By Blood Hunted: Kingsblood Chronicles Part Two (The Kingsblood Chronicles Book 2)

by David J. Houpt

Oh, you clever man, she muttered to herself, then showed Lian her memory of both spells.

  Lian, he’s hidden the first ward at a distance roughly half that a sensitive or mage would detect the second, she explained. They’ll see the dark warding, pause to inspect it, then advance again, right over the outer ward to get close enough to counter the one they noticed.

  Once they reached the origination point there was another flare of magic, one that even Lian could feel. It felt chill and foreboding, threatening by its mere existence. Many of the spells considered to be black magic were unnatural and their presence could be unnerving.

  Once again, the necromancer bid them tread around the fire and the sentinel rock, but this last time was much closer to both. This song was simpler and lighter, raising what was called a protective ward. Unlike the other two wardings, which would actively try to harm an enemy, this inner ward would instead work to shield allies within it.

  “None of you cross the captain’s footprints this last circuit around,” Lord Grey said warningly. “You want to stay inside this last spell, and you do not want to cross either of the others, believe me, sailors. The other two will not distinguish between friend and foe and will strike you down as readily as an enemy.”

  The sailors’ eyes were huge—in fact, they had been the entire time Lord Gray had been singing. Mikos nudged Naryn none too gently, clearly wanting the cook to ask for an explanation. The cook cleared his throat, trying to find a way to express it without offending the skull-bound blackrobe.

  Lord Grey answered the question he knew the cook was formulating, but what he said was a bald-faced lie, or would have been if he’d had a face. “I thought I saw something moving in the marshes,” the skull explained. “The little I know of this part of Vella tells me that all sorts of creatures would love to make a meal of you living folk.”

  “Why three spells?” Jinian asked. He didn’t like the necromancer any better than his two shipmates, but that didn’t stop him asking.

  “The outermost is a trap to try to snare any creature coming across it,” Lian said, though he knew that wasn’t exactly true. In fact, he suspected the outer ward was by far the most destructive one.

  “The second is a more potent one?” Mikos asked the captain, relieved to be speaking to him instead of the skull.

  “Different, but another trap, yes,” Lian said, evading Mikos’s question. The precise workings of the three spells weren’t important for the sailors to know, after all. The men nodded their heads, their attention almost totally inland, searching for the “creatures” that Lord Grey said he’d spotted. It was a fortunate thing that it was Lian and Snog’s watch, for the sailors were very likely to miss a ship’s sails now.

  Once Lian and Snog were upon the sentinel rock, the prince glanced back toward the pack he wore on his back. “Why raise these wards tonight instead of when we first chose to set camp here?” he asked quietly.

  “This is the first nightmare you’ve had since the attack,” the skull said, “or at least, the first one that’s woken you more than once. I wish you’d had some kind of impression instead of just the nightmare, but these wards haven’t weakened my reserve significantly, so if it’s a wasted effort, we haven’t lost much other than time.”

  Lian frowned. “What makes you so certain it’s anything but a normal nightmare?” he asked. “Or that it means something will happen tonight?”

  “I know neither, Lian,” Lord Grey said seriously. “They may merely be bad dreams, and even if they’re a product of your prophetic touch, they could be about something that won’t happen for a month’s time. But if they aren’t just bad dreams and if they aren’t about the distant future,” the skull added, “then it would be the height of carelessness to simply keep watch as we have been. I can sing these same spells every night for at least another tenday, so if we must wait that long for Wavecrest, I can raise wards each night.”

  “Why only at night?” Gem asked. “Never mind, one of them’s necromantic.” It was far easier to cast such spells after the sun went down.

  “And because it is harder for Radiel to operate during the day,” Lian replied absently, looking mostly out to sea but glancing shoreward from time to time. “If she attacks us, I expect it to be after full dark.”

  “Won’t we have some time after dark before an attack, my lord?” Snog asked. “She’ll have to come from whatever daylight refuge she’s found, won’t she?”

