Crooked Finger and the Warl of the Dead

by Rex Hazelton

  Turning its thoughts to the diminutive assailants that feverishly slashed at its giant dragon body, the Evil One considered his foes. The Hammer Bearer and his sons? Hmmm. Yes. The griffin does have the feel of the man who snatched the Prophetess out of my hands back in the Warl of the Dead. As for his sons: I’ve met two of the swordsmen before, though they were not yet fully formed. I smell the fragrance my touch left on their spirits, a scent the other two have less of, though their mother transferred some of it to them as well.

  Shaking its head as it settled the matter, the Evil One concluded: Yes, the four swordsmen are brothers.

  Unhappy that the Hammer Bearer and his sons could diminish its magic with their cuts, the giant, black dragon suddenly whirled about, planning on catching the assailants with its claws, its massive jaws, or with a smashing blow from its powerful tail. As sinewy as its body was, the dragon was able to gyrate in a way that achieved its goal when it batted the swordsmen and griffin with its tail as they flew about. But as hard as it hit them, the attackers weren’t deterred from the task they had undertaken. It was clear, by the dogged determination they displayed, this was going to be a death match. And the longer it went on, the Evil One began to wonder whose death would end the fight: their’s or the one the ancient entity depended on to keep its grip on the Warl of the Living- Ab’Don’s.

  If the Evil One wasn’t careful, the magic it was using to keep the Sorcerer’s body safe could be compromised enough to let the Hammer Bearer and his sons strike the mortal vessel it had taken possession of in a way that would severe the cord that bound the Evil One and Sorcerer together. With the ice dragons having all but taken away the Fires of Darkness efficacy and the surviving Fane J’Shrym continuing to dispatch its horde of wraith warriors, the foul entity realized it was in trouble. Each pang of pain it felt as the griffin and swordsmen continued to cut away at its black skin, told it this. The victory the fiend once was convinced it would gain was no longer a sure thing.

  How is such a thing possible, the Evil One thought? That fire-blasted Vlad’War. I hate him almost as much as I hate the Singer.

  But instead of going after the troublesome wizard to exact revenge on the man’s spirit that had already been decimated by the Fires of Darkness that had touched it- the giant, black dragon shook its body to gain separation from its assailants so it could escape the fight. As big as the beast was, it achieved its goal for the briefest of moments; but that was long enough for it to fold its gigantic wings against its sides and fall toward the ground where the battle continued to rage.

  To say it dove would give the dragon too much credit. Fall is the appropriate word: like one falls off a bridge and into the river below to keep a large cargo wagon from crushing them with its unreasonable width. Yet, the fall that began in desperation turned into a dive that veered toward a gathering of Thrall Giants that encircled a statue of an iron tree they had carried onto the field of battle as the Evil One had the Hag order them to do.

  A slight deployment of its wing tips redirected the dragon’s plummeting body toward the iron tree, the giants, and the Hag that encircled it. Spreading its wings as wide as it could as it reached its goal, the giant, black dragon landed heavily in the space between the iron tree and those who stood nearby. An inadvertent swipe of its tail knocked a portion of the onlookers off their feet as it settled to the ground. Six of these never stood again.

  Once on the ground, the Evil One cast off its dragon form as quickly as it could to become Ab’Don again, knowing the Hammer Bearer and his sons would be in hot pursuit. As expected when the foul entity looked up into the sky, the silvery-gray winged-lion was descending toward it with the four-swordsman riding their griffin mounts close behind him. The rest of the Community of Blood followed, as well as the flock of ice dragons. So few cretchym remained, once the combined forces of griffin and ice dragons dealt a final fatal blow to the swarm, the winged-mutants flew aimlessly through the sky overhead waiting for orders they hoped would never come.

  “Stop!” Not-Ab’Don shouted as he stepped over to the iron tree and reached for the slender iron talisman that protruded from Muriel’s unconscious body. “If you attack. I’ll kill the Prophetess.”

  A thousand Hag ropes looked like fiery snakes worming about between the host of Thrall Giants that stood ready for battle with their huge metal-studded clubs in hand. Two thousand whiteskins backed up the giants with their eyes, all looking like cataracts covered them with a dull film, dutifully locked on their master waiting for the Sorcerer’s command.

