Dark Moon Rising (The Prophecies of Zanufey)

by A. Evermore

  She looked at Issa, then down at the silver bracelet in her hand, ‘If it were not meant for you then you would not have seen her.

  Issa’s breath caught in her throat and her head spun. She reached for the bed and sat down.

  ‘Issa, what is it?’ Ely asked worriedly.

  ‘Nothing it’s, it’s just all too much. So much has changed so fast, I can barely breathe,’ she gasped. ‘I was just a girl, a farm girl if you will. I have never known anything beyond Little Kammy. You all think I’m something special but I tell you I am not.’

  ‘I’m sorry, forgive me;’ Ely’s voice was hoarse, ‘I am afraid for I have nightmares of what must come to pass. They darken my days as they darken my nights. I think I felt as you when Dargan and my mother died. We have a little time, let Freydel teach you his art. All growth is hard, I know that, but it will be rewarding,’ Ely soothed and sat down on the bed next to her.

  ‘What I do know is the bracelet will help heal you faster. I fell off Izy a year or so ago and landed badly. I broke my arm but I had my mother’s bracelet on. In less than a week it was healed,’

  Issa looked wide-eyed at Ely and then slowly took the bracelet from her outstretched hand.

  ‘I wish I could understand what it is you all expect of me, I wish I knew what I have to do to help,’ Issa said quietly. ‘I am not some great warrior or Wizard that can save the world. I have no religion, no power and no gift besides helping sick animals. I could not even save my mother.’ Issa felt the emptiness welling up as she spoke. ‘I too have dreams… they are very powerful. I am me but... not me – something much more than me. Urgh, I don’t know, it’s hard to explain,’ Issa said, shaking her head, wishing she hadn’t tried.

  ‘There is much we do not understand, but I know there is something special in you,’ Ely said, ‘I see it, Freydel sees it, and even my mother – who has never met you - saw it all those years ago. You say you do not see it, but that is because you are it. I’m glad you can talk to me. We must talk more of these dreams but I fear the guests have waited too long for their poor hostess. It is my thinking that these dreams will be understood in time.

  ‘Here, put it on,’ she slipped the bracelet onto Issa’s wrist. Issa looked down at the shining silver leaves and calmness settled upon her.

  ‘See, it fits perfectly,’ Ely said, smiling once more. ‘Come let us go and greet the guests,’ she whirled away dragging Issa once again behind her. Issa followed, feeling a little of the happiness she felt that morning return.

  CHAPTER FORTY

  Karalanths

  A sharp pain at his throat awoke Asaph with a start. Frozen in fear, he stared down the long haft of an arrow aimed at his neck and into the hostile brown eyes of a very odd-looking man. Asaph’s eyes darted left and right searching for Coronos.

  ‘Do whatever they say!’ Coronos’s strained voice came from behind him and was swiftly followed with a grunt of pain.

  The man before Asaph was unlike any man he had seen before and was becoming clearer in the growing light of dawn. He had long brown hair hanging loose about his shoulders and his skin from the centre of his chest downwards was covered in soft brown down over a bare, heavily muscled, chest. That was not the oddest thing about him for atop his head protruded deer-like antlers spreading high above him, and his body, from the navel down, was that of a stag.

  Karalanth, Asaph thought of the deer-people Coronos had once mentioned. The voices of men and women came from nearby telling him they were outnumbered, at least in his human form, and he could by no means risk Coronos’s safety.

  ‘If you mean to kill me then do it now,’ Asaph growled, catching a glimpse of his sword beneath his cape an arm’s length away. The Karalanth followed his eyes and gave a powerful kick from his cleft hoof sending the sword clattering away. Another Karalanth, a woman with a lighter pelt and small leather jerkin, picked it up.

  ‘We do not allow trespassers on our land and certainly not armed ones!’ snarled the Karalanth, digging the arrow dangerously close to Asaph’s throat.

  ‘And since when did the lands along the Arin Flow belong to the Karalanths?’ Coronos’s voice behind him was mocking, demanding an answer.

  ‘Silence old man!’ an unseen voice commanded, and another gasp of pain exploded from Coronos as he fell heavily to the ground.

  Anger boiled within Asaph, the distraction was all he needed.