  Lian shook his head. “Not necessarily. She could hide from Rula Golden in a boulder or one of the marsh cypresses, if it was big enough, or simply underground. Or she could have warded herself against sunlight, but that’s less likely because of the danger to her if the ward were to be dispelled.”

  “So she might risk daylight to travel near to us, but not in battle, I take it?” Snog asked and Lian nodded.

  “I doubt that she’s enamored of the idea of risking her own existence,” he said, gesturing toward the treeline. “That being said, she could be in line of sight of us right now, and I don’t know if I’d know it. My sense of her isn’t that discriminating.”

  ^ ^ ^ ^ ^

  To say that the troll hated the situation would have been a great understatement. Effectively enslaved by the insane Undead witch, forced into her service to hunt down those who had never done him or his clan wrong, the creature known to Radiel as Tenkiller glowered angrily as the band crossed the rough terrain toward the coast.

  The werewolves longed to leap ahead of the slower humanoids, to try to outrace their mistress to the enemy, but she kept them on a tight magical leash, forcing them to remain with the main body of the small army she’d assembled. Tenkiller had to admit she had a talent for making “lesser” beings do her bidding. Indeed, he was forced to admit that she had found a way to make him do her bidding, although he considered the mad wraith-girl a lesser being than him.

  It was a stain on his honor to be used this way, and it made him feel unclean to be in the service of such a creature. He’d tried to get her to talk about who her enemy was, the man with the spirit blade, but she’d kept that information to herself. It was clear she hated him, whoever he was, and the troll had been tempted to assume that the swordsman was somehow responsible for the girl’s Undead state, that he was deserving of the fate that was about to fall upon him. That his service to the girl somehow held a scrap of honor.

  But such self-deception, while tempting, was unacceptable. His fear of being blind so far from home forced him to obey the wraith, and it was his weakness that caused him to aid her in bringing doom to the human and his small band of shipwrecked survivors. He raged at himself for being that weak, but he had no real choice.

  In life she may have been a mere slip of a girl, barely on the edge of womanhood, but her magical power was tremendous, she had a beautiful voice, and her magical education had been stellar. Further, she was improvising, something beyond the capabilities of most Undead. She was learning and improving her magical abilities, becoming more and more powerful in the process.

  He shuddered to think what she’d be like had she attained the rank of Master before she had died. Or if her powers progressed to that of Master despite being Undead.

  If she triggered the curse upon him (or if he risked slaying her, he angrily told himself, and that activated the curse), he had no doubt that her other servitors would destroy him. Some of them, the spellbound, would do so eagerly, throwing themselves at him with abandon.

  He hated himself for his cowardice, for letting her control him this way. Not enough to do something about it, however, and that was an even greater dishonor. He was accepting her control, even aiding her—true, he was doing so in the hopes that she’d release him after she achieved her goal, but he didn’t really have much hope she’d do so.

  No, this evil thing that pretended to be a young girl would likely blind him anyway out of spite or in retaliation for some grudge he didn’t even know she was holding for some minor transgression he hadn’t known he’d committed. Still, al
l he could do was to attempt to please her and then hope that she had no further business in Vella. Hope that she’d return across the seas to wherever she came from and leave him alone.

  Radiel broke in on his reverie. We grow near, she said in her spectral voice. When she wished, she could allow only one person, two, or many to hear her, and now she made herself understood by the entire force of goblins, ogres, werewolves, and Tenkiller.

  The one with the singing sword, she reminded them, is to be captured whole. As for the others, you know what to do. The trio of werewolves slavered at her words, and the bespelled goblins grinned at the thought of doing her bidding. The ogres, always willing to cause mayhem, growled and grunted, swinging their stone-tipped mallets eagerly. The troll didn’t know why she’d bidden him make sledgehammers for the ogres—they were used to simple clubs, and the hammers would be clumsier in their hands—but he had obeyed her in that as he had in other things.

  Tenkiller unlimbered his axe and cracked the bones in his neck with an explosive series of sounds. If he couldn’t prevent himself from doing this, at least he could get it over with as fast as possible.

  Silently, my minions, Radiel said into their minds as she grinned hideously, the object of her hatred coming close once again. They must not know we approach. And all of them, even the troll, did as she commanded.