  Without the slightest hesitation, the Hammer Bearer and his sons landed inside the ring of Ar Warlers that were determined to destroy them if they did anything to displease their master. Transforming into a human, Jeaf spoke with a loud voice that didn’t have to compete with the thunder that was no longer heard, nor the sound of rain hitting the ground since the downpour ceased when the griffin the Sons of the Storm rode landed beside the Hammer Bearer.

  “If you touch Crooked Finger, you’ll bring the Community of Blood and the ice dragons down upon your head.” Jeaf looked up at his allies that circled overhead.

  “Do you want to negotiate? Is that it?” The Evil One used Ab’Don’s mouth to sneer as his hand reached out for the talisman that was thrust into Muriel’s heart. “Then hear my terms for your surrender.”

  “Negotiation? There’ll be no negotiations. My warning was for the griffin and ice dragons not for me or my sons.”

  With that said, Jeaf stretched out his arm and summoned the Hammer of Power into his hand. Ay’Roan and J’Aryl lifted their swords to channel the lightning the thunderhead dubtifully sent to them at the Hag and giants. Travyn sent the lightning entrusted to him at Not-Ab’Don to keep him from grabbing hold of Crooked Finger before the Hammer of Power made its way into Jeaf’s hand. Remembering being told that the Evil One absorbed lightning without being harmed by it at the time Kaylan escaped from the Hall of Voyd, Travyn aimed the bolt of energy he controlled at the ground Not-Ab’Don stood on. Though the mud it threw up was a nuisance at best, it was enough to distract the Evil One Long enough for the Hammer of Power to reach Jeaf’s hand.

  Moving with super-human speed, Jeaf threw Vlad’War’s Child at the Evil One who was equally as quick to lift a hand to bat the Hammer of Power away.

  While that was happening, Kaylan inexplicably directed a bolt of lightning at the iron tree his unconscious mother hung upon. A thread of energy broke away from the bolt as it struck the tree and found its way into the ring Kaylan’s mother wore on her finger, the one her father had given her at the time of her birth, making the ring’s jewel look like a star sat on the Prophetess’ hand.

  Not giving the Oakenfels time to act, ignoring the lightning’s energy that surrounded the Prophetess hand, the Evil One levitated off the ground and floated over to take hold of Crooked Finger and pull it out of the unconscious body it had been thrust into. To the Evil One’s surprise, the talisman refused to budge. More surprising than that, a woman’s hand wrapped in brilliant light grabbed Not-Ab’Don’s wrist and pulled it away from Crooked Finger. Then the hand took hold of the talisman and pulled it out the heart it had been sheathed in, Muriel Oakenfel’s heart.

  Floating two arm’s length away from the impossible event that just occurred, the Evil One lifted his head- covered with matted clumps of hair that continued to stick out like eagle’s feathers despite the recent rain- and looked into the brownish-red eyes of the Prophetess who showed no signs that she had been unconscious only a moment before. Startled by the gaze that was looking at the monster hidden inside Ab’Don’s body, the Evil One fell to the ground where it had to drop a foot back to keep from stumbling.

  Reaching out, the foul entity summoned a Hag candle, already lit, into its hand as it stepped further away from the transformation that was taking place.

  The bit of lightning that found a home in Muriel’s ring carried more than nature’s unbridled power inside of it. Andara’s and Vlad’War’s inimitable magi
c was carried along on the radiant current Kaylan sent her way as well. Melded together as they were, the whole was greater than the sum of its parts, and much more so, when the powerful blend of wizarding might joined forces with the magic found in the ring Muriel’s father had given her. When that happened, something new was created, something the Evil One had never contended with before, something Kaylan- in an act of intuition bred by his esoteric way of thinking and the desperation he felt- hoped would happen.

  The daughter of warrior-parents, adopted into the Community of Blood whose magic was used to protect the island of Stromane from being invaded by poachers as it once was, the wife of the Hammer Bearer whose magic had gloriously infected her, and the mother of the Sons of the Storm, Muriel was something the Warl had never seen before. She was the Prophetess, a Warrior-Healer who held the key to the Warl of the Dead in her hand, a key the powerful being who ruled over the darkness found there couldn’t apprehend.

