The two men stood up and one began sawing the dead dog’s head off, much as they did the ghoul-kind they fought at the Keep of the stonecutters. The other winced as he tucked his broken arm into his jacket and put his sword in his other hand; sweat mixed with tears on his grimy face.
Bel and Kerlith spun and leapt to Kephas’ aid as another dog dove toward him. The soldier parried with his sword, quickly slicing off one of the beast’s legs, it landing behind him, the dog whimpering for a moment then snarling with rage. Bel blasted the hound into the air and down the mountain.
The old mage looked back at him and frowned, quickly saying, “Not so hard! Don’t use so much energy!”
Three dogs bounded up the mountain at them from the front. Nes’egrinon touched his staff on the back of a large boulder, light slithering out of the end of his stick of mage-wood and spreading into the large rock threadlike, spiraling across the hard surface in small ringlets of power and light. The boulder struggled to move from its perch, then rolled slowly, then more quickly, gaining speed, tumbling down the mountain, hitting others on the way, creating a small landslide, unavoidable by the approaching dogs. The animals tried to dodge but were pulled under the bouncing rocks.
The band looked about, here and there for others but the silence told them that they were all gone. Kerlith smiled and said, “Was that stone magic, Master Archmage?”
“My hand never left my staff. I am a mage of the wood, not a heretic like Rylith who attempts to control all life,” he said shortly, clearly not liking the boy’s questioning attitude.
Alexius said, “Report! Are any injured?”
The soldier who was bitten heaved, saying, “I am sorry, my commander. The hound got my good arm. I can still fight though.” But everyone knew that he lied. He would not last long at all. His blood was everywhere.
Alexius gingerly slid the man’s arm out to see a mangled, bloody and broken piece of flesh, skin torn to ribbons, fibers and bone fragments exposed below. He said out loud, refusing to look the man in the eyes just yet, “Master Archmage, can you do anything?”
“I can. I can dull the pain. But that is about it right now. In this place.”
“Do it! Do it, please!” the man said, suddenly nearly in tears as he looked down at his arm.
Alexius slid the arm back into the man’s shirt then tied a piece of cloth to support its weight as Nes’egrinon placed his hand on the man’s head and pushed from deep within himself. The man exhaled slowly as relief poured into him.
The band did not speak as they began to descend the mountain, all somehow knowing that they shared a common fate with the man whose arm was destroyed. They trudged down for a time, going long past when they would have stopped for a few moments to take in some dry crusts or seasoned meats but they had no supplies left, not even water, so they continued on without stopping, all of their mouths growing more and more parched.
As they carefully stepped from stone to stone and rock to rock, Bel felt his mind drawn to the battle with the dogs. Kerlith and I used the same magic yet his seemed so much stronger. I know we are in the land of the stonecutters and his magic should be a bit more effective, but it was much more than that. I wish I had not gotten stuck in Lasaat for that sixth year. A mix of jealousy and resentment grabbed Bel’s heart. He did not flee from the responsibility of the challenge that trapped him in Lasaat and prevented him from moving on, but he also recognized Kerlith’s guilt. And now the one partially to blame for his setback had gained a year of private instruction, a year that Bel did not have, and it appeared that Kerlith’s magic was far more refined than his. Maybe I am only a Fifth Year, Bel thought, suddenly despising himself.
“Fifth Year,” Nes’egrinon’s voice rang out in the black, shaking Bel from his thoughts, “guard your mind. Kerlith, you too. Something is close. Something is here, trying to invade our thoughts. Do you feel it?”
Kerlith choked, “I feel it.”
When Bel did not immediately respond, the old man said, “Fifth Year, what were you thinking?”
“I… nothing.”
“Listen. Do not trust your thoughts right now if they would divide us. Do not listen to the enemy. He is here, somewhere, among us.”