  ^ ^ ^ ^ ^

  It was close to midnight when Lord Grey said, “Something moves in the marshes.”

  Lian signaled Snog to get down and wake the others and scanned the dark saltmarsh. Lushran’ half-moon was just about to set, with the pale half-circle of Sterath leading him on the bright side, already shifting to a reddish-pink hue as the Moon of Fate began to near the distant horizon. Lushran’s yellow light cast the swamp in soft shadows, but it also reflected off of something beyond the treeline.

  The Coin Lord’s moon was also in the western sky, well above the two setting moons, and although Ashira was three quarters waxing, he was one of the outer moons and his golden light was not a significant contributor. Lian hoped the Moon of Luck’s presence in the sky boded well for him and his men, but the fickle god might take either side—or both—in any conflict. Sina’s blue disk, well beyond three-quarters in her own slow cycle, soared above Ashira.

  Gem, making better use of his eyes than he could, said, “Whatever that was, it’s higher than the head of a man and has a pretty wide gait. The reflection moved side-to-side significantly.” She tried to keep the worry out of her voice because only a handful of creatures were that much taller than men, most of them were hostile, and all of them were physically dangerous.

  Lord Grey began weaving defensive magic, and shortly after, Gem began as well. As they’d agreed, the skull would lay additional wardings on Lian (to deflect arrows, among other things), while the sword would work to protect Snog. Lian wished they had mages and power to spare for the sailors as well, but they didn’t.

  “You’re exposed up here,” Gem reminded him, but Lian only nodded, keeping his eyes on the saltmarsh and the approaching unknown creatures.

  “Now would be a good time to spot those sails, milord,” Snog called up to him with a sardonic grin. He wasn’t afraid of battle, but to the goblin scout it was to be avoided whenever possible.

  Lian glanced quickly to the east, but the rolling waves of the nighttime sea were devoid of any sign of Wavecrest and the elf who claimed to be Elowyn’s brother. As his eyes swept back onto the saltmarsh, he spotted something familiar, a lean grey shape moving through the cypress trees. Gem, he quickly asked, knowing she would have seen it, too, that look like werewolves to you? He was hardly an expert, having met them only once when the ranger Saul—in truth, Kolos, the Vampire King of Greythorn—had aided them against the necromancer Lyrial, but the way they moved reminded him sharply of it.

  Yes, Gem replied grimly, having spotted something else as well. Three of them, and right behind them is your sister.

  None of the sailors had silvered weapons, and he was tempted to give the crossbows over to them with the silvered bolts he and Snog had purchased in Avethiel. Calling down to Snog, he settled for ordering the goblin to give a silver bolt to each man then climb up to join him. A bolt was at best a makeshift weapon, but the crossbows would be more effective in his and the goblin’s hands, and he wasn’t willing to give up either of his enchanted blades. “She’s coming,” Lian said softly aloud, and Lord Grey made an acknowledging sound as he continued to weave defensive magic.

  ^ ^ ^ ^ ^

  Active spellcasting, Radiel thought to herself. One of his slaves has sharp eyes. She’d found it simpler to think of everyone in terms of mistress and slaves and found it a comforting thought as well. Her power, after all, made her very obviously the former. Because of this stark worldview, anyone working for Lian obviously had to be his slaves, but that would hardly matter in a short time. Releasing the werewolves from the mental leash she’d kept them on, they leapt away ahead of her, jaws snapping in anticipation.

  We’ve been spotted, she said emotionlessly. Advance at full march. She didn’t know exactly what “full march” meant, but she’d once heard her brother Alec give such an order to the troops he was leading.

  The ogres started to pull ahead of the shorter-legged goblins, and Tenkiller corrected them with a harsh, barked order, bringing them in line with him and Radiel. “Together,” he growled, and they obeyed. He suspected they feared the wraith more than him, but he didn’t fault them. The troll feared her, too.

