Battle Mage: A Hero's Welcome (A Tale of Alus Book 8)

by Donald Wigboldy

  A woman’s voice cries out weakly.

  A green bulb changes and the sounds of nearby cars drown out another sound, the sound of flesh tearing and blood dripping to the ground where it escapes the mouth of the predator.

  The woman’s voice continues to call for help, but her strength is fading and her sounds seem to go unheard. The creature continues to draw out her blood, feasting. It has done this before, though he is still young and new to the feeding to sate his hunger. The predator that was once a man is now merely a vessel of desire for the only food that will stop his hunger, if only for awhile. The woman’s head lolls to the side, her energy spent as her life begins to fade.

  The scuff from the roof top above draws the predator’s attention, though human ears could not have heard the faint sounds from nearly thirty feet away. The creature no longer needs to hunt, but he will not leave a witness to his deed. Still dripping blood from his chin, the creature leaps high upon the near wall and bounds from it across the alley to the far wall. A third leap brings it to the lip of the building and the creature searches for the source of the sound.

  Night vision picking out heat sources, the creature quickly finds the man. The voyeur is calm. The murder and the monster which created it bring no fear or seemingly any emotion from the man. The creature should have wondered at such a thing, but its bloodlust clouded judgment. The man must die, it thinks and no other option presents itself.

  Leaping forward to attack, the predator’s claws search for the man’s throat. It will rip the life from his body, or so it thinks, but as its claws slice the air before its target, the man moves with amazing speed side stepping the killing blow.

  The predator feels pain from the side of its chest.

  Glancing down, the creature sees blood dripping and bands of flesh and cloth swaying as it turns to face the man. Confusion etches it features. The mouth opens revealing extended incisors. The eyes are all white save its irises. Ears, nearly pointed, are oversized and acute of hearing. It hears the man’s heartbeat thrumming steadily.

  It looks at the man more closely. Reason begins to override bloodlust and the creature notes four ivory claws dripping with his blood. Virtually gleaming white even in the wane moonlight, the claws extend unnaturally from the man’s right hand. There is a glint of steel from the man’s side. A sword rests upon his hip where the moon catches the metal hilt revealing the blade still sheathed.

  Arrogance in the predator’s strengths, well beyond human now, convince it to attack again. It is a mistake. The clawed hand swipes across its chest tearing through bone and flesh alike. A back swing, as the predator stumbles back in shock, removes the head at the neck.

  The heart is bared. It thumps, even as the body falls to its knees. The man calmly stabs the claws through a black diseased looking heart. Pierced, the heart stops and begins to burn. As the man steps back withdrawing his claws, the torso catches flame and soon the whole body is afire.

  Knowing the creature is dead, the man steps to the edge of the building above the site of the kill. With a vampire’s corpse behind him, the man knows that the story may not be over. He jumps over the edge, but instead of injuring himself thirty feet below; the man seems to slow his fall. At half the speed he should be falling, the man touches down without harm.

  He checks the woman and finds a ragged pulse. Taking a dagger from another sheath, the man cuts his hand and places it over the wound in the woman’s neck. His blood enters her wound. With a cry of pain, the woman wrenches her body from the pavement with a quick jolt. The wound seems to burn, though not the way of the vampire. The torn skin cauterizes and heals as if there has been no attack.

  Falling back towards the alleyway floor, the woman fades back towards unconsciousness. The man catches the woman as she collapses backward. Checking her pulse again, he finds her heart strengthening. Apparently out of danger, the man pulls out his cell phone.

  “Marek,” he states, “there’s a little clean up for you.”

  It is not long before they come. The man, with his claws now hidden, waits for them on the roof. The vampire’s head sits on a furnace cap near the body’s remains. Burned near to ash, there is little left of the body and even much of its clothes are reduced to char. The man had found a wallet mostly intact. As the quartet leaps onto the building from the darkness, the man’s wallet is thrown to the leader.

