by Philip Blood
We rested in the shallows, staying in some river reeds for concealment in case any of those flying things came near. It gave me a chance to ponder what I had just learned. If Fiona was correct, then I had stolen something valuable from a necromancer Archimage so evil they wouldn't even speak his name. Now this 'Dark One' was hunting me, across the worlds. The biggest problem I had was I didn’t know what it was I had stolen. I mean, come on, if you are going to be hunted by the Ghost of Christmas Future, at least you should know what the hell he wanted! What, did I take forget to send him a birthday card or something?
Chapter Nine
Caught in a trap.
Sometimes you got to know where to run for cover.
-Electric Light Orchestra
When morning light appeared, Myrka and Ziny woke up. Ziny was in better shape than Myrka and was soon swimming around looking for fish for breakfast.
Myrka was still weak, too weak to form a Traveling Star, though she nearly tried it until Hydan convinced her that she would just pass out again, and we would have to leave her here while we went to the capitol. She was determined, more than ever, to stay with me now, she had confirmation that The Dragon really was after my hide.
I sat down in the shallows next to her and said, “So, what, exactly, is your mission again?”
“To find The Dragon and report his location to my Archimage.”
I nodded, “And when we first met you had tracked him to Earth?”
She nodded.
“And now you know he is on Abal. Tell me, just before we met, why didn’t you fly off and tell your Archimage The Dragon was on Earth?”
“Because I need a more precise location than a planet to fulfill my mission,” she replied.
“And now The Dragon has left the tower, do you know precisely where he is on Abal?”
She scowled at me, “No.”
“Then why go back to your superiors yet?”
She was quiet and stared at me darkly. Then she said, “I see your point, and I will stay with you until The Dragon arrives to kill you.”
“Right, that’s a jolly thought.” I gazed at her for a minute and then said, “At the Inn, I was ready to cut you loose at the first opportunity. You had shown no care for anyone but yourself, and that’s not a very good teammate in a crisis.”
She just glowered at me.
“But then, in the Tower, you nearly died to defend us from those shades, why? You could have run into the room after Toji.”
She tilted her head at me in a puzzle fashion, “It was my task to defend you, not bring them upon you.”
“Your task?”
“Yes, why is this confusing?” she demanded, blinking at me.
I shrugged, “I don’t know, why did the chicken cross the road?” I retorted, as an example of a question you just can’t answer.
Hydan perked up at the chicken reference, and exclaimed with a grin, “Because such a ridiculously designed bird couldn’t fly over! What a gloriously dumb fowl! I wonder what I would get if I crossed a chicken with a snogfish, A snoken? That would be a creature which can’t walk, swim or fly!” He thought about it, perhaps picturing the crossbreed, and then laughed.
Ziny swam up at this point with a fish stuck in her mouth, and one in each of her hands. She spat out the one in her mouth, so it landed on the shore, and then gave us a big crooked smile as she declared, “Breakfast!”
Even Myrka smiled.
When Myrka had recovered enough to travel we took to the water. It wasn’t long before the Celadon River departed the lake, and we were once again headed downstream with a strong current. In another day, we should reach the capital, and then I could try to find out whom my saeran parents really were, and if they were still alive. I needed some answers, badly. I really hoped they could help fill in the gaps in my brain. There had to be a reason why they had hidden me on Earth, and why I had the balls to steal something important from The Dragon, of all dudes. Perhaps I had been on some secret mission?
As we continued down the river we passed three burned out villages. These were old battles, with only skeletons of the dead to decorate the ruins. Ziny and I surfaced to take a look, but she turned her head away when we saw the rotting bodies, and I thought I saw a tear in her eye, but then the river water washed it away.
Soon the river entered a dense forest and started winding through the tall trees. The water was slowing and had started to spread outwards into the surrounding forested area. I noticed many tree trunks in the water, which was odd. Normally they are near the water, but not in it. Which meant there had been some kind of flood recently.
