The Lost Prince (legends of Ansu Book 3)

by J. W. Webb

  The creature’s hide blocked what little light remained. It loomed over them, close enough to fry them all. Instead the Ty-Tander raised its horny head and bellowed rage again. The roar deafened them; again shaking the ravine, and again spilling more rocks from the scree above. As one they covered their heads and ears. Burnt or crushed seemed the only outcome. Not a happy scenario.

  “Back!” yelled Zallerak. “We’ve no chance stuck here!” The bard beckoned frantically then turned, stumbled over fallen rocks back down the ravine in a windmill of swaying arms and billowing cloak. In seconds he was gone from sight.

  Corin spat in the fleeing bard’s direction. Again he turned to face the horror.

  “Come on, beastie, we’re not all craven here. I’m going to poke your scaly arse with steel!” The Ty-Tander’s roaring had ceased. Instead it drooled silver slobber over the inert body of Tamersane. Its eyes hovered like baleful lamps above the prone Kelwynian. It lowered a hooked hoof, commenced dragging Tamersane across the broken ground. Still he didn’t stir.

  Then slowly it lowered its three horns.

  Tamersane chose that moment to open his eyes. It wasn’t his finest decision. His jaw dropped as he stared petrified at the brute looming and stinking like decaying gallows feed just above him. He reached along for his sword but his fingers were slippery with blood. He couldn’t grip the hilt properly. He tried again.

  Down came the horns…

  ***

  Corin saw those horns spear down, witnessed Tamersane roll free by a whisker. Again they jabbed. Again he rolled. The monster was still playing, it seemed—too idle to summon its ruinous fire.

  But Corin wasn’t playing. He wasn’t idle—not today. He had enough attitude to bite the beast’s fucking head off but lacked the molars. He levelled Clouter, yelled and then launched himself like a human missile at the monstrosity gloating and dribbling over Tamersane.

  Whack…thud and groan. Corin’s shoulder rammed into its ridged flank as a fly might bounce off glass, after striking that iron-hard hide with Clouter’s length.

  The blade clanged and wobbled in his grasp. Pain ran up Corin’s arm, but he swung again and once more Clouter bounced off the dazzling scales surrounding the beast’s horny face. This time his whole body quivered with recoil and Clouter rang like a holy bell. Corin clung to the hilt with both hands in desperation, gripped the rocky ground with his feet and made to swing again.

  This one will hurt.

  The monster, faintly distracted, turned its ponderous head in his direction and rewarded Corin with the full malice of its fiery four-eyed glare. Tamersane found that an opportune moment to roll over again and slip behind a rock. Once there he lost consciousness again.

  The Ty-Tander’s alien gaze fell on Corin. Those amber orbs were alight with contempt for this miserable bug daring to confront it. Never had it known such reckless valiance. But Corin felt his courage ebb rapidly as the full weight of that baleful stare fell upon him. Despite that fear he swung the blade—this time at the nearest horn.

  Corin’s stroke went wide, the beast having jerked its head back suddenly. Looking across, he saw Ulani’s short spear clatter free of the monster’s flank. Corin watched Ulani reach for another shaft and step defiant into the creature’s path.

  Behind the king, Bleyne (who had been waiting for his chance) held bow ready, seeking a clear shot at one of the beast’s eyes. Of Zallerak there was no sign or sound. Gone. Corin cursed the bard for deserting them in their moment of need.

  He raised Clouter again…

  The Ty-Tander bellowed and roared. Seldom had mere mortals given it such trouble. This game had proved distracting but it was time to set a fire in their flesh.

  An arrow pinged off its hide. The monster turned its head, nostrils flaring wide and launched a streak of amber fire that sent Bleyne whirling out of reach.

  The Ty-Tander ignored Ulani’s second spear. Instead it struck out at Corin with a barbed forehoof. Scarcely quick enough, Corin vaulted aside. Wild-eyed, he hacked at the leathery underside of the beast’s foreleg. There were fewer scales here, bridged by small gaps of hoary foul smelling skin.

  If I can puncture one of those.

  He gripped Clouter hand over hand and stabbed hard at one such gap. The monster yammered as Corin’s sword found entry, albeit shallow. Dark liquid oozed. It scorched the ground below.

