The Sword of Life (Chronicles of the Magi Book 1)

by Dave Morris

  While he spoke, Icon was laboriously fitting the huge bones of the skeleton into place on the iron frame. Gradually a towering figure took shape, the fleshless remnants of the long dead giant. When everything else was completed to Icon’s satisfaction, he fetched the massive domed head and lifted it up to the top of the frame. As he did, a cold dry wind whipped up around the atoll.

  ‘Skrymir’s soul is returning from the dead.’ Icon smiled in satisfaction, though there was a nervous gleam in his eyes.

  Caelestis had been wrenching desperately at the violet tendrils, but they were as strong as steel cables. He gave up the effort and glanced over to his friend. Incredibly, Altor had managed to get to his feet and retrieve his sword, but he was reeling with weakness and looked on the point of passing out. With his left hand pressed to the blood-soaked bandage around his thigh, he took a faltering step towards Icon.

  Icon noticed the movement out of the corner of his eye. He began to turn, his hands already coming up instinctively to fashion a spell.

  ‘Icon,’ said a voice from behind him. ‘Icon, it’s Magus Zyn.’

  Icon looked round. There was no-one there. Too late he realized he’d been tricked by Caelestis’s ventriloquism. He conjured a gout of red fire in his hand and, whirling, drew it back to hurl at Altor.

  The young warrior-monk had no other choice. He was too weak to run. Calling on his last reserves of strength he threw the silver sword -

  The red flame dropped from Icon’s fingers. He stared down in amazement at the blade protruding from his chest. His face was ashen and contorted with pain but, instead of falling, he reached down and pulled the weapon out, flinging it away as though the silver metal burned him.

  ‘My magic shall sustain me until I have time to heal,’ he groaned, forcing each word through a snarl of agony. ‘But I must retreat to lick my wounds, and so you’ve thwarted me. Be warned: Aiken of the Utayama remembers his foes...’

  Glaring coldly at them as blood trickled from his mouth, he spat the words of a spell of transformation. Rapidly his body dissolved into a red mist which seeped down the side of the atoll.

  Caelestis felt the tendrils loosen from around his ankles. Tugging free, he hurried over to Altor in time to stop him from falling over.

  ‘It’s okay,’ said Altor, swaying back onto his feet. ‘The pain’s going now. Icon’s spell must have been broken.’

  ‘I think he had to use all his magic just to keep body and soul together. Even so, you’ve lost a lot of blood.’

  Altor shook his head to clear it. ‘Can’t worry about that now... The giant...’

  They both looked at the skeleton hanging on its iron frame. Already patches of skin were sprouting like fungus on the dry bones. A spark of life glimmered deep in the sockets of the skull.

  Caelestis could only think of one way to counter such sorcery. He held up his ring and called on the Faltyn. It appeared in a burst of blue smoke, its habitual expression of vacant insolence turning at once to undisguised terror. ‘Send me back!’ it cried.

  ‘Send you back? I want to stop the giant returning to life first!’

  The Faltyn took no notice. ‘I do not care to involve myself in the affairs of Magus Zyn and his creature. Put me back in the ring, I beg you!’

  The skull’s jaw dropped open to suck in breath. ‘First use your magic,’ insisted Caelestis.

  ‘I have no magic strong enough! No, I must depart at once! Here, take back the gem I extorted from you earlier—only let me go back!’

  So saying, it pressed the pommel stone into Caelestis’ hands. Seeing that argument was futile, Caelestis dismissed it with a scowl.

  Strong sinews spread across the huge skeleton. The sagging skin filled with muscle. Altor staggered forward to retrieve his sword. Caelestis saw that it was futile. They could do nothing against the power of the giant—if his magic ring was not sufficient then neither would the silver sword be. Then, as he felt the pommel stone in his hand, he remembered the third of Larisha’s gifts...

  He fished it from his pocket: the sparkling orange gemstone that Larisha had described as the last breath of a dragon-lord.

  Caelestis glanced up at the frame. The giant was almost whole. There was just time. Darting forward past Altor, he popped the orange gem into the giant’s gaping mouth.