  Jeaf, his sons, as well as everyone else stood transfixed by the magic the Prophetess wove as she broke the iron tree down into its basic components. The griffin and ice dragons hovered in place like butterflies paying homage to the most beautiful flower they had never seen.

  While the arbor’s branches turned back into fraethym flame and Bear’s body returned to normal, Muriel controlled the transformation so deftly that she looked like the fraethym were lowering a child into the giant’s waiting hands. Once Bear was cradling the Prophetess like she was the greatest treasure he had ever held, the fiery tree broke apart into individual fraethym that were summoned into their master’s hand and were reshaped into a blazing sword the Evil One planned on using to defend itself with.

  Lowering Muriel to her feet, Bear took hold of the massive metal-studded club he fastened to his belt before he had taken hold of the fiery tree Muriel hung upon back when she traded places with Kaylan. Looking about to get the lay of the land, so to speak, Bear said, “I knew it would comes down to a party none would attends if they didn’t have to.” The giant nodded his head at the Oakenfel brothers before he shouted to Jeaf, “It’s goods to see ya Shorty.”

  “It’s good to see you to, You Ragamuffin Giant.” Jeaf’s subtle smile betrayed the the running joke the two friends shared, a smile that disappeared as quickly as it came.

  Once his own smile disappeared, Bear turned to the Thrall Giants and said, “Ya boys better keeps your paws off Muriel here ifs ya knows what’s good for ya.”

  After witnessing the magic Muriel put on display, none of the Thrall Giants ventured to offer the kind of brusque reply their normally unruly kind would.

  With Crooked Finger in hand, and the light coming from her ring diminishing enough so that all could see her, Muriel stepped towards the Evil One unafraid of the flaming sword and black candle the ancient entity held. “As you’ve already guessed, the talisman is mine now,” Muriel explained. “You made a mistake when you thrust the branch into my heart for the second time. You made that mistake worse when you twisted it about to open a door between the Warl of the Living and the Dead. You of all creatures should know how Blood Magic works: The one who makes the sacrifice controls the magic. And I’m the one who chose to be sacrificed so Kaylan could be set free. All you did was accept my sacrifice. Then when you thrust the talisman back into my heart, it had to submit its power to the one who gave it the blood it required to work its magic. Twice in my heart and once in Kaylan’s, who sacrificed himself so his brother could escape the Hall of Voyd, the talisman is bound to my family and will do our bidding. And what do you think that bidding might be? You do have a heart don’t you, or something vital that sits at the center of your being? I’d like to use the talisman to find out exactly what’s there. And once I do, I think I’ll leave Crooked Finger, isn’t that what people are calling it, stuck in whatever I find.”

  Once Muriel took another step toward the Evil One, the foul entity felt panic for the first time since doom befell the empire it had ruled over in a Warl of the Living in an age lost to antiquity. The Prophetess had already done something it couldn’t do by opening a door between the Warl of the Living and the Dead. Now that she had taken control of Crooked Finger, what else could she do? Could she turn the Fires of Darkness against him? Would the wraith warriors be forced to obey her? Could she actually ram that fire-blasted talisman into its being and take control of its essence like the Evil One had once controlled hers?

  Summoning the fraethym after it took another step away from the woman who came at it with the troubling slender, iron branch in hand and the giant guarding her back, the Evil One decided to push all of its coins to the center of the table. First, the Lord of the Darkness Covering Half of the Warl of the Dead pulled on the black candle it held in its hand like it was a fishing pole used to hook a catch and summoned the all of the flames sitting on the Hag’s black candles to itself. Hundreds of fiery ropes snaked through the air before slithering into the Evil One’s single flame like it was a bright hole leading to a serpent’s den.

  The Hag quickly spoke Words of Power and relit their candles whose flames were summarily snatched from their perches and drawn to the Evil One’s own black talisman once again.

  With all the magic that was flying about, Jeaf and his family had their hands full staying out of harms way for the time being until they could figure out the strategy the fiend was employing. When the light went out in the whiteskins’ cataract-covered eyes a moment before they collapsed to the ground behind the ring of Hag and Thrall Giants, it became apparent what the Evil One was doing: amassing supernatural power by retrieving the magic used to cast the Spell of the White Hand on those who had been turned into whiteskins. For what? Who knew?

