing their task had finally been completed.
One last time, King Thorgar turned to face his castle. Ohm’s radiance was fading, and his body was already growing older as the magic slipped away.
He was not upset. After all those long years stuck in the slowed time of the barrier, he was ready for true rest.
From the Arborium windows, he could see the companions watching him and raised his axe to them in honor. Then he turned his fading smile to Broxlin, his brother in arms, who stood on the other side of the broken gates to Castle Ul’kor.
“I will miss you, old friend,” Thorgar said. “Good speed.”
The gnome king dropped to his knees as his body, like those of the proud gnome army around him, withered to glittering dust and floated away on the gentle breeze.
Chapter 27
“What will you do now?” Broxlin asked Bipp as the gnome engineer-turned-adventurer tightened the buckles on his pack.
It had been several days since the Final Stand at Ul’kor, and the companions used that time to mend their wounds. Isaac meditated for two days straight before speaking again. When he rose from that deep trance, Broxlin thought the mage stood a little taller and that the swirling fires of his eyes burned a little brighter.
Nero used the time to repair his shattered leg, mending it so that all that remained of its break were the surface cracks and chips.
Logan, Bipp, and Corbin alike were still healing from serious injuries, but they were in far better shape now and ached to get back to the open road. Bipp felt his head was clearer, and his body only ached with a dull throb from the Necromancer’s dark assault.
“We’ll stop at Dudje,” Corbin said, “just to confirm what they must already be guessing by now. When the Necromancer’s curse was lifted, we all felt it, and I’m betting Mayor Fimbas did too.”
“Do you really think they’ll come back here?” Broxlin asked. His anxiousness showed, and Bipp strode over to set a bandaged hand on the noble general’s shoulder.
“There’s no way Mayor Fimbas would not send our people here to rebuild the great city Ul’kor,” Bipp said. “Not now that the darkness has been lifted.”
Broxlin frowned and cast his one good eye to his feet. “I miss me king. Why didn’t Ohm take me with them?”
Broxlin had awoken to the sound of battle outside the castle. At first he was terrified, seeing that none of his kin remained in the castle hall. But then a song guided him to the gates, where he saw King Thorgar and the rest of the Guardians of Light taking their last breaths on this plane. Bipp could only imagine what torment Broxlin must be going through, to be the last of his time left alive.
Bipp’s warm smile seemed to display newfound wisdom. “Only he knows.”
Broxlin nodded and forced a look of contentment onto his face.
“Perhaps he wanted you here to guide the gnomes as they rebuild this place,” Logan said.
“Aye,” Broxlin agreed, “and judging by the looks of Bipp’s weaponry, I think that might be accurate.”
The companions shared laughter with the one-eyed general. It was good to see him displaying some modicum of joy.
Broxlin walked with them to the edge of the castle gates and no further. “And you, Corbin Walker, what will you do now?”
Corbin produced the Shadow Stone from a pouch he kept tied around his neck. Where it had been large enough to fill his hand before, it now seemed half that size. “We have the power now to return to Fal and free our people from Baetylus.”
“Are you sure it’s wise to be meddling with that thing?” Broxlin asked.
“The Necromancer used the Shadow Stone to gain power. We have no such desires,” Corbin said. “Isaac and I will figure out how to harness its power only to complete our task. Once it is done, we’ll find a way to seal it away forever, so no other puppets of the Shadow Lord can get their hands on it.”
Broxlin bowed with doubt lingering in his heart. The Falians’ course seemed pure enough, but he could not help worry what would become of them, wielding such a dangerous implement of the shadow realm. “Then I say good road to you, friends. I hope it is long and winding, ever filled with battle and treasures.”
Logan snorted at the gnome’s idea of good will and bowed low, as they all did, before turning for the open road, ready to return at last to the Kingdom of New Fal.
Epilogue
Across a vast distance, many leagues over hill and through tunnel, Baetylus, the Great Crystal floating above the Kingdom of New Fal, roused from his brooding.
A spark of light caught his attention, somewhere in the periphery. His wandering eye gazed across the lands of Vanidriell, searching for the source of the disturbance.
When it finally rested on the ruins of Ul’kor and the horde of cobolds outside Castle Ul’kor, he paused.
“Now what could have the little rodents so riled up?”
Baetylus ex
amined the scene, his gaze focusing on one image. He quaked and pulsated, roiling with unbridled rage at seeing Corbin Walker standing at the precipice of the Arborium, watching the army of blessed gnomes tearing down the cobold forces. He sent his mind reeling back to the cavern of Fal, gestating that fury until it festered into a simmering rage. There was no use working with an unclear mind. Not when that was all he was or possessed.
Baetylus’s wandering eye worked over the white walls of Fal, searching for the sleeping mind of Magistrate Fafnir. He penetrated the old man’s dreams and cast them aside so that Fafnir stood before him, naked and meek, shivering in the cold halls of his own mind.
“M-milord?” Fafnir trembled. “What miraculous event honors me with your presence?”
“Elise Ivarone is secure in your grasp?”
“Yes, of course milord. Why?”
“She will be useful in what is to come.” Baetylus coiled around the feeble man, who himself struck fear in the residents of Fal. “Prepare yourself, Fafnir. For Corbin Walker is coming home.”
FOLLOW THE ADVENTURES of the Walker Brothers and their companions, in book four of the series, KINGDOM’S FALL, coming Winter 2016.
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D. M. Almond is a figment of your imagination. His works are only the byproduct of a deeply interesting dream you are now having due to consuming an overabundance of pizza before bedtime. Your parents warned you about days like this, but you just didn’t listen. Alas, the pepperoni could not hold its grip upon you and you must now wake up.