  Skrymir flexed his arms. The iron frame now formed a suit of armour around his rock-muscled body. His beard sparkled with icicles, his eyes burned like frost. He rose slowly to his feet and the ground shook as he moved. Towering high as the shadow of a great glacier, he raised his head towards the cavern roof and gave a shout of exultation that shook the very bedrock.

  ‘Skrymir stands once more upon the earth!’ he cried. ‘The rime of the northland fills his thews. The land reverberates to his battle-roar. Let the would-be magi who crouch upon the old thrones of Krarth beware—they shall not see another dawn, for the sky then shall be washed with their blood.’

  His voice was as terrifying as thunder, as wild as a primeval storm. Altor and Caelestis saw that they could never hope to battle such a creature. To him they were less than ants. Small wonder that the Faltyn had fled in abject fear. If the magi in the city above knew of Skrymir’s resurrection, they must be trembling now.

  The giant turned towards the flickering beam above the Emblem of Victory and gave a roar of both delight and hatred. Climbing to the very peak of the atoll, he knocked the Emblem aside and stood bathed in the beam for an instant. As the spell took hold, he shimmered and faded.

  ‘He’s gone to the surface, where he’ll wreak havoc no doubt,’ said Altor. ‘Somehow I don’t think we can expect a reward.’

  ‘Well, at least I got your pommel stone back.’ Caelestis handed it to him.

  Altor looked at it a moment, then closed it in a strong grip. ‘When I think of everything we’ve been through for this...’

  ‘Was it worth it, I wonder?’

  ‘It was to me,’ said Altor. ‘All I wanted was to honour my vow to a dying man. Now I think that perhaps I should have agreed to complete his quest, as he asked me first, for I believe it to be an honourable one. There is nothing in the world worth more than honour, Caelestis.’

  ‘Except for food, wine and a hot bath.’ Caelestis chuckled bleakly.

  ‘What now?’ said Altor, glancing at the Emblem of Victory. ‘I don’t relish what we’ll find above, with Skrymir marauding through the Keep.’

  As if in answer a distant spout of flame flared indistinctly through the mist.

  ‘Well, we can’t stay here,’ said Caelestis.

  They reached for the fallen Emblem and together carried it to the peak. Weariness weighed them down after their long ordeal, but they knew it wasn’t over yet. Somehow they still had to escape from Kalugen’s Keep before Skrymir took his bloody vengeance on the city and all within it.

  They exchanged a look. Altor was grimly determined. Caelestis cracked a smile. ‘Here goes nothing,’ he said.

  The beam shone starkly around them and they disappeared.

  An instant later they found themselves in the Great Hall of the magi. The scene that greeted them was one of carnage and confusion.

  Skrymir was pacing the length of the hall spreading destruction in his wake. Bodies lay crushed and moaning, a horde of frantic courtiers and servants clogged the exits, screams came from all sides as the angry giant ripped blocks of masonry from the walls and hurled them at the crowd.

  Several of the magi had collected their wits enough to flee, disappearing off to the safety of their distant citadels along inter-dimensional corridors opened by magic in the air.

  Others had not been so quick to react. Among the dead were the pulped corpses of Magus Uru and cruel Magus Kalugen. Magus Venzor lay not far off, groaning piteously in his death-throes. His body had been crushed when Skrymir stepped on him.

  The giant paused in his violent rage and fixed the occupants of the hall with a look of blizzard-fury. ‘To live again!’ he thundered. ‘To turn about the yoke of de
ath and place it upon the magi’s necks! This is all I dreamt of in my centuried sleep. So now, you magi, quake in fear. Bolt the gates of your citadels. Marshal your armies and your puny magics. Skrymir strides the world once more, and this time his iron-shod feet shall tread your mortal bodies into the mire!’

  Altor took Caelestis’ arm and pointed towards an exit, intending that they should slip away in the confusion, but then they both felt Skrymir’s dark gaze on them. The feeling was like the first frost of a cruel winter. Slowly they turned to face him.

  ‘Skrymir was raised from his grave by mortal hand,’ murmured the giant menacingly. ‘Is this meet? Should the proud Lord of Jotunheim endure such shameful obligation? No! You two must take my place in death, and bear a message from me to the Queen of Hell. Tell her that before another day is spent I shall be sending her a host of souls—enough to swell the borders of her realm!’

