Dread of Spirit: Rise of the Mage - Book One

by Jason Bilicic

  “Stand capable, Alkern. He’s binding him with cold iron. The law states that we must have no fewer than four witnesses to any execution.” The taller deputy remained impassive as Tasher stomped away from the scene.

  “The law! When did this warden begin holding up Symea’s laws?” Tasher spat as he left.

  “Kreg,” Kelc whispered.

  “Say nothing,” Kreggen snapped as he pressed a flat iron bar in between Kelc’s teeth before pushing a leather strap over his head that secured the bit there.

  Iron, bitter and alkaline, filled his mouth, pulling at him, at his nature, drawing his spirit inward, effectively clamping his mouth shut, forcing his teeth to ride against the coarse metal surface.

  “Nah!” he barked as spit streamed from his mouth. Jista eased toward him, causing the captive to fall silent and still.

  Kreggen then latched an iron cuff around each of Kelc’s wrists, each linked to the other by a half reach of chain at the center of which a steel circle hung, it’s half-knuckle width threaded through one of the links.

  Kelc’s hands felt numb and cold instantly. His spirit, impeded as it ranged through him, recoiled from the iron as if abandoning his hands and forearms. Already, Kelc thought, the flesh of his hands looked grey.

  “There,” Kreggen announced. “Does that satisfy you, Hull? Can you contain your fear now?”

  “It does,” he said, his tone dangerous. “Tasher is temperamental and disrespects too much, but that does not mean he is wrong. He has lived three decades dealing with witches and deads, many of those years alone.”

  “Jista, you are a provisional deputy. The Vanguard sent you as aid. True, they’ve forgotten you here for three years, but I sense your loyalties are not to me or any of those that live beyond the tall walls of Skurgaard and Chinggen Mor.” Kreggen rested his hand on his scimitar, gripping the smooth ball that capped the handle. “I’ve invited you more than a few times to return to them, free of shame and dishonor.”

  “And again, warden, I refuse. I have not fulfilled my duty here. And besides, like it or not, one way or another, you need me.” Jista spun on one heel and walked after Tasher.

  Kelc’s breath gusted from his nostrils and the small space above and below the thick iron bit in his mouth. He reeled at the feeling of iron pressed so close to him. It wrecked his ability to remain calm as if it leaked poison into his blood.

  Chills danced on his skin, leaving tight patches of prickles behind them. His muscles convulsed in turn, one in his foot, then another in his lower back, tightening to the point of pain before they simply released, only for another to follow suit.

  Kreg! He howled in his thoughts, desperate to tell him of Tasher’s nature, but his thoughts, like his body could not focus enough to even offer a sensible hint in any fashion.

  “Kelc,” Kreggen said, looking down at his younger brother, “We rest tonight and tomorrow we’ll go find the Vanguard troops.” He dropped a small wooden cylinder into the snow. “Drink that. It will allow you to sleep.”

  Tears dropped down his cheeks as Kelc greedily pounced on the small vile, gripping it with both hands, the chain clinking as he did. He unstoppered it and turned it over as he leaned his head back allowing the contents to drip into his mouth, past the iron bit.

  “Good,” Kreg said weakly. “Rest easy, younger brother. Tomorrow it ends.” Kreggen walked away without looking back.

  Kelc wept. Somehow, in that moment, it became real.

  All through his life, the one person who never gave up on him was Kreg. He’d taught him how to fight when his blade work was abysmal. He’d helped Kelc with his letters when he didn’t understand what his instructor had wanted. He’d offered him hope thousands of times when Kelc felt that death would be better than another day living with his father and the incessant beatings that came with him.

  Kreggen escaped the house, Kelc thought. He was the hope of the family and the one person that pushed me to believe that I’d make it. And now even Kreg has given up on me. Greeching hells, Kelc thought miserably, raising his manacled hands to wipe his nose. Kreg has no hope.

  Kelc thudded heavily onto his back, his hands pressed to his eyes.

  Tomorrow it ends.

  Kelc bounced atop his horse, his hands holding the front lip of the saddle. An iron ring, woven into the thick leather of the saddle, linked through the ring on the chain between his manacles.

  “Don’t fall from the horse or you’ll shear your hands clean off,” Tasher had warned as Kreggen attached the chain. “Would be a shame, a witch with no hands.”