  Quick as lightning he flinched back knocking the arrow at his throat upward, causing the Karalanth to release it into the sky. In the same motion he reached for the knife hanging at the Karalanth’s waist and yanked it free, falling backwards to escape slashing hooves. He got no further for the festering bloody wound made by Keteth shot pain up his side and he screamed in agony. Hooves from another Karalanth hit him square in the back and he tumbled forward, winded.

  Rage, made ferocious by his pain, consumed Asaph and he closed his eyes, powerless to stop the Dragon awakening within and taking over. In less than a heartbeat Asaph knew he was massive: huge muscles as thick and strong as iron formed under his skin, a heavy tail snaked out behind him and the rage he felt became fire in his belly.

  He opened his eyes and looked down upon the small and pitiful Karalanths. He could see them clearly now, five deer folk, two females and three males trembling in Dragon fear as they fell back from him. All were armed with bows, arrows and hunting knives.

  Ancient Dragon magic surged in his veins and his belly rumbled with fire as he took a great breath in. He opened his mouth wide to release it upon his enemies, but instead searing agony exploded in his side once more and his wounds split open releasing toxic bloody puss. His head reeled and with a smoke-filled sigh he collapsed onto his side, poisoned blood oozing heavily from his wounds. The fire in his belly did not ignite and instead smoke billowed from his nostrils as he struggled in vain to cling to consciousness.

  With Dragon fear in their hearts the Karalanths had stayed their arrows but now they barked orders to each other. Asaph’s human form returned and with it came blessed painless unconsciousness.

  Coronos’s head spun. He struggled to his knees and winced from the pain on the back of his head. Lights danced before his eyes but beyond the lights he clearly saw the biggest Dragon he had ever seen covered in shining golden scales.

  A Draxian and once a Dragon Rider had made him immune to the Dragon fear but still his hands trembled a little. He tried to stand but his hands and feet were tied and the world spun sickeningly. Instead he knelt hunched over and watched in horror as Asaph’s wounds, made large by his change in form, split open and oozed poisoned blood. The golden Dragon sighed a huge bout of smoke and crumpled to the floor.

  ‘Asaph!’ he screamed, but nothing more than a croak came out.

  The five Karalanths sidled around the Dragon that heaved in pain before them, arrows still at the ready but lowered. The Dragon shimmered and became a man once more, weak, unconscious and badly wounded.

  They talked hurriedly amongst themselves in their strange barking accent and then tore strips of cloth from Asaph’s cloak to stem the blood and bind his wounds. With surprising care after their aggression they washed the bloody puss from Asaph’s side with water from their canisters. They tied the make-do bandages around him as best they could and carefully lifted him onto the broad back of the largest Karalanth, the one who had held the arrow to Asaph’s throat. They secured him there with rope from their belts.

  ‘Please! Do not harm him!’ Coronos gasped, feeling wretched and pathetic, too weak to fight and cursing his age. Silently they lifted Coronos up too and tied him onto the back of another, ignoring his protests. The one that carried Asaph turned to look at him. Coronos reasoned he must be the leader.

  ‘You did not say you were Dragon kin, old man. We thought they were long gone. This is important to us,’ he said and then turned away, barking a command that sent them leaping at speed through the woods. The blurring jolting landscape made Coronos’s head spin even more and he closed his eyes to
keep from vomiting.

  They had been travelling fast for what seemed like forever when Coronos finally felt them slow. His head and body ached terribly but he only dared to open his eyes when they slowed to a walk.

  They now walked along a wide dusty track through a Karalanth village surrounded by a mix of evergreens and deciduous trees, typical of the great forests of mid-Frayon. Round wooden huts of varying sizes were dotted here and there. They had shallow thatched conical roofs, from the centre of which rose smoke and the smell of cooking from the hearth fires below. Given what Coronos knew of Karalanths, he suspected they were deep in the forest; they were the most secretive of peoples. The scent of wood burning was heavy in the damp forest air. He could hear the thundering sound of a large river not too far away and wondered if they had come eastward following the Arin Flow.

  Through bleary eyes he watched the Karalanths of the village come to stare anxiously at the strange humans. Karalanth children, their antlers small and covered in soft light brown down, stared fearfully at him from behind their mothers’ legs.