  In sudden rage the creature lashed out, incensed this fly had pierced its armour. Forcing its entire bulk through the cleft, the beast tore down upon Corin an Fol intent on tearing him apart.

  Corin dived for cover, the enraged beast close behind. Just then Tamersane (thankfully conscious again) rolled out from behind his rock with a yell. He stabbed up at the monster’s nearest hind leg with a great two-handed thrust.

  Again the beast was gored but only slightly. Roaring indignation more than pain, the Ty-Tander turned towards the blond warrior, summoned its fire and then bellowed like thunder again. But then the beast’s roar changed key, rising to a searing wail of agony and outrage. Bleyne’s next arrow had pierced an amber eye.

  A dreadful wrath filled the monster. A hideous hate. Its hide blazed crimson fury and dark gooey ooze trickled from the pierced orb, Bleyne’s slender shaft still showing like a needle in the iris. The Ty-Tander turned its full attention on the archer with nostrils flaring wide. Bleyne ran. The spout of flame tunnelled after him. Nothing could survive that. Trees crackled and hissed. Smoke filled the ravine. Bleyne the archer had vanished from view…

  ***

  Corin still gripped his longsword in sweating palms. The Ty-Tander in its pain had momentarily forgotten him. Corin rolled beneath the monster’s bulk, stabbing up towards the creature’s belly but to little avail. Corin tried again but a hoof the size of an anvil (and just as hard) struck him square in the shoulder. That crunching impact lifted Corin from his feet, and sent him cartwheeling skyward, before sprawling onto the rocky ground with a painful thud. Corin’s head whirled like a chariot wheel and his badly bruised side screamed at him. Despite that his body remained more or less intact. He felt sick and giddy but clung onto Clouter like a life raft.

  Shaky, Corin stood up but his strength failed him, his legs trembled and he sank to his knees, still gripping Clouter. Stubbornly he raised his longsword a final time as the monster’s bulk loomed over him again. Then somewhere behind him Corin heard Tamersane curse. Dazed and nauseous, Corin turned his head witnessing the Kelwynian hack at the beast’s tree-thick tail with his blade. Some hope. Impossibly quick for so huge a creature, the monster spun round, striking the fair-haired warrior with the iron hard side of a horn, sending him spinning.

  And Tamersane lost consciousness a third time…

  King Ulani strode forth. Boldly he confronted the Ty-Tander alone, his left hand flicking out with wickedly curved tulwar, whilst his right made ready with a golden-headed cudgel.

  “Come on, demon breath—meet the king who will wreak your ruin! I am Ulani of the Baha!” Ulani dived forward, struck the beast’s nearest horn with his tulwar. That was a mighty blow, the tusk was severed an inch from the monster’s scaly crown and sent through the air like a juggler’s baton.

  The Guardian bellowed in outrage. It kicked and stamped down at Ulani with an anvil hoof, seeking to crush him to pulp. The king jumped aside, the horn missing his right ear by an inch.

  Ulani struck out fast with the blade, severing the sinew behind the beast’s left hind leg. The Ty-Tander roared in pain as the leg buckled beneath it. Ulani raised the tulwar again and closed in for the kill.

  But the Ty-Tander was quicker. It had only feinted the buckled leg. Down on the king it pounced with cat’s speed, catching Ulani off guard, sweeping the king aside with a thunderous blow from one of its remaining horns.

  Thud—crunch. Ulani was knocked from his feet and sent flying. His face sprayed scarlet drops across the ravine, and his body crumpled on the stony ground with a hollow thud. He lay there lifeless and bleeding. The monster loomed close, i
ts gaping maw revealing triple rows of filed crystal teeth. Its tongue forked like a snake’s. Cobra-swift, that tongue danced out to lick the dripping blood off Ulani’s battered face…

  Corin shook life into his rattling bones. Somehow, he’d regained his feet again and with a great yell launched Clouter spear-like at the monster’s ravaged face. The sharp steel cut into Corin’s palms as he hurled the longsword but Corin didn’t notice.

  Clouter flew true—pierced another eye. The Ty-Tander roared in frenzy. The beast tore down upon Corin—twenty tons of dripping ooze and gleaming, rending fang. Corin reached down to his boot, gripped a throwing knife as the monster reared above him. He fumbled Biter free from its scabbard. He thought of Shallan—of Finnehalle. Queen Ariane, Barin; Cale and Galed. What a way to die.