“Yes, Master,” Bel replied but something gnawed at him in his thoughts. Whatever the source of these thoughts does not matter, Bel pondered, even if they are from the enemy, they are still true. My magic is weak. I’m just a Fifth Year. What am I even doing here? I am going to get myself killed. I am going to get some of these men killed. I can’t do this! I shouldn’t be here!
Nes’egrinon stopped, holding his hand high. “Wait,” he said. They all looked about, straining their ears but all was black and silent, all except the faraway groan of a dead dog’s head, severed from its body, that they left back high up on the mountain, in what now seemed like ages ago. “Something. Something is here.”
A tear streamed down Bel’s cheeks as he squealed, “I can’t do this! I can’t! I’m only a Fifth Year!” then crumbled to the floor, his short staff falling to the ground in front of him.
Nes’egrinon dashed over to him, “No! Get him out of your head! Fight it! Fight! You can do it, boy!”
Bel refused to look up, blubbering, “You’re lying! Just like you did before. He told me! He told me you would!”
“Who?” said Kerlith, “Who are you talking about?” His voice trembled.
Bel looked up at Kerlith, suddenly feeling tremendously inferior to him, “My Master has had only two apprentices before me. He killed them both. Everyone knows it!”
Nes’egrinon’s face grew dark. Bel continued, now looking at his master full in the face, “He came to me. One of them. He told me. He told me that you lied to him! He told me what you did! You got him killed!”
“No…” the old mage said, stumbling back a few steps.
Bel’s accusations grew stronger, “He told me and I saw it! I saw his arm. It was blown clean off! Just a burnt stump where a boy’s arm should have been. And he was so young! How long did you teach him before he died? He was younger than me! And now I am fresh out of school and you are so quickly leading me to my death? And all of us too?”
Kerlith and the soldiers looked at the panic on Nes’egrinon’s face then at the pain on Bel’s, then at the ground and away. None of them could stand to look at it. Reality; it was reality; it was the reality that they could not last more than another half day or so. And for what? They followed an old wizard with no plan and with no clue what they were even up against. They did not have enough supplies. They were ill prepared and ill advised. It was a doomed mission from the start. One of the soldiers began to mutter to Kephas. He wanted to leave. He suddenly wanted to leave right now, to run, right now. Despair and anguish hung thick in the air.
The man with the broken arm began to sob loudly then howled, “We’re all going to die! Now! Now! Death is upon us! We are going to die now!”
“Quiet soldier! Grab a hold of yourself!” Alexius huffed, but it was no use; he felt it too. He was the chief of guards and he had left his post to die in the black. He didn’t belong here. He belonged at the Keep, where he could do some good, where he could lead his men to victory against the ghoul-kind, where he could protect his people. He had abandoned his people. Out here, he was a dead man walking. He didn’t belong here and he wanted to run and run and run. He wanted to flee from this place with all of his might. He was afraid.
Kerlith howled out in pain, “It was all my fault! My master is dead! I should have stopped them! I should have cast the love spell but I didn’t and now he is dead! Then I left him there like old trash to wander in the black! I don’t deserve to live!”
The soldiers began beating their breasts and crying loudly for they had left their children fatherless and their wives would soon be widows. One tore at his clothing and another ran in circles screaming. Alexius threw down his sword and howled, “I am not fit to lead! I am a failure!”
“Stop.” Nes’egrinon squeezed his eyes down
tight. “Stop. Stop. Stop! STOP!” The old mage lifted his staff high and desperately pushed bright light into it not knowing what else to do, “
The sky lit up brightly in hazy greens and blues, shining full of unnatural mage-light and about ten paces away stood a small, frail boy, staring at them, grinning intently, his ragged, dirty and torn clothing the color of a urine-stained sun, a short mage-wood staff in one hand and a blood caked flask hanging from his shoulder, a young child of a man, a boy with only one arm, grinning wildly.
Chapter 14
Fleck
“How did you like my dogs? I’ve been training them for some time,” The one-armed boy said.