  The captors untied him, gently this time. He searched worriedly for Asaph as they set him on his feet. His legs were weak and cramped and he would have fallen had not strong hands supported him.

  ‘Easy, two-foot,’ the Karalanth said gruffly, though there was no malice in his tone. Coronos pulled away and staggered towards his son as the Karalanths laid him on the grass. He knelt beside Asaph and smoothed the matted golden hair tenderly away from his face. His skin was pale and damp and he groaned softly yet did not awake.

  ‘How long has he had these wounds, two-foot?’ the leader Karalanth asked.

  Coronos scowled up at him, ‘A day at least, and the name is Coronos. His is Asaph,’ he said, indicating to the younger man before him. His scowl turned to a frown of worry, ‘I fear my healing was enough to clean the wound but not enough to stop Keteth’s poisoned magic work its evil. He would not be this bad if it weren’t for you barbarians,’ he spat.

  The Karalanth guffawed, ‘So you have some spirit! Maybe you should be more careful into whose lands you tread, old man, then this would not have happened. Regarding trespassers, experience advises us to strike first, ask questions later.

  ‘Maybe for you it was lucky you found us. You cannot fix those wounds alone, as well you know. Only a Seer has ever successfully healed a wound from that beast and rarely at that. Just two days gone one such as they passed through here. Send for Triest’anth,’ he said over his shoulder and the Karalanth that had carried Coronos nodded and bounded off.

  A few moments later Coronos looked up into the wizened face of an ageing Karalanth. His face was deeply wrinkled but still angular and his fur was sleek though greying. He had a long grey beard that hung in a thin point to his navel. Coronos could feel the energy of magic within the old Karalanth, the tell-tale sign of one skilled in the art.

  There was nothing but kindness in the old Karalanth’s deep brown eyes and this set Coronos at ease. He took one look at Asaph and with a motion of his arm commanded them to bring him to his house. They jumped to do his bidding.

  Through thickly woven doors of toughened reeds they entered into a dark candlelit round room; Triest‘anth’s house seemed larger inside than it looked outside. In the centre a fire burned low, above which a blackened pot supported by three iron poles hung, the rich smell of food came from the pot, making Coronos feel faint with hunger.

  A long deep shelf, covered with jars of potions and odd-looking utensils, some of which Coronos recognised as magical devices, ran around the centre of the wall and underneath it were various wicker baskets filled with breads and vegetables. Large cushions surrounded the hearth and there was a pleasant herbal smell drifting from the incense burning beside it. The place was relaxing, almost meditative.

  A pallet bed made of straw and blankets and surrounded by linen drapes was arranged in one end of the hut. It was to this that Triest‘anth motioned them to put Asaph, and then waved them away except for Coronos. He bade Coronos sit before the hearth as he busied himself mixing herbs and liquids into a bowl.

  ‘Stay, please, I will need your help. Tell me what you put upon the wounds.’

  ‘I made a simple poultice of plants and minerals,’ Coronos obliged, hesitated, and then ‘but none from Frayon, from far away, from the Unchartered Lands.

  Triest’anth stopped his stirring looked up into the air for a moment and then resumed. ‘I have heard nothing of the lands beyond the Shadows, beyond the beast,’ he said in wonder, ‘indeed I know of no one who has. You are knowledgeable indeed. I want to hear more of this wondrous land and its people. But another time perhaps for his wound festers, though your herbs have done well for such terrible injuries.

  ‘I will do what I can here to bring out the fever and send a runner to find the Seer who left two days past. All we can do until then is keep him alive. Luckily I sense he is strong, a Dragon Lord so they tell me,’ he cast a sideways glance at Coronos as he ground his pestle and mortar.

  ‘He is…’ Coronos hesitated, unwilling to reveal anything but the minimum of Asaph’s identity to anyone, ‘… my son.’

  Triest’anth regarded him, seeming to understand, ‘It is fine, we must protect our secrets and ourselves in these dark times, Draxian. You will not find trouble from us again... Dragon Rider,’ he said softly, making Coronos start.

  ‘How did you know,’ but the old Karalanth only smiled knowingly and beckoned him to help with Asaph’s bandages.