  He took a heavy step along the hall, provoking the watching courtiers to fresh bleats of terror. But Altor and Caelestis stood fast, defiantly facing the giant.

  ‘You’re a frost giant, isn’t that so?’ said Caelestis.

  Skrymir paused, confused. ‘My home is a land of hard winds and ice-rimed peaks, of—‘

  ‘Yeah, yeah.’ Caelestis covered a yawn and turned to Altor. ‘He’s a frost giant all right.’

  Altor didn’t know what Caelestis was planning, but he had learned to trust his friend’s wiles. ‘He certainly talks enough for twenty giants,’ he said scornfully. ‘But talk is cheap.’

  Skrymir roared and pounded his foot on the floor. The walls shook and masonry dust rained down from cracks in the roof. ‘By the blood of the old gods!’ he snarled. ‘For this insolence your deaths will be painful indeed.’

  ‘You’re full of hot air, Skrymir,’ said Caelestis.

  Skrymir was enraged beyond words. He stooped to snatch Caelestis in his hand, but was prevented by an enormous belch that caused his to clap his fingers to his mouth. A wisp of steam curled from between his lips. His expression turned from anger to puzzlement and then dismay.

  ‘What’s the matter, giant?’ taunted Altor, remembering now the magic gem that Caelestis had tossed into Skrymir’s mouth.

  ‘I think it’s something he ate,’ said Caelestis.

  Skrymir clutched at his stomach and gave vent to a long scream of agony that shook the building and forced everyone to cover their ears. Altor and Caelestis looked up, and in the wind that issued from the giant’s throat they saw red sparks that blazed with all the fury of a dragon’s last breath.

  Then Skrymir fell, smashing to the floor with such force that the marble flagstones cracked and people were thrown off their feet. Through the clouds of stone-dust thrown up they saw him gave a short convulsive spasm as the burning flame exploded within his belly. A creature of frost, he could not endure the power of heat and flame. The smell of brimstone and charred flesh filled the air, spreading in a cloud of black smoke. Even as they watched, the fire spread through the huge body and within seconds it had been reduced to ashes. This time not even Skrymir’s bones remained.

  Altor and Caelestis had seen so many horrors that day. Now they felt drained, bone-weary. Numbly they turned away from the smouldering cinders that marked a giant’s shadow on the broken floor. Pushing their way to the exit through the press of ashen-faced guards and courtiers, they emerged from the choking clouds of sulphur-smoke into the clean raw wind of early evening.

  Fifteen:

  The End of the Beginning

  ‘You don’t have to come,’ Altor was saying. ‘Just tell me where Janirus lives.’

  Caelestis shook his head. ‘I think it’s better if I show you the way.’

  Powdery snow had begun to swirl down out of the charcoal sky. The square was deserted, the street lamps unlit. Kalugen’s soldiers were in confusion. With their master dead, they were more interested in looting his palaces than in patrolling the byways of the Keep. All sensible citizens stayed barred inside their homes.

  Altor and Caelestis stepped into the lee of a building, out of the biting wind. ‘It’s just up ahead,’ said Caelestis.

  Altor nodded and, gripping the pommel stone in his left hand, started along the street. The lantern in his other hand cast a blurry beam of light through the snow.

  Caelestis caught his arm. ‘Wait, I’ve got to explain something first...’

  Altor glanced back. The firm set of his jaw betokened impatience, but then he relaxed. He had gone through so much to deliver the harpist’s stone; another few minutes wouldn’t make much difference.

  ‘Okay,’ he said.

  Caelestis, who was never normally at a loss for words, chewed his lip pensively. ‘The old man who gave you the stone,’ he said at last. ‘He said you were to give it to Janirus.’

  ‘I already told you that.’ Altor was getting impatient again.

  ‘Yes, yes. But think back, Altor. What did he say exactly?’

  Altor cast his mind back to that night in the forest glade. Incredible to think that it had been only a few weeks ago—so much had happened since then. Altor felt that he had left his monastery as a boy and would be returning a man.