The band slowly walked towards the boy, fanning out in a sort of arc around him, the soldiers with their swords nervously drawn, each realizing that the boy was somehow in their minds. As the mage-light overhead began to fade, Kerlith wiped his face then called light into the surrounding stones, the tiny chips of crystal and quartz in each of the rocks glowing brightly, casting a dim light up from the ground at the boy’s face. The one-armed boy turned as they approached, keeping his stump of a missing arm behind him.
“What have you done, Fleck? Why?” Nes’egrinon asked.
“Fleck? Hmmn. Yes, that was my name wasn’t it? I had forgotten. How long have I been dead? Looking at the age on your face it must have been at least thirty years. We have no time in the underworld, you know. One day or one hundred, it is all the same. It feels as if it is one continuous moment. But fortunately for me I had my dogs. And I trained them. You didn’t tell me. How did you like them?”
The band was a short distance from the boy and they halted their approach. They each tried to shake the feeling that still grabbed them: fear, dread, the desire to run away, far, far away from this place. The feeling was still there and even though they each knew that it was a false feeling, a sensation pushed into their minds by the dead wizard, it felt no less real than any other feeling that they had ever had. It was difficult to overcome. The old man continued to address him. “Fleck. You are insane, aren’t you? Why did you set the dogs upon us?”
“Why? Why not? All of you will soon be dead anyway. What does a few more moments of life for you or your men matter to me? Anyway, these others I have no quarrel with. I just wanted to see how my dogs would do.”
“And me? You have a quarrel with me then.”
The boy suddenly hissed, “You know I do!” He pulled his head back and smiled mischievously then drank from his flask and wiped his bloody mouth.
The mage looked over at Kerlith and Bel and nodded then continued speaking, “Listen son, I am sorry for what happened. You know that I am. I labored over your death for years. How many years has it been you asked? Yes, thirty, perhaps more than thirty, and only now have I taken on a new apprentice. In the moment of your death I would have traded places with you in an instant. But who can cheat death?”
Bel and Kerlith continued to move slowly, inching behind the boy. Bel shook his head a few times; he was so dizzy, tired and worn out; the fight with the dogs took more out of him than he had realized.
The boy smiled again. “No one can cheat death. Enough of these words, we will have much time to talk when you join me here in the underworld. All of you who surround me, leave this fight. It is between the two of us alone. If you would value your lives you will stay out of my way.” He took one more swig from his flask, a shudder passed through him and the hairs on his head began to glow brightly, greens and blues emanating from each hair like glowing tendrils waving in the air.
The old mage sounded suddenly desperate. “Fleck, please. Leave off from this madness. You were my apprentice and I am sorry that you died but if you challenge me I will have to destroy you.”
“Destroy me? You cannot harm me. You cannot kill me. I’m already dead, remember?” The boy pointed his staff at the old man and squeezed. A large ball of light erupted from the end of it and arced out toward the old man who quickly lifted up his own staff sideways. The round orb of light struck the stick of mage-wood, knocking the mage back a few steps, him gasping loudly under the force, then the light dissipated into his staff.
The boy laughed loudly, arching his back and tilting his head toward the black sky, “Hahaha. How weak have you become, old man? When I was your apprentice you would have swatted that away with the flick of your wrist.”
Kerlith and Bel were now behind the boy. Bel couldn’t stop staring at the burnt hole in the boy’s body, the empty socket where his arm should have been. He was mesmerized by it and was having trouble focusing on anything else; a fog was in his mind. The soldiers still stood to the mage’s left, swords drawn, but their enemy ignored them as if they were insignificant as buzzing flies.
Nes’egrinon spoke, “Listen, I don’t want to fight you. You know this. For… for I love you. But if you continue then I will unleash a force that even a ghoul-mage cannot withstand.”
A puzzled look stole over Bel’s face. Something was not right here but he couldn’t seem to figure it out; he couldn’t seem to think.
