“You are very…annoying,” Brosse spat, and with a motion of his finger, a jolt of electricity ran through just the right parts of Grelion’s brain, and he fell asleep.
“Flote? Put me through to commander, I need to run something by her,” Brosse said warily.
XXIII: A DARK PALACE OF FLAME
Screams reverberated through the crumbling stone streets of Wallstrong. Hundreds ran from raining meteors of flame, hid in small cracks within yet untouched buildings, or lay dying. A dark figure, glowing the color of blood, hovered under a giant pyre; the incredible spire of flame fed skyward among the ruins of a once great building, the architectural genius of the united races of freedom, the Wallstrong capitol. The ancient tree, once situated in the council hall of the capitol, lit the night as a massive torch. It was only days before that Erguile had observed the enormous column, imagining that it might be a living trunk—as it had been until the Feral had sieged it. A strained voice croaked amid the rising din of destruction, the chaotic sounds of a city defeated:
“Master, do we trace them south?” came a dwarf, draped in black robes and silk gloves, gripping a small marble in one hand. The dwarf gazed into the marble, through it watching a faction of the remaining Wallstrong forces escape into a dilapidated cavern.
“They seal their own fate,” came a slimy voice, hissing above the echoes of trolls marching past, a black swarm, broken occasionally by the gold glint of Gazaran armor.
“But master—they’re likely taking a passage into the mountains, they plan on defending the Corlisuen!” came a worried tone from the wizard dwarf.
“Silence, Eusolem!” scolded the slithery voice. Scarlet film flashed around the floating man; pale eyes pored over the marble. “The vision of my father will be in short time achieved—they march to a den of Feral Dwarves—the Reichmar have been brooding, waiting, eagerly licking their lips, for this moment…”
“Master?”
“The whole of this world will be mine, and then I can finally achieve what my father failed to—there will be one race on this planet, the original line of Darkin will once again naturalize, and then…”
“But, your spell? What if it wears off—”
“Did I bid you speak, half-dwarf?” chided the slippery voice of the Unicorpoas. A jet of light zapped the dwarf, smoke sizzling from his arm where it hit.
“Sorry master,” cried the dwarf, attempting to conceal his pain.
“Then—then I will have enough power, the collective power of the whole world. I will be able to—” Something in the sorcerer’s eyes changed, a look of astonishment, and the dwarf appeared befuddled, wondering why his master had stopped speaking.
“Master?”
“So the Enox has arisen.”
“Enox?”
“Never mind, it won’t be of any use now anyway—do not trace them into the tunnel to Ascaronth, there will be no need.” A sinister chuckle resonated into the atmosphere. “We go directly to the Corlisuen, and that much sooner will we descend upon the last of our opposition.”
“Yes master, I’ll make it happen.”
The black-robed dwarf strode off, erupting in an aura of midnight-blue energy. He began to stretch his aura out over the marching Feral trolls—as if in response to the light of the dwarf, the trolls surged with an understanding that their purpose had been achieved in Wallstrong—they were to march in a new direction, through the southern gate of the city. The Jaigan trudged south alongside the putrid troll ranks. The Gazaran sped hastily ahead with their new orders. Vesleathren stayed behind, the night sky rent with flames; slowly he murmured, nothing coherent at first, and finally words:
“Zesm, how is it that the Enox is here?” came a grainy voice. The floating sorcerer talked to himself.
“Gaigas is attempting to neutralize us, but do not worry—it cannot interfere,” Zesm returned.
“How are you so certain?”
“I was here last it emerged, when your father died,” replied the slimy whisper.
“Then it is a cause for concern!” came Vesleathren scathingly, bound in a single body with Zesm by the magic of the Unicorporas spell.
“No—Melweathren died not from an assault by the Enox—Molto was to blame. He alone ended the design of your father.”
“It won’t matter, even if the Enox aids them—without Flaer there is no hope for them; now that he is dead, there will be no last protest,” Vesleathren reassured himself.
“The only true power left to them is Krem, the poor hermit, and now that we have merged, even he is useless to defend Arkenshyr,” came Zesm.
“Krem! Hah!” laughed the Vesleathren in his gravel-tone. “That poor thing?”
