INBORN (The Sagas of Di'Ghon)

by Lawrence, J.

  She had known Irkhir since birth. He was her father’s advisor, then her mother’s, her brother’s, and now hers. Although she would be the only one to put the man to any real test. She had always known him as a tutor, kind of like a gruff old uncle. Now the man had turned out to be quite a strategist as well. Every bit of their plan was well thought out and based on simple common sense.

  “With that we can make it to Flameshelm in three weeks, four at the worst.” Irkhir grunted satisfactorily, running a meaty finger along the top of one of his axes. The heavy axe hanging at his hip had been the feared weapon of the Ontars for ages. It could chop through any shield and open the heaviest armor in a single cut. It took years of work for the men of her ranks to build enough muscle to wield the weapon with any skill. Now that Irkhir had been transformed by the blood of the dra, a process she still had to remind herself was real, the mighty axe looked too small for his hands, like he caressed a child’s toy. The insufficient weapon was a perfect reminder of why they needed to push for Flameshelm.

  Flameshelm was the largest city in all of Anwar. Due to its protected harbor and close proximity to the upper passes, it was the center of trade and therefore garnered the bulk of Anwar’s wealth. Pilinor, the fat pig that ruled Flameshelm, would try and fight. But he wasn’t a warrior. His army was more for show than fighting. The last time she saw him, he came with a huge retinue of men, not a one of which had bothered to sharpen his blade. Once it fell she would put that wealth to good use. War was expensive. But more importantly, Flameshelm derived its name from the hundreds of low smoke stacks that stuck up from the city. They protruded up through the rooftops of smithies, armorers, and smelting yards, making the vast city look like a giant smoking pin cushion. Lisella needed weapons. Bigger weapons. Weapons made for the likes of the Bloodborn. She would put every one of those smokestacks to work.

  Irkhir heard the man coming long before she did. By the time he knocked on the lintel they were already turned around, waiting.

  Blackthorn, one of the First, had been big before the ritual. Now the warrior was too tall and his shoulders were too wide to allow him to walk through her door straightway. Getting through it required a stoop and an awkward looking side step at the same time. Behind him five more men filed in, all members of the First, wearing the traditional crimson and heavily decorated shining armor plate.

  “Mistress. I bring word from Gremsfell.” Long blonde hair hung down either side of his head, almost touching the floor as he bent low.

  “Blackthorn, get up. Where have you been? The First of the Bloodborn should not keep me waiting. ” Lisella let her chill tone wash over the man. Word from Gremsfell was overdue by a day.

  Once his name was spoken the man rose on one leg like his bulk didn’t matter. The truth was that it didn’t. She had been watching the men train. The blood of the dra had transformed twelve hundred soldiers into killing machines. The Bloodborn weren’t just bigger. They were faster. More agile. All but the most grievous of wounds healed in seconds. In fact, they were more, in every way. The glory of Ontar would indeed return during her watch.

  “My Mistress, Lord Markos refused our offer.”

  “I knew he wouldn’t willingly pledge.” Irkhir growled.

  “We need Gremsfell before we march for Bucholtz.” Lisella stuck her dagger into the table, the point wavering over the dot that marked Gremsfell, as she looked into Irkhir’s dark eyes.

  Blackthorn shifted on heavy boots.

  “What else?”

  “Mistress, when Markos refused he sent his cavalry and axe to cut down our envoy. They didn’t give us any choice. I unleashed the First. The Bloodborn slaughtered their cavalry in mid charge. The axe pledged to a man, all one thousand. Gremsfell is ours.”

  “One thousand men.” Irkhir sucked on his teeth. “How many did we lose?”

  “Twenty-two in total, but none of the First.”

  Lisella Ontar set her chin. She glared at Blackthorn.

  “When Markos sent his cavalry did they come out of the front gates?” Lisella asked casually.

  “Yes, Mistress.”

  “I see,” she said, “and where was the First?”

  “Mistress…” he stammered, not quite understanding the reason for the obvious uncomfortable tension that filled the room. “We were in the trees as you ordered.”