“Fine. Don’t fight back and die or fight back and die. It makes no difference to me,” the boy howled as he sent another blast towards the mage, then another, then another, then another. Each time the archmage held up his staff in defense, absorbing the light, absorbing the power. It knocked him back further each time and after the last blast he found himself down on one knee, his right hand bracing his body on a boulder, trying to hold back the successive onslaught of deadly energy.
“What? Is that all you are going to do? Let me pummel you? You owe me a fight!”
Nes’egrinon slammed his staff into the ground then used it to pull himself up to his feet. He twisted the staff in the ground softly as he stood and breathed hard, huffing air. “You are right, I am old. I cannot stand much more of this. I ask mercy of you. We are on a journey to close this breach. If you would have my life once our mission is complete then I will give it to you gladly. I will join you in the underworld.”
“Hahaha. Close the breach. Impossible. How do you think this breach came to be anyway?”
Tiny roots clawed their way from among the stones and rocks littered on the ground as the old mage continued to gently twist his staff. They wrapped themselves around Fleck’s feet, ankles and legs.
Fleck spoke excitedly, “I did it! I caused the breach to rip open! I poisoned his mind. Called to him for years!” He bellowed, proud of himself, “The others said it couldn’t be done. The other dead mages, fools all, said that the dead could not communicate with the living. But they forgot about dreams! Dreams, dreams, wonderful, terrible dreams! I got into them. All I needed to do was find a mind that was so full of the hope and lust for glory that he would believe almost anything to get it, the mind of a mage, one who could actually do something to set me free. I found him and entered his dreams. It took time, probably at least twenty years, but what was time to me?”
The tendrils were wrapped around the boy’s legs up to the knees now.
“It is I who did this, Father. That’s right! All of you have heard me say it. This man who stands before you, this so-called great mage, he is my father and it is because of him that I am dead and because of him that this breach is open! The very fabric of reality has been torn asunder and you have him to blame! I tell you this, you will join me, Father mine. But it will not be a happy reunion.”
Nes’egrinon screamed, “Now!” as he lifted then swung his staff down at the boy, pushing out all of the energy that he had been absorbing and holding. A giant flash of energy exploded out of his staff toward the one-armed boy. Kerlith and Bel each pointed at the boy from behind, attacking him with magic and the soldiers leapt at him with their swords.
The boy tried to quickly kneel into a defensive position but his lower legs were held tight and he began to lose his balance, flailing his single arm. He quickly formed a barrier of protection around himself, a thin blue orb of energy, as he tumbled. The soldiers were rebuffed when
they struck the orb but Nes’egrinon’s attack pierced it, disintegrating the shield. The boy fell back, landing hard on the ground and Bel poured all he had into one last ball of magic, speaking in the old tongue, “
The archmage stood over his son and said, “My son, I am sorry. I am truly sorry. I did not mean for things to happen as they have but dead or not you are still my son and you need a spanking.”
Bel and Kerlith looked at the old man, their eyes changed, their opinion and knowledge of the old man now broken. The old man was not who they thought he was. He had a son, secretly. All wizards, upon graduating from Lasaat took the oath to not marry or have children. Now here stood a wizard who not only had a son, but also somehow got him into Lasaat without the other masters knowing who the boy’s father was, then—and this was incredible—got his own son assigned to him as apprentice. The gears in their minds spun feverishly. To do all of that and then for the boy to die? That must have ripped the old man apart. No wonder he hadn’t taken an apprentice until now.
Dizziness spun Bel around and around and he realized that the spell drained him further than he thought. He reached out, grabbing Kerlith’s shoulder to steady himself.
The archmage spoke, “My son, now we will go on. If we fail then perhaps I will be joining you this day. If not and we succeed then it will not be long. I am old and have not much life left in me. I will join you, whether it is this day or another. We will speak and you will know my heart. I hope that one day you will forgive me for your death.” The old mage spoke to the others, “Come. We must go. Bel, Kerlith, drain him.”
Under the Shadow of Darkness: Book 1 of the Apprentice Series Page 13