  In silence they removed the young man’s sweaty blood-soaked clothes and washed his wounds before salving them with a black acrid-smelling poultice. They wrapped fresh bandages over the wounds and washed the sweat and dirt from the rest of his body, leaving him to sleep under a thick blanket.

  ‘We should all sleep here tonight. I shall make two more beds beside his for he should not be alone, we can take turns to watch over him. And now we should tend to your bruise,’ Triest’anth gestured to the red swelling on Coronos’s head. Coronos touched it and winced.

  ‘Please forgive our hostility, we have suffered many hardships and many enemies for a long time; pushed ever further north from our lands by ogres, Harpies, Maphraxies and countless other evil things for which we have no name. It seems the land itself is sick… food is scarce for all these days,’ Triest’anth said and smoothed a cooling paste on Coronos’s bruise.

  ‘I sensed the sickness in this land as soon as we set foot on it, as if the Great Goddess Herself has abandoned us,’ Coronos said making a warding sign against evil in the air.

  ‘The infectious decay is Baelthrom’s doing, of that I am certain,’ Triest’anth said grimly. ‘And now the dark moon rises, the forest watches and waits. There is the stillness of expectation in the trees, the animals, the air. We do not understand Woetala’s plan but we, her devoted followers, must be ready for this coming war.

  ‘Many years passed, Dragon Rider,’ Triest’anth explained, looking far away into the middle distance, ‘many years spent in hiding, watching the rise of the Immortal Lord and his minions. We must admit that at first we enjoyed reports of the Maphraxian war with our enemies, the Dwarves and Humans, but soon we grew fearful, knowing full well Baelthrom would not stop until all of Maioria was in his grasp and Woetala on her knees at his feet.’

  Coronos looked at the deer man as he spoke. The Karalanths were the keepers of the forest and legend has it that they were blessed by the Goddess of the forest, Woetala, and made in the image of her beloved consort, the stag. It was the Forest Goddess aspect of the Great Goddess that they held most reverently in their hearts.

  Coronos knew well that the Karalanths ancestral lands were in Venosia and the islands between Venosia and Davono. But, many Woetala moons ago, war raged between the Karalanths and the Dark Dwarves as the Dwarves entered their lands. They received no help from the Light Dwarves for they cared little for the deer people.

  Hating the Necromancers for their evil ways, the Karalanths fought back hard enough t
o enter Dwarven lands. Thinking the Karalanths in league with the Dark Dwarves the Light Dwarves retaliated. Thousands of already battle-weary Karalanths were slaughtered. They fled the Dwarven lands only to be crushed between an army of Dark Dwarves. The few remaining Karalanths fled from Venosia and their islands to Davono and beyond where they faced humans and ogres.

  Pushing north and west they finally came into the ancient forests of Frayon. It was there that they found peace and refuge, laying low and hiding, forever hating the Dwarves. They became secretive, distrustful, hostile to all except the animals of the forest, and for the most part forgotten by the world.

  ‘Few will know what happened next, for no Dwarf will ever speak of it,’ Triest’anth continued. ‘Many years later, once we had found a home deep in the forests of Frayon, the Dwarven King and Queen issued an apology to all Karalanths and welcomed us back to their homeland. But the royal Dwarven messengers were sent back, without their heads,’ he shook his head with a sigh as if he would not have done the same. ‘We Karalanths are too proud. We accepted no second chances, no half measures, no promises of peace with the Dwarves only to scavenge the scraps that now remained of our land. We would rather wait until Woetala calls us back to take what is rightfully ours.’

  Coronos sighed, he knew their story well, ‘Draxians are also proud, they would have done the same.’ He gave a half smile.

  The Karalanth looked at him and chuckled, ‘In my old age I prefer peace over revenge.’

  Coronos nodded. ‘I have been away from the Known World for too long, blessedly long, mind, living in peace and abundance with the Kuapoh peoples in the Unchartered Lands. But I long for my homeland, Drax,’ he drifted into memories of tall snow-capped mountains and clear blue skies. He suddenly realised Triest’anth had asked him a question. Coronos looked up questioningly into the Karalanth’s eyes and he repeated it.