  “Yes, I ordered you to take cover in the trees.” She paused, “You were supposed to do two things. Wait for his response and report that back to me.”

  Irkhir’s face didn’t register any emotion as he casually rested a hand on one of his axe heads.

  “Mistress, they attacked our envoy.” His eyes sought Irkhir’s.

  “Did I tell you that the envoy had to be protected?” The question stung him.

  “Mistress, they attacked. I had to.” The man’s color darkened as he stammered.

  “You had to?” She raged, the emphasis clearly on you, “Have you become my consort, Blackthorn?”

  “Mistress, I.. only.” The huge man bowed his head.

  “I told you that unless you were stupid enough to find yourself surrounded in the trees that you were not to reveal yourselves.”

  “Mistress, we killed them all.”

  “You killed the cavalry. Did you also kill every one of their messenger pigeons? Did the blood give you the ability to wring every bird out of the sky?” She slapped the man across the face.

  “Bucholtz knows we are coming.” Irkhir growled.

  “Mistress, I knew that word would make it to Bucholtz ahead of us.” He started.

  “What have you done?”

  “Mistress, after the battle I knew our element of surprise was lost. I took Markos’ head to Bucholtz. Lord Trevr gave us his oath when I tossed it on his dinner table.” His head rose a little. “I brought his fealty scroll, and his daughter, Winnuth, to ensure he remembers what he wrote.” The man had strolled into her presence like a dog with a trophy.

  Lisella Ontar stiffened.

  “The First is my axe.” Lisella spoke slowly, making sure the men behind him heard every word. “It does not decide to strike. It cuts when I say cut. Not a second before or later. If you can’t be trusted with that…”

  “If I have upset you my Mistress…” Blackthorn went to a knee.

  “The Ontar does not get upset.” She said. Then without warning she slammed the blade of her dagger into the man’s temple. His body instantly fell to the stone. “Is there anyone else who can’t follow instructions?” She asked as she casually wiped bloody gray matter off her blade.

  The five warriors didn’t move.

  “Get this idiot out of here.” Irkhir growled.

  As one they burst into motion and whisked Blackthorn’s corpse out of the Ontar’s chambers, probably wanting to get out of there before she decided to vent her wrath some more.

  “We’ll have to take more blood with every sacrifice. In a week we can have five hundred transformed.” Now that the dra’s appetite had been altered it would eat twice a day. According to the book, as long as it didn’t revert back to its normal diet, the process could continue indefinitely.

  “Five hundred regular soldiers.” The emphasis on regular.

  “Five hundred Bloodborn armed with spoons are worth five thousand regular soldiers any day. If they took Gremsfell’s horse and didn’t lose a man, there is no telling what we can do.”

  “That was the First. Gremsfell’s axe is not the First and I am not as convinced of their loyalty as Blackthorn was.”

  “At least Blackthorn was right about one thing… As long as we have Lord’s Trevr’s daughter, his men won’t risk doing anything that might threaten her life. Mix them in well with our troops and keep them busy. I don’t want them to have the time to start conspiring against us.”

  “By now Pilinor knows everything. We’ll have to march for Flameshelm immediately, before he can raise an army big enough to challenge us.”

  “After the initial force, what size units do you want to s
end for reinforcements?” She recognized the old schoolmaster tone. Even after all these years, it was a test.

  “No more than a hundred at a time,” She answered, indulging the man, “and each group of reinforcements takes a slightly different route than the first.”

  “Agreed. I’ll make the necessary arrangements. I’ll send word when we are ready for the sacrifice.” He paused before turning to go. “You did what you had to do with Blackthorn.” It was a statement of fact. He didn’t have to say that it was what her father would have done. She knew.

  Lisella never heard him leave. Already she was lost in furious thought. She needed Markos’ men transformed quietly before they marched for Gremsfell. Blackthorn’s actions might have already ruined all their careful planning. The man had been an able commander. Why he went off on a tangent like that was beyond comprehension.