I called to the others and said I was going to surface and do a quick visual scout ahead. When my head lifted from the surface of the Celadon two things happened, I saw a temporary log dam built just ahead of our position, and I heard someone call out from the shore.
That’s when the log dam just disappeared.
Instantly the water picked up speed, and we were sucked along with the flow.
I tried to swim toward shore, but the pull was too great, and moments later I found myself rolling and tumbling down a short cascade which led to a lower pool of water. It wasn’t a far drop, but it was enough to expose us as we fell.
I slammed into some thick netting a moment later, and the water was pounding on me from above since I was held in the net. Someone had strung nets out in the cascading water, and this one closed around me immediately. Then I felt acceleration upwards as I was lifted by the net out of the water. Looking up I could see a rope attached to my net on one end, with the other end tied to a young tree which had been bent down, and had now been released. The tree straightening was plenty of power to yank the net, and me in it, up and out of the river like a grizzly bear snaring a salmon. To my left, I spotted another net flying up, and I think I saw Ziny cocooned within the bundle of ropes.
The nets around us swung over to the right bank, there were people waiting. They immediately started clubbing me, pounding at my head right through the net. In moments, I was struck and blackness took me down the dark hole to unconsciousness.
Some indeterminable time later my eyes snapped open. I didn’t drift back into consciousness; I just woke up like someone had dashed a bucket of water in my face. I think Hydan must have ‘magiced’ me awake.
Hydan was yelling at me, “Get UP, and run!”
Strangely, all around me, there were several snogfish flopping on the forest floor. I could see the rope which had bound the net together, but the net was gone. I got to my feet.
That’s when I saw Toji fighting with three Living Husks. Toji had his tantos flashing, and his adversaries had long poniards. Those dried and dead looking saeran emaciated bodies were spry, and not very zombie-like at all. It was all Toji could do to keep them at bay.
Then, to my left I saw Myrka, she had six of them around her, and she had her blue glowing knife ready. One tried to thrust a poniard at her, and she cut through his forearm with a flick of her knife. The others were trying to maneuver around to get behind her.
I knew Myrka was not fully recovered yet, and so she couldn’t do a lot with her Derkaz magic.
Farther off I could see a group of three of the Husks carrying a net with a body inside, hurrying away. The one toward the back limped from a leg that ended in a stump. His fibula and tibia bones projected out of the dead flesh, working kind of like a peg leg. He turned his nasty head back and gave me a sick rotten-toothed grin.
“Nicholas!” I heard her tiny voice call out in a pleading tone, and it was like someone had stabbed me in the heart.
“They have Ziny!” I yelled and took a step in that direction, but Hydan grabbed my arm.
“I can help Toji and Myrka with the necrosouls, or go after Ziny, but not both!”
I hesitated, and that’s when things got worse.
A massive flying beast of some kind, with flaming wings, and a snake head, landed in the trees about two hundred yards away. Fire instantly started around it in the fore
st. It wasn’t a classic dragon, but some other kind of flying snake monster. A dark shape leaped from its back to the forest floor, and then it gestured for the three necrosouls to get Ziny up on the beast.
While they did that, the dark shape strode toward us purposefully. Four necromages arrayed themselves behind the powerful looking dark shape.
“By Baal’s colossal ego,” Hydan said, backing up a step.
I was trying to move forward, but he still had me by the shoulder.
“Let me LOOSE!” I yelled.
He shook his head, “He’ll just kill you, Nick, instantly. That is Medrod approaching, or I’m a snogfish. And those are necromages, we are outnumbered, and Myrka is weak.”
“Medrod?” I said stupidly.
“Yes, Morgain’s dead husband, the Sivaeral Second, whom his father, the Archimage of Abal, slew.”
“He seems kind of lively for being dead,” I exclaimed.
“Yes, and he does not look like these Husks! We must retreat!” Hydan exclaimed.
I tried to shrug off Hydan, but his grip was strong.