“Surely he comes to aid the Hemlin forces. But they fly into a trap, going to seek the Reichmar—it is working just as you planned, Vesleathren.”
“I have waited so many decades for this, and now that I’ve killed Flaer, I feel almost as if the war is won today!”
“Remember there is that druid; he is surprisingly powerful—I don’t know how you never knew of him before today…”
“Forget that pawn! He used every last ounce of his energy, along with the whole of his race, just to hold us for a moment!”
“I sense something deeper from him yet—how much time is left to us in the Unicorporas?”
“It doesn’t matter. I’ve stored enough energy to recreate it once it finishes, and with your revived strength it will be as if there is no dispersement at all when we reform.”
“Come, let’s finish this soon. I am growing impatient to summon the Maelvulent.”
“I can’t believe it is almost time—Enox—hah!” laughed Vesleathren again. “The vision of my father is at hand, finally, ready to be completed; once the Maelvulent is summoned, we can end the balancing act of Gaigas, shatter it, take any world we please! We will return to the stars, to our true home! Hah—the once powerful reign of my ancestors, eons ago, shall be restored!” echoed a sick laughter over the black army as it marched by.
“How long they’ve thought Gaigas an innate quality of Darkin? How long even did even I think that until you enlightened me? To think it was a mere enchantment, a hoax put on by the first line of Vapours!”
“Enough—let’s finish our business in this extrafertile cradle of fractured race and blood,” responded Vesleathren. Suddenly, high above, the top of the enormous burning trunk sagged on its side, spewed a display of sparks, then tumbled down as an ashen comet; the embodiment of Vesleathren and Zesm, the Unicorporas, flew to the side, narrowly missing the flaming spire. A red capsule surrounded the sorcerer as he flew on above his army, approaching swiftly the southern gates of Wallstrong. They rejoiced, eager to leave their wake of destruction behind and find the last free cities of Arkenshyr; the West Continent would finally be taken, destroyed, adding enough energy to Vesleathren’s store to create immortality, summon the unthinkable. The Unicorporas would then return east as an abomination to Enoa, and swiftly complete the business Aulterion could not.
XXIV: THE PRISONERS OF THE LOST RACE
Krem awoke by a grove of trees. He quickly went to rouse the others. The Sleeping Enox was gone, apparently it had left in the early morning while they slept; Krem decided that they should stop first at Rislind, go into the village and warn the community about the impending battle. He would let them know war was coming south, so that the citizens of the tiny village would have a chance to flee to a safer country, away from the violent blasts that were sure to ensue in a battle against Vesleathren. Krem remembered vigilantly Aulterion’s assaults upon the peaceful elf posts in Carbal Jungle; those places had seemed safe too, too distant to be worried about an attack, when Aulterion’s Artheldrum magic had traveled from north of the Dinbell Wall to destroy countless innocent families. Krem would not let the same happen to Rislind. He hadn’t expected the enormous sleeping bird to run off, but Falen would suffice as a replacement, flying them into Rislind then back out to the Corlisuen, hopefully in time to aid the Hemlin forces likely holed up
there by now, launching a last-ditch effort to defend themselves.
“Wake up! Wake up! The red beast’s gone, stranded us, we’d better be moving quickly!” Krem shouted, whacking Falen on his scaled head. A shoot of steam rose from the wyvern’s nose, his yellow eyes flicking open.
“What’s the need for that?” came Falen, wondering how it had turned to day so fast; it seemed only a moment ago Krem had decided to land outside of Rislind and, after much hesitation, let them get some much-needed sleep.
“The Enox—it’s gone. We’ve no more time for sleep!” Krem riled him again, smacking his bright red tale.
“Ok—ok,” Falen complied. Nearby, Reap heard the commotion, and fearing a similar attack from Krem, sat up and rubbed his eyes, ready to depart as soon as Krem commanded them to.
“I suppose I’ll be the flyer now,” Falen said.
“Well I haven’t sprouted wings have I?” Krem said, flustered for having slept longer than he’d wanted. “Come on, we have to tell Rislind to evacuate and then get to the pass. Something tells me there’s something terribly wrong there.”