  Irkhir was right. She did what needed to be done of course. Those men would make sure everyone knew what happened to Blackthorn, and why. She couldn’t have the most powerful army in the world running around doing whatever they wanted. As it was, this was going to be a close thing…

  If anything else went wrong, instead of her likeness being carved in stone, left behind to remind generations of how she ushered in a thousand years of peace, her head could end up as the grizzly decoration at the end of a pike.

  Chapter 30

  Churning

  Lisella Ontar felt the warmth of the sun on her face as she stood on her balcony waiting to be summoned for the ceremony that would bring her fifty more Bloodborn. The billowing vine of ice blossoms that had entwined her balcony’s stone railing was in full bloom, its light sweet perfume confirming her fears. Irkhir’s scouts reported that the pass was clear and open. The snow and ice that had guarded the only southern entrance to the Anwar Region was completely washed away. Melted! Any gully was now a running stream but other than that the once treacherous trek up the pass, a trip that had felled more of their would-be enemies than the Ontar’s axes ever had, was now nothing more than a beautiful uphill stroll through springtime woodlands.

  The wall and its twin gate towers were now the true defense of Ontar Hold. Any army stupid enough to face the Bloodborn would pay dearly for the mistake, but while the huge transformed warriors were away, she wouldn’t put it past the clans to mount an attack right here at her throat.

  As Captain of the guard, she needed Tristan right where he was, with his mind and eyes on that pass. Her heart raced a bit at the thought of the man and she stifled it away under the avalanche of worries she had been pouring over in her mind. It amazed and bothered her that, even after all this time, Tristan still affected her the way he did.

  It was the Caller’s fault. Ever since she stood there on top of the tower, watching how he and his kiss carried on, the memories of hers’ and Tristan’s young love seemed to keep popping up at the most inopportune moments. Sometimes she couldn’t think straight.

  She let her eyes flit across the top of the wall, looking for a reason to be mad at him. Yet all she saw there were crisp and polished men posted at tight intervals. Tristan’s men were the picture of vigilance.

  A crinkle of leather behind her caught her attention. It must have been Irkhir. He was the only man they would have let into her chambers without an announcement. He was probably coming to get her for the ceremony. She had to remember that they decided to stop calling it a sacrifice. Too gruesome a name for a gift as heady as what the dra was doing for her people.

  “Already?” She asked.

  “Mistress.” A familiar harsh voice grated. It wasn’t Irkhir.

  Lisella Ontar spun around to find one of the First bowing at the entrance to her balcony.

  “What are you doing in my chambers, First?”

  “Forgive me my Mistress. You did not hear me calling from the entrance. Irkhir will skin me if I don’t bring you immediately to the chamber.”

  When the man’s head rose Lisella recognized the face. It was one of the very first of the Bloodborn. How could she forget him? He was the unfortunate man that had put the first girl into the chamber. He hadn’t liked it one bit. She liked that. Who would? But she needed men who would do what was commanded whether it bothered them or not.

  Empires were built with blood…

  “Mattig,” She started walking back inside as the man rose to his feet. “Is everything ready so soon?”

  “He told me he would cut out my tongue if I told you any more than I have already.”

  “Sounds like Irkhir.” She responded as acid instantly started churning in the pit of her stomach.

  Whatever it was it wasn’t good.

  Chapter 31

  Widow’s Breath

  “Widow’s breath...” Irkhir held up the bottle of poison left outside the chain walls of the dra’s cage. “We think whoever did it probably sprinkled it on some evergreen.” The oversize warrior’s voice sounded like stone grinding on stone as he gestured with a hand the size of a small animal. “We found a few spruce needles stained with it over there.”

  Lisella Ontar stood fuming. The dra lay motionless beneath the foot of the beautifully carved white altar. Normally its rippling hide was blue, that of the brightest of skies, as if it had taken on the feel of where it felt most at home. When the wondrous beast was deprived of its desired sustenance of living evergreen, it lost some of its sapphire hue. Once it reached a particular shade they knew it was time to bring on the sacrifice. Yet even that faded blue was still very beautiful to behold. Lisella swallowed down the bile that wanted to erupt from her stomach. The once beautiful creature, their gift from the creator, who willed that Ontar would rule the known world in strength not seen in thousands of years, lay dead in a pale ashen heap, like a gray shadow of its living glory.

