The Beginnings Omnibus: Beginnings 1, 2, 3 & Legend of Ashenclaw novella (Realm of Ashenclaw Beginnings Saga)

by Gary F. Vanucci

  He stole through the village and made it to the far western side of the town. Confirming what he saw, he made his way quickly and quietly back to the group, who awaited him on the shaded side of a storefront.

  “What is it!?” asked Azbiel, his arms held out wide before returning to cross over his chest. He yawned and Figit could smell the wine on his breath from where he stood.

  Typical Azbiel, he thought.

  “Kobolds. And lots of ‘em! And…they ain’t alone either. There are some crazy robed figures with marks of the dragons on their garments.

  “Dragon cultists,” Triniach stated as if everyone should know. “They are amassing here as they sense something, a shift in the weather or some such. I cannot quite put my finger on it just yet.”

  “So, they are worshipers of which dragons?” Jon asked. “All of them?”

  “I would say. It is a dragon cult. Their symbol is something of a dragon claw. Is that correct, Figit?” Triniach asked.

  “A claw of red, one of blue, another of white and a black one, too. All in a circle, or a cross or some proportioned pattern. Can’t really see it too well.”

  Triniach waved his hands about and stood silently, the white of his eyes shifted in hue to yellow, like that of an eagle’s.

  “That is it exactly,” the mage announced with confidence.

  “If you can do that, then why do ya’ make me—never mind,” Figit said with a sigh and a shake of his head.

  “It is to keep your skills intact. You never know when you will need them. Magic does not solve everything,” he stated in a lecturing manner with a sideways glance toward him and then added, “almost. But not quite.”

  “Well, whatever. The four-clawed dragon cultists have taken over the town for whatever reason,” Figit exclaimed, willing his body into the shadows.

  “Then we be needin’ ta’ take ‘er back!” proclaimed the dwarven warrior, tapping her axehead upon her shield three times.

  “Let’s gut ‘em and save the day. Like usual,” stated the halfling.

  “Nothing like rescuing damsels in distress!” Azbiel proclaimed, rubbing his hands together in anticipation.

  “We are ready then?” inquired Triniach, adjusting his robe.

  All of them nodded and Figit stayed to the shadows, moving ever closer to the commotion. After a moment or two, he could hear the words of the cultists.

  “We shall make sacrifice for the scorching drakes and so that Ashenclaw will spare us,” he heard one man say.

  “The queen of the scorching drakes will let us live if we show her gift,” said one of the dozen kobolds lurking about. A pair of women were both tied to stakes that were planted firmly inside a large amount of tinder. Their clothes were torn and they were bleeding from several wounds already, though none of them looked fatal to the halfling. But, it certainly seemed as though they were going to roast these two ladies alive.

  “We need them all to burn,” stated another kobold, confirming Figit's obvious fears.

  Figit looked from where they'd come from and, held captive inside the inn that he could see through the window pane, were several more of the villagers bound and gagged. And there were even more of the kobolds in there.

  He hated the little lizard things. Whenever they gathered, there were always too many of them around, he thought with a grimace.

  Lizards! He thought. No wonder they worship the damned dragons!

  The halfling indicated to the others behind him with a point of his finger. The others seemed to understand and nodded in unison. It looked almost absurd to Figit as he turned and headed forward again, keeping to the shadows of the buildings. As he closed in on them, he signaled to the sorcerers and that’s when all Pandemonium seemed to break loose upon them.

  A hail of forked lightning shot forth from Triniach’s hands, striking kobold after kobold until three, then four and five of them fell with each bolt. Azbiel had called in an obscuring haze from above that rolled over the inn behind them and enshrouded the whole building in gloom so that they could not see out the windows. Then he began another spell as Jon and Twarda charged the cultists and kobolds combined, the forked lightning deftly missing them.

  Figit saw a cultist move behind the bound humans on the stakes as he produced a flint stone, obviously trying to get the flames going. He struck it against the steel of his dagger multiple times as Figit went to work.