“What do you mean?” Falen said, erecting his back and stretching his broad wings, standing six times as tall as the small hermit beneath him.
“I can’t be certain, something feels wrong. Strangely it’s not Vesleathren or the Hemlin Army—suddenly I feel an active energy coming from the Reichmar—I haven’t felt them stir in ages, but now that they do, something is amiss—their energy seems…distorted, too strong for dwarves.”
“That does not sound pleasant, not at all. I am not one for caves anyhow, my stay in Oreine was enough for me,” retorted Falen, half heeding the seriousness in Krem’s voice. “Well, hop on then, what’s the delay?”
“Wait…” said Reap in a hushed tone. Krem and Falen turned to him, whom they’d forgotten in their talk of bad omens.
“What is it?” asked Krem. He knew as soon as he looked at Reap, who was ducking by the trunk of the nearest elm, staring directly into at a tree-covered expanse of the Rislind plateau: in the trees a metallic silver light glinted in the morning sun; next to the silver object, half hidden by trees, were the partially concealed silhouettes of two figures, both human.
“Slowin!” Falen shouted, barely able to contain himself.
“No,” said Krem coldly. “Quiet. Behind the tree, like Reap.”
“Bit hard for me to get behind those trees, Krem,” Falen joked, but Krem offered him a scowl to shut up his deep voice. The three watched in suspense as one of the silhouettes walked away from the silver object, seemingly toward them, but the man stopped, turned around, then paced back and forth, as if in limbo.
“What’s he doing?”
“I don’t know, but I don’t like this.”
* * *
“What’s the hold up?” Brosse said impatiently, talking to no one. Behind him was Grelion, staring blankly at his captor, hoping they would start moving soon: the sooner he could get this stranger to his archives in Morimyr, the sooner he could be free again; he found himself pining for Pursaiones, and his new life within the secluded mountains of Rislind—but now it had all changed, been upheaved by this alien enslaver who’d somehow shrouded the entire mountain range with a band of mysterious light, night after night.
“Sorry Brosse, commander wanted us to get aerial reads on the disturbance, but we’re coming—should be there in ten minutes now,” Teme replied, his voice directly in Brosse’s head.
“I thought I told you—this man has information that will lead us to the ore! Of what importance is the disturbance that has held us up this long when I’ve our solution in my custody! Damned Naeos!” Brosse said. Immediately after the curse had left his lips, he prayed that Naeos wasn’t on their line. Silence continued for another moment, and he knew he’d escaped her wrath. He hated her as much as he loved her: she had held him overnight, not permitting him to move with his prisoner toward the city of Morimyr until she arrived personally. He didn’t understand why—he would have gone on ahead alone, but she had said she wanted to be there. Why? He didn’t care for answers, he just didn’t want to look at the disgusting Darkin native anymore. He wanted to move, his transport had been idling for hours.
“You’d better be true to your word,” said Brosse in his foreign language, the device on Grelion’s neck translating the words so he understood—Grelion was terrified, but he felt confident he had the records the stranger wanted. After the Five Country War, he had begun collecting a history of Darkin, archiving every valued document and artifact in the land, by force if necessary. There had to be something about the metal that this man wanted, some clue that would help him find it, but why was it taking so long? He didn’t know. He’d heard the stranger talking to himself several times during the past hour, but it hadn’t made any sense, just jargled throaty noises; it seemed the man let Grelion understand him only when he chose.
Suddenly Grelion’s eyes went wide with shock. He tried not to let it show, in case it was his rescuing party, coming to save him: in the trees by the edge of the Rislind forest-line was a dragon with two others, one extraordinarily tiny, the other his own size. They ran from one thicket of trees to another, trying to get closer undetected. Grelion glanced at his captor, who paced in annoyance but looked in the other direction, toward a tower in the distant prairie, beyond which spiked the fog-ringed Angelyn mountains.
* * *
“Tempern!” Krem said in disgust as he tried to create a spell of invisibility, repeatedly failing.
“What is it Krem?” Reap whispered. They hid behind a group of birch and pines as best they could, though Falen’s bright red and green scales stuck out like a sore thumb.