  Lisella rubbed her temples, letting her eyes adjust to the feel of the room. The way the place had been meticulously carved to look like wind itself, she always had the unsettling feeling that the place was swirling all around her. The fact that they were standing atop a hundred foot tall tower that jutted up into the middle of the place didn’t help.

  First, Tristan, with his grizzly news of a finger stealing killer running amok through her own hold. Now this. She had twenty six hundred men awaiting the blood that would transform them into the weapons she needed to push through the rest of the Anwar while the weather was still good. They were all waiting for a dead beast whose masters stood by and let be killed.

  Lisella glared down at the men around her, ignoring the fact that they all stood head and shoulders above her. She didn’t care that they were covered in hardened leather and bright armor plate. Or that every one of them wore two wickedly curved axes, one at each hip. They needed to remember who their Mistress was. She was their reason for bleeding. For breathing.

  “What does it matter how it is dead? It is dead! We have an army afield waiting for reinforcements and the mighty First can’t even guard its own house.” Lisella roared at the men surrounding her.

  Every head bent. Armor plate hit the stone floor as the First hit knees.

  “Who guarded the dra when this happened?”

  “I, Mistress.” One of the warriors looked up at her, eyes level with hers even though he was kneeling. He didn’t offer any excuses. He didn’t say anything other than that. He nodded, removed both of his axes, and crossed them over his chest.

  Every man of the First knew all too well what was at stake but she needed to remind them. They needed to understand that this was not a game. People’s lives, their people’s lives were at stake in this. The entire Anwarian Range had been loyal to Flameshelm for a thousand years. But loyalty to Flameshelm was loyalty to who they saw as the strongest of the clans. The one who had the best chance of unifying the vast region was by default the ruler. Anwarians were loyal to strength and so therefore to themselves. They would side with whatever house they saw as the strongest. If the First wasn’t reinforced soon, the other clans would smell weakness. They would unite beneath Flameshelm’s bann
er and rain steel down on their heads like a volcano. They would be surrounded, starved, and killed to a man.

  “Failure is not an option I will tolerate, not even amongst my First. Especially, not my First.” She turned to the soldier who still knelt grasping his curved axes to his chest. “Lay down your steel.”

  The eyes of the men of the First shot from him to her. A few nervously looked at Irkhir as if they thought he might intervene. They had all expected the man to die, but surely he would meet the creator with the axes he had won. For a warrior to die without his axes in hand was a tragedy only meant for the gravest of crimes. Better that he had been stillborn than to be stripped of his honor in the next life.

  “Your name will be stricken from the ranks. Your family will not be paid the death sum. You have failed us all.” She held his gaze on hers, unwavering, as his face went so red she thought he might die on the spot. As a single tear leaked down his cheek into his mustache, the man uncoiled his arms. He stared at his trembling axes as he slowly, gingerly, reverently, laid both axes on the cold hard stone. His giant fingers lingered there on the heavy handles, like he caressed a lover for the last time.

  Lisella’s hand flew out from her side, her dagger blade flashing in a descending lethal silver arc. The crunch of the razor sharp blade smashing through the base of the man’s neck echoed through the chamber. The warrior’s arms flung to his sides and his eyes instantly spun so far to the back of his head that only the whites were visible. Lisella twisted the blade with a sharp final flourish and yanked it free. Blood and fluid spurted from the man like a fountain. It sprayed across her face and showered every man beside him even as the sound of her dagger severing bone still reverberated through the chamber like a thousand dwindling cracks.

  “His family will be the first we feed to the dra.” Lisella Ontar, covered in blood, still wielding her dagger, stood feet planted wide, as she eyed each and every one of them. A few questioning eyes shot from the dead dra and back up at her. Obviously some of them were paying attention, wondering how she was going to feed a living sacrifice to a dead dra.