The Scrolls of the Ancients

by Robert Newcomb

  Tristan turned his attention to the haggard woman seated next to him at the table. “And this must be your partial adept,” he rasped. “The woman you bragged about . . . in the palace . . . She was with you on the docks. She’s lovely . . .” His head slumped forward again.

  “How droll,” Krassus said. “But I suggest you save your sense of humor. Where you’re going, you will surely need it.” As he smiled, the creases in his thin cheeks deepened.

  Raising his head, Tristan tried desperately to clear his mind. He looked at the majestic scroll on the table.

  “The Scroll of the Vagaries?” he asked.

  “Yes,” Krassus answered simply.

  “And my brother, Wulfgar?” Tristan asked. “What of him?”

  “Unfortunately, he still eludes my grasp.” Krassus sighed. “But it is only a matter of time until we find him.”

  His mind finally clear, Tristan thought for a moment. Looking down, he saw that he was bound hand and foot with heavy strands of rope, and he could not reach his weapons. That was when he first realized that either the room was rocking, or his mind still was. Then the oil lamp swinging from the ceiling and the sounds and smells coming from the open window finally told him they were at sea. As his powers of concentration strengthened, so did the anger in his heart.

  He focused his eyes on Krassus. Something the wizard had just said had sparked a question within him.

  “You mentioned Farpoint,” Tristan said slowly. “What makes you think Wulfgar is there?”

  Krassus smiled. “I see no harm in answering that,” he said. “Your son Nicholas told me to search there, just before he met his untimely death atop the Gates of Dawn. Surely you remember that day.”

  Tristan’s brows came together in a frown. “How could Nicholas have known?”

  “The Heretics of the Guild told him,” Krassus said. “Your esteemed son’s magnificent powers allowed him mental communication with the Heretics—or didn’t you know that?” The wizard’s expression was one of wicked glee.

  “From their place in the heavens, they see everything,” he added. “In fact, due to my illness I will soon be joining them. It is a reward I look forward to.”

  “Where are you taking me?” Tristan growled.

  “To a place that is almost as old as the craft itself,” Krassus answered. “Nicholas told me of it, and it is said that many of magic’s greatest secrets can be found there. Some even say it is one of the places where it all began. If the winds hold, we should arrive there in less than a fortnight.”

  Tristan tried to twist his hands back and forth, testing his bonds. They were completely unforgiving. He turned his eyes back to Krassus.

  “This ship is full of slaves you branded that night on the Farpoint docks, isn’t it?” he asked.

  “Of course.”

  “And the consuls seated at the tables—they were testing the slaves’ blood, weren’t they? Then you ordered them branded accordingly, so that it would be easier to tell them apart later on.”

  Smiling, Krassus turned to Grizelda. “See, my dear,” he said. “I told you he was clever.” He turned back to Tristan. “Meet Grizelda, Chosen One. She is my personal partial adept, blaze-gazer, and herbmistress. She is the one who will find the Scroll of the Vigors for me.”

  “Unless Wigg and Faegan find it first,” Tristan said menacingly.

  “Oh, that will be quite impossible after today,” Krassus answered happily. “Before we sailed, I ordered something be done in Eutracia. It is happening as we speak, and it will change everything.”

  Tristan’s blood went cold. “What are you talking about?” he demanded. No reply came. “Tell me, you bastard!”

  “Oh, no, Chosen One,” Krassus said gently, almost as if he were talking to a child. “That would be revealing too much.” Silence settled over the room for a moment.

  “Why do you need all of these slaves?” Tristan finally asked. “Of what possible use could they be to you?”

  “For much the same reason I require your brother.” Krassus smiled. “But you will probably go to your death never having learned the answer.” Then the look in the wizard’s eyes intensified and he leaned forward, lovingly placing his hands on either side of the massive scroll.

  “You have yet to ask the one question that I thought would be foremost in your mind, Chosen One,” Krassus said.

  “And that is?” Tristan asked skeptically.