  All these people, Kelc thought, think that I need my hands to work. Micah, Kyndron…Tasher. “Nah!” he spat, the iron bit still filling his mouth.

  The wardens never bound anyone at Kelc’s house when they tried them. Never in all of the stories and warnings Varrl had ever spoken of had he mentioned needing to bind a practitioners’ hands, and the man had served in the Vanguard. Kreg said naught of it. No one spoke of it, Kelc knew, because none of them had encountered anyone that wielded spirit in such a way.

  Blood and greeching guts! Only those from Reman know that. Only they have seen these spirit mages that wave their hands to create these runes or whatever. Damn it all! Tasher is from Reman. He’s some awful demon trying to…do…what?

  “Keh!” Kelc yelled, trying to call his brother’s name, but Kreggen never looked back. Only Jista did.

  “Stay silent, or we’ll silence you. This ride is enough without you howling and fussing back there.” The huge warrior held Kelc’s gaze. “I’d think you’d spend your last glasses enjoying the scenery, the wide open grasslands in which you grew up.” A crooked smile followed. “It’s what I would do.”

  Kelc could think of several obscene gestures he’d like to share with Hull Jista, but his hands were secured. Instead he glared at the deputy, his breath blasting from his nostrils as his face flushed.

  “You’ve some temper,” Jista said. “I’m surprised you let your brother capture you so easily. I’d have thought…”

  Kelc’s horse screamed beneath him and stumbled. Even as it did, Kelc saw blood spray from beneath it.

  “Ah!” Kelc crashed to the ground. His leg just escaped the bulk of his horse as it convulsed, lying on its side.

  “What in all the Hells?” Tasher yelled. “I told you to bind him more efficiently.” Kelc felt spirit ebbing from the former warden and it felt rife with fear.

  Kelc turned to see the man, to focus his grey-green eyes on Tasher’s grey, showing no fear himself.

  “I wasn’t him,” Jista said even as he tossed a handful of sandy granules into the air, watching them swirl to the ground. “It was the vampire. Dislodged right under the horse, gutted it and went back under ground. It’s helping him,” Jista said. “Seem your younger brother certainly has befriended the vampire at that.”

  “I thought Pyter had turned the vampire against him,” Tasher growled. “You told me he travelled with this witch because he’d fallen under some compulsion.” Again fear bled from the man’s spirit.

  “Ech mah oo!” Kelc said through the bit. He’d nothing to say, but he barked the sounds hoping to further unnerve Tasher. “Mah!”

  “Damn it, Kreg, this brother of yours is still wielding his foul curses. We should kill him now! Say he attacked us!” The older man pointed at the dead horse with his sword. “He had to have caused this somehow, after all!”

  “Silence yourself!” Kreggen walked to Kelc and lifted a twine necklace from around his neck where the key to Kelc’s chains hung. He leaned down and opened the ring, releasing Kelc from the saddle. “The vampire attacked the damned horse because it knows it cannot prevail against us. The prisoner will ride with one of us, double.” He looked at Tasher.

  Fear again. “Not with me, he won’t. You’re so cozy with your brother the witch, you bare him on your beast. I’ll not taint my blood with his foul touch. My word is kill him now. What say you Jista.”

  “I say you’re acting a mite
sideways, Alkern. Kreg is right, the vampire cannot so much as touch one of us, we’re so salted and coppered. It killed a horse. Maybe it needs the blood, or maybe it is an ally to the witch, now.” Jista spat. “We’ll catch the thing later. Hells! Had you not been so in thrall to the idea of hunting Kreg’s brother, the vampire would be stopped, chopped and buried already. So try and show some composure and let’s get this greeching practitioner to the Vanguard and execute him so we can get on with our duties.” Jista looked back to the ground where Kelc could now see tan sand particles in an obvious swirl pattern. “Vampire can’t keep up with running horses. And,” announced the tall man, his black armor clinking as he dug in his saddle bags, “just for the price of the horse, we’ll tax him a bit.”

  Jista pulled a one reach iron rod from his pack, along with a large hammer. He set one end to the ground and pounded it into the frozen turf. “There,” he panted, once done, “that’ll hurt the bastard.” His eyes rose to Kelc’s, narrowing. “He is a friend then?”