“Nick, you don’t have protections yet, and I can’t hold a Second off of you! He will turn you to dust with just a thought if you get near him, do you want that?”
I snarled something unintelligible, but right then the fire beast beat its flaming wings, setting four more trees alight, and then it lifted off with Ziny on its scaled back.
I cursed, but without any chance to save Ziny, my decision was made. I turned and ran toward Toji, with Hydan running right beside me, which was fortunately away from the approaching resurrected wizard and his four necromages.
As we got near, Hydan gestured and the nearest Husk turned into an undead snogfish, flopping on the soil for air, which explained the ones I’d seen earlier.
Toji leaped in and beheaded one which was still standing to his left, spun low and under the thrust of the next one and cut its leg off at the left knee. He continued his move around and stabbed it through the eye. The monster went down, finished.
“Now I finally have you!” a deep voice declared.
Hydan, Toji and I turned, and found the approaching Medrod was only fifty yards away, and running toward us swiftly.
Hydan called to us, “I will slow him down; you help Myrka!”
So Toji and I ran to Myrka’s aid, and I hoped Hydan could deal with a Second Derkaz wizard, somehow returned to life.
“YOU!” Medrod bellowed, and then added, “I will take your soul and bind it to my will forever!”
Hydan smiled and said, “Good luck with that, Medrod. I have some other plans, and you should have stayed dead.”
Medrod was clad in red glowing plate armor, and now he reached back and up by his shoulder and drew a thick, but short blade. The short sword had purple flames running up and down the blade.
Hydan actually smirked and said, “Pretty… useless.” Then Hydan gestured, but nothing happened.
“Damn,” Hydan exclaimed, taking a step backward, and calling to us, “I suggest haste.”
I only heard his last statement because I had already turned my head to deal with the six Husks attacking Myrka. She had downed one already, and right then Toji leaped in, taking out two more swiftly. That left one more for each of us.
Toji squared off with his, and Myrka leaped at the second one, but the third headed for me; uh oh.
I grabbed a rock off the ground, and tried to believe I’d picked up a knife, but it was still a rock, great. Doubting Thomas has nothing on me.
Now I was face to face with this Husk, and I could see its eyes were dried up milky white shriveled grapes in the sockets where its saeran eyes should have been, but it seemed to see me just fine. The lips were also dried, as was the skin of its face, pulling back against the bones like plastic wrap. This caused the dry lips to pull back from the brown rotten looking teeth.
It thrust its knife at me, and I realized it was one of those rubber movie blades.
Now, you have to understand, it wasn’t, not when it started toward my belly, but I really thought it was, and I guess I believed myself, because just as it was about to get thrust deep into my guts, the rubber blade bent.
I clouted the thing in the side of its dried brain pan and felt a satisfying crunch as the dried skull gave way to my rock.
It fell to the ground.
Toji and Myrka had finished theirs and were just turning to see if I needed any aid.
That’s when the fog came up out of the ground. This was the thick pea soup kind of fog, and in about three seconds it was impossible to see.
I found Toji and Myrka because they were right nearby, and I just moved that direction, calling out to them so they didn’t try to stab me.
We found each other, and that’s when Hydan ran into us as well. He stopped, almost surprised, and then said, “Link hands, and run for the river!”
“Which way?” I asked.
“Listen!”
So we all shut up and then heard the sound of the river to my left. I dropped my rock and we grabbed hands, turned and started running.
Behind us, I heard Medrod, “Clever, but this fog won’t last!”
Already I could see the fog lifting, and then our feet hit the water. Dimly, I could see the place where the nets had been in the cascade, but we were below that now. The Celadon had nearly filled in the cascade now, as the water from above brought the river below back to full level.
We let loose of each other’s hands and dove under the surface, and then started kicking.
An hour later, we surfaced and took a quick look. We could hear sounds of pursuit from up river so we went under again and started kicking. Soon the water picked up speed and then we were all falling. We had gone over a massive waterfall and were plummeting toward the pool below.