  Radiel smiled at the troll for anticipating her desires. It’s too bad I won’t be able to keep that one, she thought to herself. Once her business in the south was concluded, the troll wouldn’t be able to keep up with her and she’d have to leave him behind. She’d been toying with the idea of letting him go unharmed, and she still didn’t know if she would.

  After all, she’d gone to the effort of cursing him in the first place; it wouldn’t do to waste it. She smiled another of her mirthless, cold smiles.

  The three werewolves burst out of the marsh, bearing down on the campsite, but Lian and Snog were ready, firing their crossbows with enspelled bolts courtesy of Lord Grey. The man-wolves, in full wolf form, were three abreast, and the prince and goblin calmly fired, knowing without having to plan beforehand to aim at the outermost pair, each on their respective side.

  It was a very long shot, but between their skill and Lord Grey’s spell on the bolts they both struck true against the unarmored and unprotected werewolves. These were not silver bolts, rather two of their few lashthirin quarrels, and the two outer wolves went down immediately from the force of the bolts coupled with the shock of actually being harmed by weapons. As Lian’s father had once told him, being immune to something could be a disadvantage, if the creature becomes complacent—King Evan had been speaking of demons at the time, but it held true for werewolves—and was suddenly and unexpectedly met with something that could harm it.

  The third redoubled his speed, sand spraying behind him as his claws dug into the sandy beach, but before he reached the first ward line Lord Grey’s far-reaching earth spell caused an eruption beneath him, hurling him back in a huge spray of sand. It didn’t hurt the creature, but it gave Lian and Snog enough time to reload their crossbows. They let fly with another pair of Truesilver bolts. These weren’t specially ensorcelled like the first two, and only Snog’s bolt hit home, but on the lycanthrope’s hindquarters.

  The werewolf immediately yelped in pain and fear, skidding to a halt and half-shifting back into his human form, just enough to form hands. The lycanthrope yanked out the bolt, howling in pain and rage, and viciously threw it aside. With a hateful look toward the small group on the beach, he immediately returned to full wolf form and, to Lian’s surprise, resumed charging immediately. He’d expected it to flee, if not back into the swamp where Radiel could drive it back onto the offensive, then along the line between marsh and beach.

  “It must be controlled,” Gem said aloud, and Lian nodded. He had better levera
ge than Snog, and he snapped a bolt home in time to fire once more before the wolf hit the first warding. He relaxed, seeing the bolt’s fall onto its target in his mind’s eye. It was hard, with his sister nearby and resuming her attack, to see the “archer’s eye,” as his instructors had called it, but he had time for only one shot and he didn’t want to waste that outer warding—whatever it did—on a single werewolf.

  As had happened with the ballista on Searcher, he didn’t actually sense the moment he fired. Instead, he was a little surprised when the crossbow twanged, the bolt flying before he realized he’d pulled the trigger. Downrange, the charging wolf tumbled to a stop in a fresh spray of sand, only ten or twenty feet from the warding line. It lay motionless, the bolt having pierced its skull and driven lashthirin into its brain.

  A hundred yards from the outer ward Radiel began to feel the middle ward. She reached out with her magical senses, locating the roughly hemispherical warding that covered a huge amount of the beach. She directed the shamans and their guards, which included two of the ogres, to go ahead of them, intending to have them bring down that ward—it had a decidedly necromantic feel to it—before she got anywhere near it.

  On the beach, as the main body of Radiel’s force became visible out of the cypress trees, every man (and Snog) felt their blood go cold. In addition to the roughly thirty goblins that accompanied the wraith, seven figures strode ahead with her that were each at least twice the size of man.

  “Oh, gods, ogres!” Naryn said, swallowing hard and sinking to his knees in despair.

  “That’s no ogre,” Jinian said, oddly calm in the face of the seven giants coming their way. “That armored one’s a troll.”

  Lian could see that a small group of goblins was leading the way, four unarmored and cloaked, surrounded by eight goblin warriors and escorted by two ogres. Must be shamans, he murmured mentally to Gem before saying aloud, “Can you suppress the outer ward and let them pass, Lord Grey?”

  “I could, Lian,” the skull responded, “but if I did, it would become visible to magical senses and that would be counterproductive.”