  Before the cultist knew it, he was bleeding from several wounds in his lower back and legs. He looked queerly at Figit who giggled at that expression. He’d seen it so many times.

  It was funny to him because he coated his blades with a numbing poison that was so strong, it reacted just as the blade entered and so oft times; the victim felt nothing but a slight pinch when his blades entered their flesh.

  But, the cultist did manage to successfully produce a spark when he struck the flint with his blade before Figit could stop him. He tumbled backward as the cultist fell into the fire that was just in its beginning stages. Figit also noted that there was a chemical or oil that was administered to the kindling which was why it ignited so easily. He did not see it before as it was dry and dulled, but he saw it clearly as he caught the reflection in the light of the flames.

  The two women screamed and the cultist shrieked from below his masking hood. Figit turned to face a kobold and another was beginning to make his periphery when he saw an axe head bury into its scaled head.

  Twarda kicked out, removing the blade from her victim and slashed her axe across another’s throat, but it did not slash. Rather, it tore the kobold’s neck open and its lifeblood spewed forth, staining her armor a rather odd shade of lime green.

  It was like they were everywhere! Two more attacked her, one on either side. She smashed her shield into one of them as the thing slammed into it at top speed as the sound of bone breaking could be heard over the roar of lightning bolts to her side. The other one made it past her sloppily made attack and stabbed at her with a short spear. Its thrust made it to her shoulder, which was turned away by the steel of her pauldrons.

  She shook her head and backhanded the tiny lizard creature with the handle of her axe before turning and burying it in the creature’s head.

  As he fended off the kobold’s predictable attacks, Figit watched Jon hewing several of the cultists down with his blade, a radiant glow coming forth from it and at one point; he thought he saw something in the shape of a hammer slam down atop three opponent’s heads, crushing them into the ground.

  Jon rushed into the throng of cultists and kobolds with a sense of anger. He was angry that the rusty-scaled lizard things and the cultists placed the scorching drakes on pedestals like they were the Gods of Order. He was incensed by it all and used that anger to fuel him.

  He swiped hard at a kobold, cleaving its head from its tiny body and slammed his shield edge into a cultist’s throat, silencing him forever. He summoned a prayer of holy energy, allowing it to caress his bastard sword, encasing it in white light.

  Three of the enemies approached him at once and he braced himself, uttering an invocation to The Watcher for a blessing of divine judgment. He remained still and brought forth a manifestation of divine energy in the shape of a three pronged hammer that crushed all three of his foes around him in one fell swoop.

  He smiled and felt someone rushing his rear flank and held up his shield. He saw the reflection of one of the tiny kobolds charging him with a spear and spun on the draconic creature, bringing the full power of his hips into the blow with his bastard sword and severing its head. The body collapsed helplessly, falling forward into him. He shoved it to the ground with a thrust of his shield and looked for more enemies to smite.

  And Figit not so much as saw, but rather felt a blast of frigid cold that reminded him of the bitter winters up north that came from Azbiel as the flames on the tinder turned to icicles just that quickly.

  Azbiel saw the flames burst forth from the tinder and saw the two ladies kicking and screaming beneath their gags,
their eyes wide with terror. They were still fastened tightly and uncomfortably to the stakes buried inside the conflagration. He did not have much choice in the matter if he wanted to save them. The flames that were licking at their flesh would turn them to liquid sludge in seconds.

  He concentrated and pushed out a burst of wintry air from his hands, directed right at the pile of twigs and the women marked for sacrifice. The resulting effect was incredible, leaving a block of ice in place of the raging fire. He wasn’t sure about the origins of the blaze, but it seemed to be borne of magic, too, but he couldn’t be sure. He could not give it careful consideration bearing in mind their predicament.

  He was about to thaw the two girls, releasing them from the icy prison of his spell when he spotted a cultist was heading toward the inn, no doubt to tell those inside that things weren’t going as effectively as they’d originally hoped.