“My Vapoury is disrupted again, something is stopping my channel to Gaigas,” he said in frustration. He bent his head down, focused all his attention on his feet, then drew his hands slowly up along his sides, closing his eyes and wincing. A small lick of light grew around the ground. Krem’s feet began to dissolve into thin air, but in an angry huff of exhaustion, the feet snapped back into sight.
“But it can’t be Tempern can it? He wrote us—he knew what he’d accidentally done—he knew he’d almost killed us up there. He wouldn’t let that happen twice,” Falen said, his low voice filled with doubt.
“But the Enox’s gone…Maybe it’s distracted him again,” Reap guessed.
“No, it can’t be him—even if the Enox distracted him again, that would nullify my Vapoury in Nethvale, near his home,” Krem responded, his beard ruffled by his roaming fingers, frustrated as to why he couldn’t conjure a simple spell of concealment.
“Ough egroue?” shouted a voice. Krem looked out over the grass separating their batch of trees from the one concealing the silver object.
“He’s seen us!” Falen responded. “I say we confront them, magic or not. I still have fire—and he’s not so tough looking.”
“Krem?” said Reap, warily observing the small hermit for direction. The strange man now strode towards them: he wore a funny-looking suit that seemed to be both pants and shirt at once—it was a soft-looking material, emblazoned with an odd row of stripes running down one side. In his hands was another shiny silver object which the stranger quickly placed on his head.
“That’s not a helmet or cloth I’ve seen before,” said Krem, entirely disturbed by the foreign appearance of the man. The other being remained back by the oblong vessel of glinting silver, half-hidden behind tree trunks. The one wearing the helmet now paced fast toward them—Falen immediately stepped out from the cover of the trees, neglecting to wait for instruction from Krem.
“Hieh fron dough!” came the voice, and though Krem did not recognize the strange language the man used, he knew the tone of it—it had been a warning. Falen roared mercilessly; from his scaled face shot a stream of napalm-like fire, straight up as he arced his back and stretched his wings. The even pulse of fire rose then fell several yards in front of Falen, burning ferociously on the grass between them and the approachi
ng stranger. The man stumbled at the sight of the fire. The red scales that had first caught his attention were now a full-sized animal of the likes he’d never seen before. Falling over backward in a tremor of fear, Brosse’s helmet lit up with dull-green phosphorescence.
“Known as a wyvern Brosse. Better neutralize it fast—our information has it aggressive—brute force capabilities of 130.234, damage value intrinsic, fire secreting glands,” fired Teme into Brosse’s ear in response to the emergency scan sent to her of the creature now bearing down on him. Brosse didn’t waste any time wondering if the enormous force capability reading was wrong, as it seemed impossibly high—instead he simply heeded Teme’s advice and from the ground raised his flash-pistol, firing a shot at the monster towering overhead.
“Falen!” Krem cried, unable to assist in any way. Reap stood fast, gripping the secret blade he’d kept within his oversized red robe, ready to pounce. The small glimmer of spark lasted only a second, but an explosion followed, loudly echoing over the sparse prairie. Falen roared in a fit, the hoarse-coughed cries of a dying dragon—his enormous body thudded against the ground, paralyzed by the blast of Brosse’s weapon. Krem stared in horror, unable to believe the power the strange man possessed, sensing no magic coming from him.
“Please—we mean no harm!” shouted Krem. Brosse immediately stood up, surveying the small hermit and his serpent counterpart. Reap moved his left leg tensely, gripping tighter the handle of his short sword, waiting for his chance to bound forward and take down their assailant. Brosse’s headgear translated the common tongue of Darkin into his own language, making sense out of puzzling gibberish. Amused, Brosse awaited another desperate plea from the natives.
“Please, let us help, we go to what may be the same cause as you, to fight Vesleathren at the Corlisuen,” Krem pleaded, though in the back of his mind he was sure that he must be staring at some sick creation of Vesleathren’s, unfathomable in every way—the artifact of power in the stranger’s hands, the metallic pistol, was unlike any vessel of magic or energy Krem had ever known or heard of, and he feared his words fell on deaf ears.
Darkin: The Prophecy of the Key (The Darkin Saga Book 2) Page 27