  “Recognize him?” the first man asks before the others can barely slow themselves in front of the ash.

  “Leonard Newton? No, I can’t say that I do,” the man’s English holds the trace of something eastern European, but it is only slight. Years of practice have removed much of it since the two had met so long ago.

  The monster slayer points to the head. “Someone in your clan may recognize him. He seems only recently changed, maybe someone didn’t finish a kill? You know your people can call me so we can avoid this sort of thing, Marek?”

  “Of course they do, Nicholas,” he pauses, “if that is the name you still go by today.”

  The man addressed as Nicholas smiles a half hearted glance in recognition of the attempted joke. “It is for now, yes.” Quickly returning to the matter at hand, he adds, “Do you think we have someone new moving into the territory? Maybe he’s just some loaner wandering in off the train or something?”

  Marek shakes his head as he offers the wallet as evidence. “Chicago. He lives less than half a mile from here. If there’s someone new converting people, my crew hasn’t brought them to my attention.”

  Nodding in answer, Nicholas responds, “Alert them to keep watch. We can’t afford to have someone creating feral spawn and leaving them to cause a mess we can’t hide. We’ve worked too long to keep your people out of the media to have some careless vampire exposing us now.”

  The others nod.

  A moment’s thought brings a new question from the vampire slayer. “How is your stores of the blood holding up?”

  “The clan should be fine with what we have for a month.”

  “Good. I part with it to avoid this sort of thing.

  “Did you bring a car or just fly over? There’s a woman down below that can be brought to a hospital.”

  Marek nods. “Of course, we did. You said there was clean up. Jake parked a street north just in case. We can get her and the remains removed. I assume that you treated her in time?”

  Sniffing in mock arrogance, Nick replies, “Don’t I always?”

  A slight chuckle from the group precedes Marek’s friendly retort, “Well, you are getting older, voran. If you were just a human, you would be dust, so it’s understandable that you might start to forget things.”

  “Humph, you better hope that I don’t get so old that I forget we’re friends, you silly old bat. I still remember the day I decided to spare the scrawny yearling hiding from its sire. As long as I am around, we can maintain the peace. If I were getting too old, we’d have to find someone else willing to prolong it.”

  Marek sighs, “You are entirely too serious, my friend. We know your mentor still lives and she’s centuries older than you. Must you always head for the doom and gloom when we talk?

  “Come, Nicholas, the night is still young and beautiful. Smile and join us later for a run across the rooftops. We can even keep an eye out for more trouble, peace keeper. That way you can even feel that you’re making a serious attempt at remaining serious,” the man finishes with a chuckle.

  “Running with this lot will make me old before my time. You and your clan can play without me this time. Just make sure the woman gets to a hospital and make sure her memory is properly adjusted. There’s no sense sending the poor woman to an asylum on top of this.”

  The quartet laughs. “You’re almost showing a sense of humor, my friend, but we will accept your refusal this time. Soon we must get you out here with us. It’s fun. You might actually like fun.”

  Again the others laugh, but Nick is already cinching his long jacket tighter with his belt. It is getting colder even as winter was
supposed to be relinquishing its hold. Some years Chicago just refused to let spring come and then it would skip to the heat of summer.

  With a last parting farewell, the man, known as a voran, moves off into the darkness.

  For the Original Story of Gerid the Grimnal Read:

  The High King: A Tale of Alus

  Chapter 11- A Berserker Among Us

  Gerid wiped the sweat from his dirty brow. Leaning on his shovel, he turned to survey his progress. The dark line of the new irrigation channel, which he had been working on, appeared dark against the summer sun's bleached earth. The scrawny shoots of the Taltan continent's main staple, cracker corn sprang up in rows to either side.