  He raced after the man and stopped once he was within range. He cast a quick spell of holding on the man, freezing him in place. He then followed that up with a blast of necromantic energy that simply reduced the man to obscurity. Absolutely nothing remained of the cultist, not even ashes as the blackened beam fell over him.

  Then he saw another of the kobolds heading toward the inn as well. He’d already shrouded the inn in thick mist and then decided that wasn’t enough.

  “Enough’s enough,” he said to no one in particular.

  He summoned forth a bank of tangible, dense fog that caused the kobold’s progress to come to an almost complete halt. The creature was running forward at speeds that were laughable, which Azbiel did as a result. He turned to Figit to see if he was all right and then proceeded to encase the inn in the same thick fog and mist.

  Advantage: us, I’d say, he thought with a wide grin planted on his face.

  The mage smiled at Figit and then turned to cast more enchantments around the inn, the fog seeming to thicken into a barricade of gloom. He was pretty sure he saw one of the kobolds go straight into the fog and immediately crawl to a halt.

  Figit shook his head, parried a series of strikes from the kobold and tumbled around it, diving into a series of front flips until he made it to the creature’s exposed back. The draconic beast could not keep up with him and lost all sense as to where he’d gone. Figit reached around and with two outward strokes, sliced the front of the kobold’s neck wide open.

  He watched Azbiel continue to work and admired how the mage could cast spells so effectively while under the influence of so much wine.

  He dove between two oncoming cultists, drawing blood as he passed between both of them, maneuvered into and then out of a front roll, coming to his feet. Before the two could even turn, he was off and running again. He leaped atop one of the two men’s backs and the man pitched forward with the newfound weight.

  As Figit passed by the other, he sliced the second one deftly across the throat. On the way down, still riding the man’s back, the halfling nimbly managed to pin the falling man’s arms as he fell to the floor, smashing his unprotected face against the hard ground. Figit maneuvered to stand atop the man just as he hit the ground and hopped off in one motion, tumbling forward.

  He got to his feet just as Twarda slammed a kobold in the side of the head that was rushing toward him.

  “Thanks,” he said with hands on hips before quickly reaching into his belt and producing three daggers. They were smallish throwing knives and well balanced at that, which he tossed one after the other at yet another attacker who had gained Twarda’s flank. Twarda spun away from them as they darted past. Her eyes were akin to saucers of jade at seeing the knives approach and then pass by harmlessly. They landed with loud thunks in the man’s chest.

  “Warn me next time,” she advised in a gravelly voice.

  “If I had the time to warn you, then you would have just defended yourself, silly,” Figit said with a wide grin.

  Triniach had taken the bulk of them down with his lightning and the last one who approached him, a sword raised high in both hands, fell dead with but a word spoken by the mage.

  “Ye’ll have to teach me that one, old man,” he said with a smile.

  “Certainly. I merely told him to—“

  “Don’t say it!” Figit said, covering his pointed ears. The halfling nodded in understanding and witnessed the charred remains of numerous cultists and kobolds that littered the ground around him. All of them were victims of the mage’s lightning bolts.

  “Hey guys,” called a voice from behind them. “Maybe we should take care of the whole ‘bad guys at the inn’ problem?”

  They all stood and then ran toward Azbiel as they saw a few more of the cultists and kobolds within the cloud of fog. They ran as if they were moving through molasses, Figit thought.

  “Hold!” Triniach yelled to them and they all stopped. He began to cast a spell and without warning Figit felt his heart racing. “This will counter the effects of the thickening fog. You will be able to move at normal speeds within it. Now go.”

  Figit ran like he was shot from a ballista! Until he hit the fog and then slowed to what he assumed was a ‘normal’ speed.

  Mages! He thought. I love ‘em and I hate ‘em!

  As he entered the fog, he could barely see within it, but he did manage to pick out an enemy here and there. He slashed and hacked and cut them down quickly. It seemed very silly to him just how slow they were moving. Azbiel remained outside; uttering an incantation that Figit assumed was keeping the fog going.