  “Why I allow you to live,” the wizard answered quietly.

  For a time, Tristan continued to glare at Krassus. Then he glanced at the haggard herbmistress. Grizelda only smiled back wickedly, exposing the absence of several teeth.

  “Very well,” Tristan finally said. “Why?”

  “Because I want to bear witness as you pay for your sins,” Krassus hissed softly. “The sin of killing your only son, Nicholas, the messiah who was also my master. That’s why we’re having this little talk. As you find yourself suffering by my hand today and in the future, I want you to know why.”

  Tristan’s jaw hardened. The wizard’s continual mentions of Nicholas conjured up conflicting emotions within him. He glared hatefully at the wizard across the table.

  “I would see him die a thousand times again, if need be,” Tristan whispered venomously. “He was of my seed, that much I cannot deny. But he was conceived in an act of violence, and against my will. His azure blood was adulterated with Forestallments placed there by the Heretics of the Guild, forcing him to cherish only the Vagaries. Much the same way I suspect he tainted your blood.”

  Seeing the anger rising in Krassus’ face, Tristan smiled. Having nothing to lose, he decided to press. “But in truth, how perfect could Nicholas have been? After all, his blood failed him just when he needed it most, did it not?” He again paused for a moment, allowing the import of his words sink in.

  “I didn’t kill Nicholas,” he finished. “I didn’t have to. His own imperfections did that job for me, while I watched. And I enjoyed it.”

  Krassus’ temper suddenly reached the boiling point. Standing up, he pointed an angry finger at the prince.

  “Liar!” he screamed. Standing, he walked around the desk.

  He slammed his fist into Tristan’s face with a force so great that the prince’s head hit the back of the chair. Azure blood snaked down from one corner of Tristan’s mouth as he shook his head, trying to clear his mind. Grasping Tristan’s hair, Krassus violently jerked the prince’s face up to meet his. Tristan’s eyes fluttered open. Bruises were already showing beneath the dark stubble.

  “You’re . . . very good at beating people who . . . can’t fight back . . . aren’t you?” Tristan croaked. “Why don’t you just use . . . the craft . . . to do it, traitor?”

  Krassus bent over the prince until their noses almost touched. “Because sometimes this is far more enjoyable,” he whispered. “And as I told the lead wizard that day in the palace, I’ve been ill.”

  “I will kill you,” Tristan snarled through his pain. “I swear it. You represent nothing but evil, like Nicholas . . . I will watch you die, just as I watched him. And I will enjoy that, too.”

  Krassus wrenched the prince’s head up farther. “Evil?” he replied. “He who has yet to be trained dares to call me evil? Don’t you know that there is no such thing as ‘good’ or ‘evil,’ Chosen One? There is only the Vigors or the Vagaries. There is still so much your wizards have not told you. But I would have thought your experiences with the Coven of Sorceresses would have taught you something. Tell me, dear prince, do you really believe Failee was ‘evil’? Or was she simply doing what she was born to do, compelled to do? Given the undeniable call of her left-leaning signature, did she truly have a choice? Don’t you see, you fool? It is the same with me. I’m not ‘evil.’ I don’t even know the meaning of the word.” Once again, he smiled wickedly. “You see, my dear prince, I simply have a different point of view.”

  With that, Krassus again slammed his fist—with a force supplemented by the craft—into Tr
istan’s face. This time the blow was even harder. It launched the chair off its feet and sent it crashing backward to the floor. The prince immediately went unconscious.

  Wasting no time, Krassus walked to the door and violently threw it open. Several demonslavers entered immediately, swords drawn.

  “Get this abomination of the craft out of my sight!” Krassus ordered them, pointing down at the prince. “Signal the Wayfarer and order her to come alongside. Transfer this refuse to her. I want him immediately ordered to the Wayfarer. He is to man an oaring station. And keep him in his clothes—I want him easily singled out from the rest. It should be most interesting to observe how that famous azure blood of his holds up.” Looking down at the bloodied prince, the wizard smiled again.