  Summer was half over now. Nearly two months of slavery showed themselves in the hard calluses that were even rougher than from working in his family holdings. His upper body and face were dark brown from exposure to the sun, a stark contrast to his silvery, white hair. The youth still had to smile in satisfaction at his progress. The herculean feats that he had performed had begun to get Holtein's notice by now. New plans to impress the slave holders and ways of finally winning his freedom continually played in his mind. This channel, for instance, would normally take five men to complete in the same amount of time his pace would complete it, if he could keep it up. The smile played about his lips still as he returned to the hard labor.

  "Gerid!"

  He looked up to see Mateil coming through the path between patches of growth. The shovel was powerfully driven into the earth one more time and he left it to stand by itself. "What can I do for you, Mateil?"

  "Leoltus wants you to come to the soldiers' barracks immediately along with most of the servants. He wouldn't say why, but that it was extremely urgent."

  Gerid tugged the tool free of the earth and followed. On their arrival at the barracks, they found nearly every male slave that the Holteins owned gathered around the foreman. The men stood in various states of anxiousness awaiting Leoltus' news, but, when Gerid was entering the building, he had spied three men that he had

  seen very seldom in his stay at the farm. Karma, the only son of Master Carter Holtein, a dark haired, handsome young man, stood with two of his bodyguards wearing their light armor. Upon seeing the master’s son in his armor, the men all began whispering to each other in their surprise and a new wave of questions were whispered about.

  "Quiet! Quiet, all of you," Leoltus ordered. "Master Karma has come to deliver some important news, so be quiet."

  The slaves quieted as the young man moved to the center of those gathered there. "I'll get straight to the point. We've had word that there are bandits in the area headed here from the southern hills. We don't know if they're Tolmonan soldiers or simply bandits, but until King Colona can recall a brigade to deal with them, the farms to the south of the capitol are on their own.

  "My father cannot come here now, so I will lead you in the defense of our home in his absence."

  "And what do we fight with, our hands?" Gerid asked casually.

  Karma's eyes narrowed from annoyance. The guardsmen tensed towards their weapons in slight surprise at the rare questioning of the master's authority. Seeing that it was the rather intimidating giant, Gerid who had spoken, Karma held up a restraining hand to his men. Gerid thought that he saw relief in their eyes despite the weapons in their hands. He was nearly a head taller than even the tallest man here and holding a shovel that could be used as a weapon gave him a strong presence within the room. On top of that, they all knew the feats of strength that he had performed in the past months even within the main house as well. "That's why I had you all called here. Though you are all only slaves

  and untrained in battle, we still have weapons and shields. There is even leather armor here, such as it is. My men and I can try and show you what we can before the bandits arrive. They may not even arrive here, since the reports are not completely clear, but we must still prepare for the worst."

  Gerid didn't bother to reply to what he thought of that type of thinking. There was little that untrained men could learn if they faced real swordsmen, but instead of worrying over that point, the nearly two score slaves spent the next half an hour finding weapons that the mercenaries who had been trained at the Holtein's facilities had left behind. He had taken a stout club studded with nails and a foot and a half long knife for his own. Gerid figured that, if the bandits were well armed, as was probable, then he could steal a proper sword from one of the fallen enemies. If they weren't well armed, of course, the club would suffice in his strong hands.

  Leoltus moved over to him clad in mail. Karma had apparently decided that his overseer deserved better than the leathers which would do little more than the clothes that Gerid wore. "Aren't you going to put on some armor, boy? At least grab a shield."

  A wry smile crossed his face as he looked up from his seat on a bale of hay. "I'm too big to wear anything in there and a shield just isn't my style. I prefer two weapons. They're a lot quicker and less clumsy. If they use arrows, then I'll worry. Maybe I can hide behind you instead," he suggested with a grin.

  The older man laughed, "I'll lend you my shield and hide behind you more likely, thank you." His face began to change as he seemed to reappraise Gerid again. "You seem awfully confident. Were you a soldier already back in your old home despite your young age, boy?"