  Twarda and Jon began to collect all of the villagers—all twenty of ‘em!—Figit saw, as they hacked down the remainder of the kobolds. Once the kobolds and cultists were dispatched, the fog seemed to disappear altogether. He noted many windows framed within walls of stone with floors of cobblestone. Tables were plenty and the bar was a dark color of some kind of wood that Figit did not recognize. There was a fireplace on one side of the room that was not lit, thankfully, as it was already too hot.

  He did note a dwarf, praying to himself in the corner of the inn and standing against the wall with…something…around him—it looked like a barely-shimmering magical shield of force. He noted that is shone dimly and pulsed, too. As a matter of fact, he wondered if anyone else could even see the barrier around him as it was very faint in its manifestation.

  The dwarf was white of beard and hair and was dressed in the garb of a priest of one of the new Gods of Order. He didn’t know which. He didn’t keep up with that very much, but he did remember liking the sound of one of them—something about a goddess of luck! Now that was something that he could get on board with! This dwarf had a symbol of an eye on both his garments and on a chain that dangled loosely about his neck.

  By the time Figit took his eyes off the priestly dwarf, all of the cultists and kobolds alike were either dead, unconscious, lying prone or otherwise nullified as threats. Azbiel finally came into the inn and strode right over to the bar, looking for more wine, no doubt while the others were aiding the villagers.

  Jon walked right up to Azbiel and looked at him oddly. “Are you going to unfreeze those two women?”

  “Sure. Just as soon as we get someone who can tend their wounds.”

  “I can do that, brother. Or have you forgotten? I am a paladin; a holy warrior. Need I always remind you?” Azbiel mumbled something under his breath as the two of them strode right out of the inn to tend to the two almost-sacrificial tokens to the dragons.

  “Can ya’ heal, priest?” Figit asked. The dwarf looked up at him and tried to back up, but hit the wall upon where he leaned instead. He nodded a confirmation.

  “I can heal just fine. I be Morgrim, servant o’ The Watcher,” he offered with a polite bow. ”His eye guides me to where I’m ta’ be goin’.”

  “So he sent you here for us, I take it?” Figit declared with wide eyes, hoping for an affirmation.

  “That be a wise assessment, me lad,” said Morgrim, tugging on a thick column of hair that ran straight down from his chin and intermingled with the
rest of his hair.

  “What happened here?” asked Triniach. He stood leaning on his staff and waited for the dwarf to speak.

  “I be passin’ through is all. I be on a patronage, goin’ wherever me god wants me ta be goin’. He sees all and I be his humble servant. I happened about this town and took a rest fer me weary feet,” Morgrim explained as Figit and the Triniach listened.

  He glanced over and watched as Twarda was discussing things with what looked to be the innkeeper and perhaps another town official.

  “These cultists o’ the dragons came runnin’ over the town, sayin’ they gotta’ make sacrifices ta show they be good an’ loyal servants,” Morgrim started in again, finally dismissing his shield and moving away from the wall. “They be speakin’ nonsense and whatnot. I don’t pretend ta be knowin’ what they’re sayin’ or why.”

  “I’ve got a pretty good idea,” Triniach stated, plopping into a chair as Jon and Azbiel returned with the two girls, both of them healed and fully recovered physically from their ordeal.

  “I’d conserve your strength and healing powers, Jon. We will be needing them soon, I fear.”

  “What are you talking about, old man?” Figit finally blurted. The mage had been hinting around cryptically like he knew something but did not share it with the rest of them. “What is it that you’re not sayin’?”

  “The dragons have woken. Something in my divinations recently I found disturbing and this settles it. The scorching drakes are coming,” he peered outside and noted the darkness that had dropped over the land and yet the heat continued to swell. “That is why it is so hot. I would suggest that we all get some sleep, for tomorrow should bring some answers. Amongst other things.”