  Kelc said nothing, but he knew the iron rod would harm Micah somehow, probably by eating at least some of his spirit as he rose from the ground, his corporeal body transformed into lyatum.

  “That’s not proven to do a greeching thing,” Kreggen said. “Why waste the rod?”

  “I’m tired from driving it. If we want it, have Tasher jerk it free.”

  “Leave the thing!” Tasher spat, turning his horse and guiding it away. “I’ll not waste my energy or my time. Ground is frozen solid. Sooner try and pull the keystone from Southgate.”

  “Fine, let’s go,” Kreg said, taking Kelc’s chain in hand and leading him to his own stallion, a fair distance from where Tasher mounted. The glossy black horse whuffled, one hoof digging at the icy ground. “You first, brother.” The decency of the words drew Kelc’s attention, but Kreg only motioned for him to climb atop the powerful horse.

  Kelc scrambled into the saddle and Kreg climbed up behind him. The two of them barely had room what with the saddle having been designed for a single rider. “This’ll be some greeching ride,” Kreg grumbled.

  “Uh-huh,” Kelc agreed, shifting himself to get his groin some space, pressed as it was against the rising cantle that threatened to injure him. He choked for a moment, the feeling of his teeth on the rough cold iron suddenly setting off his gag reflex.

  “Calm down, brother. And turn your head.” Kelc looked to his right and Kreg leaned forward over Kelc’s left shoulder. “Heeyah! Let’s go, Darrow! Heeyah!”

  The horse leapt to a run, quickly jumping out in front of Tasher and Jista, the deputies unprepared for the sudden speed.

  Cold wind blasted Kelc, but he let it in, gathering it in his semi-open mouth, letting it wash some of the bitter iron stink from him, replacing it with a cold freshness that defined winter.

  Kelc could feel Kreg kicking Darrow’s flanks, driving him hard, too hard. The black horse managed still more speed, flying over the snow as if it didn’t even touch the ground.

  Elation and fear rose in Kelc, the ride a thrill and the power and speed beyond his control. He found himself clutching the saddle so tightly his fingers hurts. Despite the biting intensity of the air he kept his eyes open, squinting so he could see ahead.

  They sped across the plains for a while before Kelc felt a hand on his head. A moment later, the bit slid from his mouth, scraping against his teeth.

  The dry rusty spot left on his tongue caused him to cough as he tried to spit it out. “Here,” Kreg’s hand rose and pressed a damp cloth to his face, allowing Kelc to moisten his tongue and clean it off.

  It astounded Kelc how much clearer he could think without the iron bit in his mouth, how much closer to normal he felt.

  “Kreg,” he said, as loud as he dared. “What the…”

  “Be quiet,” his brother answered, his mouth right behind Kelc’s ear. “This is all I can do for you younger brother. Ask no more of me. I just hope there is an answer.”

  “Kreg, I don’t…”

  “Skeesh, Kelc. I know you have power. I felt it.”

  Kelc shook his head. “I don’t…”

  “Kelc,” Kreggen snapped, “I know you healed me. I know it. I remember the wound. The damned thing should have killed me. His blade sliced through my lung and tore through my back. It was mortal. I still have nightmares about it. I felt you in my flesh, fixing it. I felt your power. I’m sure of it.”

  Despite the ice-wind pounding on him, a chill dropped through Kelc. “You knew,” he said, his words lost to the currents of wind, currents going straight to his brother.

  “Yes. And I looked past it.” Kreggen fell silent, his legs still driving Darrow. “And now they’ll kill you for it. They’ll make me kill you for it.”

  “Kreg,” Kelc said, turning to make sure he would be heard without yelling, “Tasher is a demon. He’s possessed or something. I felt…”

  “Yeah, I thought so too, once, but I’ve run every test on him,” Kreggen said. “Every one. On Jista too. Both of them pass everything. I ran them on every one of the deputies once we realized how many spirits and deads and such were running free in Symea.”

  “That means nothing,” Kelc said with a snort of bitter laughter. “Absolutely nothing.”

  “But they passed them all without so much as a flinch.” Kreg snapped the reins, urging Darrow to keep his speed. “I tried tests on them that I discovered in books dating back as far as six hundred years. And they passed every greeching one.”

  “That means nothing, imbecile.”