  Vervandi, Huntsman, anyone—help me now!

  The monster’s head was lowering upon him, the breath choking Corin and making him retch. Corin coughed as a barbed hoof thudded into his neck. Almost tenderly the creature lifted him up towards its horrible gaping jaws. Straining to breathe before blackness consumed him, Corin stabbed Biter up in a final act of defiance.

  Eat this, fucker!

  ***

  “Stop!”

  The command echoed as dusk darkened to blackest night. The monster turned its head toward the voice. What new intruder was this?

  Out of the corner of his squinting eye Corin saw that a tall shining figure had entered the ravine and stood defiantly facing the monster. The beast, sensing a new challenge, turned its attention towards this new adversary and unceremoniously dropped its prey.

  Corin pitched to the rubble a mass of aches, saved only by his mail shirt from any broken bones. Forgotten for the moment, Corin wriggled free of the monster’s range and staggered giddily to his feet. Ahead a new scene was unfolding. Corin gazed in amazement at the sapphire-blue aura radiating out from the newcomer and filling the night. Then he recognised him.

  Zallerak. Of course. But a different Zallerak. Gone was the pompous bard, the elusive, evasive enchanter that so irritated him. Here was no wily warlock.

  Instead confronting the Ty-Tander was a being of power and majesty, radiating blue light with eyes terrible and cold.

  Corin remembered when he had first seen the wizard change form in the Assassin’s castle. This time was different. This time Zallerak was clothed in gold from head to foot. A dazzling radiance of blue and gold emanated out from his form.

  Over nine feet tall, Zallerak’s eyes blazed golden fury, challenging and entrancing his foe. The long hair framing his ageless face was no longer silver, but rather shone with the brightness of the sun. That glare stung Corin’s eyes, lighting up the rocky ravine and chasing shadows back behind rocks.

  The Ty-Tander watched in deadly calm, its canny mind calculating and probing, reaching back into days long past. At last it identified this new challenger as coming from that earlier time.

  Inside the beast’s cold mind a seed of fear germinated. This enchanter was the source of the doubt that had awakened it from long slumber. The Guardian had sensed an old adversary had returned to challenge it. But who—and why?

  Soon after the Ty-Tander had scented the mortals approaching across the desert, daring its domain—the first in so many years—its curiosity and cold fury had awakened, together with a terrible hunger rising up from within. Hunger so great only an immortal creature could sustain it.

  Telcanna’s guardian had watched and waited with growing anticipation for the intruders to approach. For not only was the Ty-Tander hungry, it was bored. But with the intruders came the feeling of doubt. A challenge from the past. Small wonder these mortals had proved hard to kill when one such assisted them from behind.

  Now that mystery was solved. The guardian knew who confronted it. Here stood a great lord of that austere race vanished millennia past. A proud stern people the Ty-Tander and its long dead kin had scattered, chased and torn, limb from limb, until the surrounding desert became copper-stained with their arrogant blood.

  The Golden Ones.

  Thieves and plunderers, they had all but destroyed themselves in their apocalyptic war against their brethren. But now one at least had returned. The guardian had grown lazy. Never before had any creature touched its flesh as had these feeble men. These mortals had shown remarkable resilience. The wounds were a nuisance but they’d heal in time—even the eyes would grow back.

  The Ty-Tander was invincible. But the beast remembered doubt and pain, sensations it had all but forgotten since the days of the Golden Race. They too had purged its skin. They too had had their little victory, then its flames had sent them to darkest Yffarn beneath that spewing mountain.

  These mortal warriors would be broken then glazed with crystal to grace the desert like those before. But this newcomer wasn’t just a golden one, but a sorcerer of old. The creature recalled a name of power, but names meant little to the guardian, a creature who in its glory days had defied the High Gods and caused even them to fret. Time to solve this riddle.

  The Ty-Tander glared across at this adversary with its two remaining amber-fuelled eyes. The impostor warlock stood with palm raised out. The beast could smell the old hatred radiating outwards from the tall figure standing imperious just yards away.

  The Ty-Tander channelled its rage and hatred. The pain of its torn and punctured flesh, the outrage of how that could have happened. Had it grown weak? Was it becoming old?