  "I've had some training though not in battle. A few duels that I found myself in with Lord Merrick's soldiers caused most of the circumstances which have brought me here. It was because I won them all, however."

  "Excellent." At Gerid's look, the older man amended, "Your training I mean, of course. If those bandits do come, I think that I'll be standing at your side. Master Karma has had some training as has his guards, but I doubt that they've truly been tested in a real battle either. I'll get Baitram, Jatan, and Mateil to join us. They've fought before though they were only trained in the basics before they were sold to the Holteins."

  "Do any of the others know how to fight?"

  "Not with the sword that I know of."

  "Then do you think that we should all stay together or try to lead the others through the attack?"

  Leoltus gave him a look that was meant to express the wisdom of all the overseer's years. With a shake of his head, he said gravely, "It may seem nobler to lead them to their probable doom, but we can do more by staying together. I'll get the others."

  As the man went to gather the other men who had become nearly like a family to him here, Gerid watched as Karma and his men sparred with the slaves in an effort to show them whatever techniques that they could. He had avoided them until now, but the giant arose from the seat he had taken and moved towards the trio and their students. After a short while of watching closely, he spoke to Karma as he paused, "You're leaving yourself wide open."

  "What?" the master’s son cried out in annoyance. With a hand raised to hold back the next student from approaching, Karma stared at his addresser with a mixture of anger and disbelief that any would dare second guess him. "What did you say, boy?"

  Gerid nearly laughed at the idea of the twenty year olds use of words for him. He answered instead, "Your shield is too low. If a blow is slashed at your face, you'll be unable to stop it in time."

  Karma's face was darkening swiftly with the red of anger at his insubordination. Gerid quickly realized that he had forgotten himself. It hadn't been the first time in his recent life, of course. He just seemed to enjoy ticking off authority figures with or without intention, especially when it was only inherited and not earned. Merrick's soldiers had probably at least earned their positions, but not Karma as far as Gerid was concerned. He almost missed Karma's order. "Prove it," the master said gesturing to a place before him.

  "Are you sure, Master Karma? You won't be too angry with me or embarrassed if I show you this?" the young slave asked as he remembered his current status.

  The master's eyes crinkled with disdain and he raised his nose slightly as if he had scented something rotting bef
ore him. Karma believed that no common slave, no matter how large, could possibly have learned enough to surpass his own skills learned from his father’s mercenaries. "Now," he ordered again.

  Gerid stepped forward already watching the other man carefully, though he still noted the slave students all moving slightly away around them. The area went still as the others all drew back and the guards and their students turned to watch as well. He only half noticed Leoltus' look of worry as he clapped a hand over his eyes as if to block the sight though he quickly lowered it again to watch the event.

  Right hand swinging the club half heartedly at the man's shield, the knife slashed quickly behind only to be repelled by the sword in Karma's right hand. The smaller blade danced in a clang from the sword intentionally and counter slashed again towards the man's throat forcing the master to step back to avoid being cut.

  The club was in movement again and suddenly it thundered down upon the stout shield. Breath hissed through Karma's teeth as he gritted them from the contact. His eyes opened wider trying to adjust to the strength of the impact as he nearly lost his defense. Valiantly, the young master countered with his sword to drive the slashing knife away. Gerid deflected the attack away easily as he jabbed the club over the lowered shield just short of Karma's nose and stepped back laughing.

  "You see? When you drive in with your sword like that, your shield dips. These slaves couldn't see the opening to use it, but someone who does would have slashed your face with a blade. As it is, I could simply have chosen to club you to death instead."

  The sounds of Karma's teeth grinding angrily could be heard throughout the renewed silence in the

  exercise room. Gerid couldn't help himself as he added, "You might want to consider using a lighter blade as well by the way. That heavy thing is much slower than the light sword that I spied inside earlier. You seem to know how to use a sword well enough otherwise. I think that you’ll want to use your speed rather than power since you are only fighting some bandits. How trained can they be?"