I believed, with all my heart, there was water, not rocks below. Then I hit the water and went under. Everything was white bubbles, and zero visibility because of it. I just kicked for deeper water and was buffeted by currents. I finally managed to reach calmer water, and finally swam to the surface. I found Toji and Myrka swimming nearby, but I didn’t see Hydan until I looked up at the waterfall, he was floating down gently out in front of the falls. He slipped into the water near us a moment later.
“You know, you don’t have to fall like that,” he noted. “Not if your body is almost as light as air.”
“Great, now you tell me,” I said sourly.
He smiled, “I did see some rocks disappear right before you hit the water, was that your doing?”
I nodded.
“Well done! That might have hurt a bit otherwise. Keep practicing, you are starting to develop your power!”
“What about that Medrod thing?” I asked.
Hydan shrugged, “I don’t know, those Husks don’t like the water, but Medrod didn’t look like them, he didn’t have that drawn and dry look. Fortunately, depending on how you look at it, he doesn’t have his flying beast, he sent Ziny away on it. So our pursuers are a bit behind us, but I suggest we keep swimming downstream swiftly to keep our lead.”
“You could not defeat Medrod?” Toji asked.
Hydan shook his head, “Regardless of his living or undead status, he is a Second, and he has great magic near him, as well as unknown Derkaz powers. I tried to reach him but he stymied my attempts to change reality. I was down on power from our other encounters, so I was afraid he might outlast me. I ran back a few yards, to get out of his influence, and then started believing in a nice forest fog.”
I was quiet at this stage, I was picturing Ziny in that net being carted off by the peg-legged necromage and his two buddies, and then being tossed onto the back of a flying flaming monster, like a sack of flour. “Where did they take Ziny?” I demanded.
Hydan shrugged, “Unknown, though I can guess.”
“Guess then!” I exclaimed angrily.
Hydan just looked at me, and then said, “To Morgain’s fortress, on Mystical Island.”
“Then, that�
��s where we are going,” I stated.
The Friare Third looked at me for a moment, as if weighing his answer, and then said, “I will take you there, but not until you are capable of surviving. Right now Morgain and Medrod would destroy you with a hardly a thought. You cannot rescue Ziny in this state, you can only die, and leave her to them.”
“Fine, what do I need to do then?” I demanded.
“Learn your powers, and part of that is finding your parents so you can learn your past. Only by truly knowing who and what you are can you fully believe in yourself, and therefore your powers. Remember, even the Archimage of Abal, in the full use of his powers, had difficulty going to Mystical Island, and some say he paid a great cost. You are not an Archimage, nor do you have full use of your powers. At this time you can barely survive falling off a waterfall, you aren’t anywhere near ready to take on a Dokkalfar Second and her resurrected Sivaeral Second husband.”
I was angry, and I wanted to save Ziny right then, but he was right, I was a weakling, barely able to take care of myself in the simplest of dangers.
“Fine, but as soon as I am ready, I’m going to save Ziny! She was under my care, and I will not abandon her to those two monsters!”
Toji nodded, “Say the word, and I will go with you!”
“And if this is where you will travel, then I must go there as well,” Myrka noted.
Hydan smiled, “I’ve lived a long time already, so sure, I’ll show you the way to Mystical Island, but only once you are ready,” he noted. Then his face brightened, “Besides, I have some things to say to Morgain; she has become a real nuisance in her old age!”
An hour later we left the forest and entered rolling grass-covered hills, with occasional bush and scrub. The Celadon wound through several canyons, cut over time by the flow of the water. Eventually, we came out onto a plain, and ahead, in the distance, we could see a massive city.
We floated along the surface for a while, watching the approach of Poseidon, capital city of Abal; it was worth a good look. Light gray towers stood tall against the dark blue sky, beyond which was a vast ocean. The wide Celadon River led to the massive gray walls and seemed to go right under them into the big city.