  The Lord of Regret had done a similar thing during the Battle of Decision. Those Koyer had cast the Spell of the White Hand on hit the ground like thousands of sacks of grain had slid off the saddles that held them. The whiteskins didn’t utter a complaint as they fell. Drained of the magic that once animated them by their master who was glutting himself with power, the whiteskins were just as lifeless as the sacks that held the grain. Ten thousand whiteskins were sacrificed that day to help Koyer get ready to fight the Hammer Bearer. Fifteen times that number was being sacrificed to empower the Evil One to fight the Hammer Bearer today; more than one hundred and fifty thousand in total across Ar Warl’s expanse.

  Koyer sacrificed his White Guard to gain greater speed and strength. What the Evil One’s game plan was would soon be seen.

  ****

  Hidden by rocks that jutted out of the steep gorge the Bridgewater villagers used to evade those pursuing them, Findyl lay beside Jayk, Bowdyn and Peyt, watching to see if the whiteskins and wraiths who had been following them would be tricked by the magic the wizard used to cover their tracks.

  After meeting with Petyr and Cloy’s spirits, Findyl was successful in gathering those from Bridgewater’s militia who escaped the army they were forced to be a part of. Jayk, Red, Peyt, Barty, Scoup, Tagle and Rufyk were the first his Powers of Intuition led him to. Later, others were included. The whiteskins who had been in charge of the village of Bridgewater, Gasyn and Trotts sudden appearance made them fear for their family’s safety as well. Like Jayk, they devised plans to get themselves out of the warrior camp, so they could go to their families.

  One in two of those who tried to escape were successful. Because the attention the desertions was drawing intensified, the odds of success for those who were first to go were better than those that followed. With the help of additional cretchym that were sent to assist Gasyn and Trott, the two whiteskins were responsible for catching the deserters who failed to escape. Once those caught returned to the camp as whiteskins, the desertions all but stopped.

  Using every trick he had hidden away in the large pouch he carried with him, Findyl worked tirelessly to keep the villagers from being caught. His affection for Bowdyn, who was born in Bridgewater, motivated him to use his powers to hide its citizens when there had to be others fleeing from villages
all across Ar Warl, since the plague of the Spell of the White Hand touched them all in a way that let them know it was never going away.

  The bracelets that he and Jayk used to lead the wraiths away from them when they went to save Peyt from those who were determined to make him a whiteskin were used on numerous occasions to confuse wraith scouts who were looking for them. Findyl used the magic of the blue stones he carried to drive off Lorn Fast demons when contact was unavoidable.

  Findyl had used both the bracelets’ and the blue stones’ magic to keep the hunters away from the gorge. A dozen phantoms were brought to life using the bracelets and sent running off into the greenwood covering the Thrall Mountains’ southern slopes in an attempt to misdirect their pursuers. The blue stones had been set into the trunks of trees that stood just inside the gorges mouth in hopes their magic would give off a sensation that was so repugnant to the trackers that they would avoid making contact with it.

  Unfortunately, the company of whiteskins that had recently joined them kept this from happening, since the bloodless monsters, who were not affected by the stones’ magic like the wraiths were, kept them from being herded away from the gorge. In fact, the repulsive magic piqued the bloodless-ones’ interest in a way that made them want to uncover the mystery of its origins.

  There were things other than the villagers they had been told to be on the lookout for, like the use of magic that couldn’t be accounted for. Ab’Don had made such things unlawful. The Evil One’s position on the matter was no different. Neither would tolerate the ambitions of magickers who were not under their direct control.

  Though the trackers were no longer focused on finding the unruly villagers for the time being, they were, nevertheless, leading the rest of the wraiths and the company of whiteskins straight for them. With this noted, Jayk ordered the women and children to climb higher into the gorge to gain separation from the place where the fighting would take place. If they were lucky enough, maybe killing or capturing the men and women who stayed behind to do battle with them would satisfy their pursuers desire to punish the rellious villagers. Then the chase would be discontinued so they could escort their captives back to the prison Bridgewater had become.