  ‘He said the stone was part of a sword...’ he remembered. ‘He wanted me to unite it with the other pieces. There were five pieces in all—no, that’s not it. There were five foes—‘

  ‘The Five?’ said Caelestis with emphasis.

  ‘Yes. Does that mean anything?’

  ‘You know the comets that streak nightly across the sky above Krarth? People call them the Five. They are stars of ill omen. Some say they’re the ghosts of five of the True Magi.’

  Altor nodded. ‘I believe that may be what the harpist was trying to tell me. The Five are planning to resurrect themselves, the way that Magus Zyn arranged for Skrymir to live again. The harpist wanted me to find the parts of the Sword of Life and stop them...’

  His voice trailed off and he looked up into the night sky. The comets were hidden beyond the veils of snow and cloud, but their baleful presence could still be felt. Altor realized now that he’d been aware of it since arriving in Krarth.

  ‘What about Janirus?’

  Caelestis’s question broke him out of his reverie.

  ‘The harpist said that if I couldn’t take on the quest I should deliver the pommel stone to Janirus. ‘Then you’ll know,’ were his last words. Know what, I wonder?’

  ‘Why couldn’t you take on the quest?’

  ‘How can I?’ Altor waved the hand holding the stone in a vague gesture of helplessness. ‘My duty is to get back to my monastery.’

  ‘But you went through the Battlepits to get the stone back. That was a quest, wasn’t it?’

  ‘I’m doing what I said I would. I’m going to pass it on to Janirus and that’s where my involvement ends.’

  ‘You don’t sound all that certain.’

  Altor scowled, annoyed at himself. He had planned all along to give the pommel stone to Janirus and then be done with it. Now that he was about to do that, why was he having second thoughts?

  He set off along the street. Caelestis hurried to catch up. ‘I think you’d better prepare yourself for a bit of a shock...’

  Altor wasn’t listening. The street ended in a small cobbled square with a water pump in the middle. Thin spines of ice dripped from the mouth of the pump. Behind, on the wall of a building was something that Altor took to be a door.

  ‘Is that where Janirus lives?’ he said.

  Caelestis didn’t answer.

  Altor stepped past the pump and raised the lantern. He could just make out a word written high up on the wall. It was weathered, worn away by time, half faded back into the ancient stones from which it had been carved.

  ‘Janirus...’

  What he had taken for a door was simply a sheet of rough bronze fixed into the wall. He put down the lantern and touched the bronze. The frost had made it so cold that his fingers stuck to the surface. He pulled them away.

  Caelestis came over an
d used the sleeve of his coat to wipe away the frost. Altor looked again. His own image gazed back at him, dim and dark as if seen through smoked glass.

  ‘Janirus is the name of this spring,’ explained Caelestis. ‘It was also the name of a wandering priest who came to the Keep a long time ago. Apparently had intended to obtain a position at Magus Kalugen’s court, but he found he could not turn a blind eye to the cruelty and injustice here. He preached against Kalugen, who had him arrested and put to death. The next day a freshwater spring appeared on the street corner where he was executed. Right where we’re standing. Kalugen was too frightened of such holy magic to do anything about it, so the pump was put here and people can come to get clean water whenever they want.’

  Altor nodded thoughtfully. ‘And the bronze mirror?’

  ‘I don’t know who put that up. I’ve come to get water here myself, and in daylight you can clearly see yourself in the mirror. But as to what it means—who can say?’

  ‘I think I know.’ Altor stared at the pommel stone, glinting dully in the faint lantern-light. He came to a decision. Looking up into the night sky, he called in a strong voice: ‘Hear this oath, you ghosts of the old magi. I, who have been entrusted with this stone, shall find the other parts of the Sword of Life. Therefore heed this, your only warning. Remain among the dead; do not seek to re-enter the world and pollute it with your ancient depravities. If you try to descend once more to the mortal vale, Altor of Ellesland will be waiting for you. You shall not prevail!’

  To this challenge there was no answer, unless you counted the mirthful howling of the night wind. On a deserted street in Krarth, two youths stood under the brooding sky and felt the weight of destiny.

  TO BE CONTINUED

  Copyright © 1997, 2016 Dave Morris

  The right of Dave Morris to be identified as the Author of this Work has been asserted by him in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without prior permission of the author.