  “It means nothing?” his brother asked, irritated. “It means they passed them, Kelc. They greeching passed every one. It means…”

  “So did I, Kreg.” Kelc allowed his answer to sink in for a moment before repeating it. “So did I.”

  The Vanguard soldiers looked uncomfortable and bored. Several milled around their camp, scimitar in hand, searching for anything to occupy their minds. Two others held a quiet conversation while rocking from foot to foot, the one facing Kelc frequently glancing up at him. Another poked at the dying camp fire with a gnarled stick, his efforts causing small eruptions of sparks to rise from the crumbling embers.

  The six of them looked weary of the road, yet prepared to follow another, preferably, it seemed to Kelc, a road away from the Territorial Warden and his deputies.

  Not one of the soldiers saluted Kreggen and his small group as they arrived. Not even a weak wave or a nod, Kelc noted.

  All six of them looked exactly how a Symean man should look. Their clothes were grey to match their eyes. Dark hair framed gaunt faces marked with lines too deep for men so young.

  But Kelc understood that. He felt ancient and broken, chained to an iron pole like a feral dog, a bitter-tasting piece of iron strapped into his mouth like a plow horse. He swallowed hard as the metal momentarily gagged him.

  He let his eyes wander, unable to focus overlong on a single thought with all of the iron pulling at him, draining his spirit and pushing his mind towards insanity.

  He sought his brother, but he’d entered a large tent with Tasher and Jista over an hour earlier and had yet to reemerge.

  The Vanguard troops, not too far distant, offered little more than judgmental looks and a reminder that Kelc would be executed the following morning, just after dawn.

  And Kelc had suffered enough at the hands of Symean tradition. So he turned and looked north, just barely able to see the dim outline of mountains there.

  He could recall the name of the range, or even if they were the mountains he thought of, but he didn’t care.

  He imagined his mother riding her horse… “Hoa,” he muttered over the bit between his teeth. He couldn’t remember the names of the horses. I lived with them all my life, he thought, or most of it. The horses.

  He furrowed his brow as his breathing sped up. The horses. He could picture them, could remember pressing his cheek against them and listening to all the rumblings of their bodies. “Uh.” Tears built in his eyes. Why can’t I remem
ber? What is happening?

  He clamped his eyes shut as he began to sob. His chains clanked as he lifted his hands to his eyes, covering them, refusing to look out into a world that seemed to be erasing itself from his memories. “Hoa!” he growled through the tears. What are their greeching names?

  “You alright?” barked a man, his grey eyes intent within his scowling face.

  What a stupid question, Kelc immediately thought. I’m trussed up to die, imbecile! And I can’t even remember Macy’s name.

  “Uht!” Macy! Macy! And Brownie! Mother would be riding Macy or Brownie, maybe both!

  Kelc looked into Symean eyes, but he saw his mother, saw her bundled up riding atop Macy, the reddish brown horse bouncing her a bit too much- She never was a good saddle horse.

  Kelc chuckled seeing it, watching her. Even more tears tumbled down his face. “Aaaaaa,” he cooed as if he were looking upon a newborn, enjoying the freedom and warmth of his mother, knowing she found freedom and family. A laugh burst from him, coming from some deep reserve that exceeded his reality.

  He let it loose, blind to the Vanguard soldier, lost in his dream of his mother. He laughed a great fit, still crying, his teeth scraping against the iron bit, his chains jingling as they shook with his mirth.

  He didn’t see the Vanguard’s eyes shoot wide with fear as he backed away, unprepared for such lunacy. He never felt the soldier’s boot sole as it forced him onto his back after banging into his shoulder. He didn’t watch him jog back to his camp, back to the relative safety of his fellows.

  “A-hee!” he said. Macy. Another wave of laughter, this one more powerful than the last, consumed him. His stomach hurt, he laughed so hard. His teeth buzzed, some of them chipped against the metal, but he didn’t care. Couldn’t care.

  And Brownie, he thought as the laughing fit subsided. So gentle. And stubborn. He could remember when Brownie stood stock still, Varrl yelling at her as he pulled on her leads, the man as significant as a fly. Then, after he’d given up and walked away, cursing the horse and promising a summer of horse steaks, Shaia had taken the leads and led the horse, with no issue, back into the stables.