  No. Such words had no meaning. The Ty-Tander was forever. The Guardian felt its belly surge with freshly summoned fire. A colossus of hide and crystal, it bore down upon the warlock.

  BURN!

  The flame surged through the monster’s loins and up through the cavern of its throat. The air crackled and a great spout of flame engulfed the golden-blue aura of the wizard.

  ***

  “Ice!”

  Even as he heard Zallerak’s command, Corin felt sudden chill enter the ravine and freeze the fiery blast of the monster. His head rocked, the ground heaved, and above the sheer cut of the cleft spewed stone, broken roots and loose detritus. The air crackled with fusion—raw untapped power.

  Corin covered his ears as lightning smote the narrow canyon; the dead trees were torn from their roots, their fire consumed by freezing rain. Clouds rushed overhead. Weird shapes of blacker black, blanketing the stars, spilling great lumps of hail onto the desert floor. Bitter cold seeped into the ravine, quenching the monster’s fire, freezing his dreadful breath.

  Corin shivered. He watched in jaw-gaping awe, witnessing Zallerak step out from beneath the monster’s last fire blast unscathed and unaffected. Corin could see that the enchanter now wore a golden circlet around his head. He looked younger, the sapphire cloak shimmering, half revealing symbols that meant nothing to Corin. In one hand he gripped his golden harp, whilst the other was raised palm forward toward his monstrous foe.

  A grunt and groan close by. Corin was relieved to see that Ulani still lived. Cold chiselled deep into the ravine, stopping the monster in his tracks. It deepened in intensity, its bitter damp penetrating then splitting the dry rocks strewn haphazard in the gully.

  Zallerak strode forward. His aura shifting between ice blue/white and gold, and his countenance stern. Zallerak now gripped his spear in his right hand, whilst the long fingers of his left worked a cunning dance along the harp strings. Alien, weird music entered the valley, growing in resonance until it drowned out the furious sound of the hastening storm clouds above. The monster loomed over him, snarling, reeking, the size of a house. Once again Zallerak spoke his incantation.

  “Ice!”

  This time a frozen lightning spear scorched the monster’s hide like a meteor bolt. The Ty-Tander reared up in shocked pain before retaliating in fury by vomiting another jet of flame directly at its foe.

  And so the battle commenced.

  “Ice!” commanded Zallerak again, once more stepping out unhurt from beneath the beast’s blazing funnel. Gone were harp and crystal spear. This
time the wizard clutched a glowing, ice blue javelin in either hand. He cast them at the two remaining eyes of the monster.

  But the beast leapt backwards and funnelled flame, filling the ravine with crackling fire. Zallerak quenched the blaze with his icy bolts. Each time he hurled a shaft another appeared fresh in his hand.

  Again and again he hurled his frozen missiles at the raging Ty-Tander. The monster responded with surging fire, roaring its hatred, spraying the rocks about with searing flame. Corin cowered in front of Ulani’s prone form, trying to protect both himself and his friend from the terrible blasts. To his right he noticed Tamersane had once again regained his senses just enough to hastily seek shelter beneath a large rock. Of Bleyne the archer there was still no sign.

  Pain pummelled Corin’s body. His skin tingled as if an entire army of soldier ants were patrolling the length of his spine. His head pounded like a demon’s gong; the terrible flames scorching his skin and smouldering his leather tunic. Adding to all that Zallerak’s paradoxical cold clung to his steel shirt, freezing his sweat and snot and chilling him to the marrow.

  I’ll not lie here like a scolded whippet.

  Corin leaned forward, retched on the floor and then squinted up at the continuing violence with morbid fascination. Corin had had better days but this was proving an encounter not to be missed. He willed aside his various woes and focussed on the conflict taking place scarce yards away. He saw that Ulani was watching goggle-eyed too, his own pain just under control. A sorry state—both of them barely managing to hang on to consciousness, but captivated as the titanic battle raged through the ravine.

  Fire verses Ice: searing heat and numbing cold. Old adversaries free to do battle.

  Zallerak’s face was changing again. Gone were golden hue, and cool blue aura. Instead the enchanter paled to deathly white. His long hair flowing like freshly settled snow all around his face. The hands were blue/white with cold, the long fingers replaced with talons of ice.