  “We’ll see how much he likes to row,” he added softly.

  “Begging your pardon, my lord,” one of the slavers said. “What shall we do with his weapons?”

  As Krassus looked at the prince’s dreggan and throwing knives, his lips came up into a sneer. “Strip him of them,” he answered. “Have them transferred to the other ship. I want nothing of this bastard left around to remind me of him.”

  Untying Tristan from his chair, the slavers lifted him up as if he were a rag doll and dragged him from the room on his toes.

  CHAPTER

  Sixteen

  Shailiha came awake first. Groaning slightly, she shook her head and opened her eyes to the sky above.

  The weather was unsettled in Shadowood, with dark, slow-moving clouds randomly checkerboarded among the white. The breeze was fairly strong, waving the new grass to and fro, and carried with it the unique, fresh smell of coming rain. Shailiha took a deep breath and sat up slowly, trying to clear her mind from the effects of Faegan’s portal.

  Not far from her, Celeste was stirring in the grass. Rising to her knees, the red-haired beauty lowered her head and shook it back and forth lightly before tossing back her long hair. She gave the princess a sly smile.

  Shailiha smiled back. Of course the wizards would never have allowed her to lead the Minions against Farpoint. She and Celeste had known that from the start—just as they had known that making that request was likely to result in the granting of a second request. Neither woman was willing just to sit by like some dainty lady-in-waiting. Doing anything was better than nothing, even if that meant going herb hunting for a three-hundred-year-old partial adept.

  Both women were dressed in black trunk hose, knee-high riding boots, and leather jerkins, with long, close-fitting sleeves. Shailiha’s was brown, Celeste’s dark gray. The jerkins were gathered at the waist by broad leather belts. On their hands they wore tight, black leather gloves, and daggers hung from their right hips in sheaths that were tied around their thighs. Shailiha also carried a short sword at her left hip; upon the sword’s gold hilt was engraved the lion and the broadsword, the heraldry of the House of Galland.

  Reaching beneath her jerkin, the princess searched for both the list of goods that Abbey had given her and the letter of permission that Faegan had penned for Lionel the Little. To her relief, they were both still there.

  “It seems we have finally made it after all,” Celeste said. “We had best hurry, though.”

  “You’re right,” Shailiha answered as she readjusted the baldric that held her sword. Then she paused, taking a sniff of the air. For a moment she had thought she smelled smoke . . . but no, she must have been mistaken. As she rose to her knees, she smiled again at her friend. “For a moment there, I thought the vein in Wigg’s temple was going to—”

  She stopped in midsentence. Holding one hand out to indicate silence, she wrinkled up her nose again. This time the smell was unmistakable.

  Placing one finger vertically over her lips, Shailiha indicated that Celeste should follow her on all fours through the grass. Wigg’s daughter nodded back. The short ridge that lay just uphill would look down onto the area where the gnomes lived. Casting her eyes to the sky, the princess could now see the dark, acrid smoke that was finding its way to her nostrils. She began to crawl, Celeste right behind her.

  As the women approached the ridge, they went down on their stomachs and wriggled the final distance to the top. As Shailiha cautiously raised her head to look down, the air left her lungs in a rush.

  Tree Town was on fire.

  At least half of the beautifully intricate houses and the huge, magnificent trees that held them were wildly ablaze. Flames shot up toward the darkening sky. Thick black smoke billowed out of collapsing roofs and smashed windows like dark, undulating rivers, rising to lay over the town in a gloomy cloud. Gnome children ran about, screaming for their parents. The adults had formed bucket brigades from the well in the center of the glade, but without their master Faegan here to help them with the craft, they were clearly fighting a losing battle.

  Holding her breath, she tried to peer through the smoke and locate the distinct roofline of Faegan’s mansion. Finally seeing it, she let out a small sigh of relief. Somehow, it seemed unaffected by the fire.

  And then, out of the corner of her eye she saw the demonslavers.

  Dozens of the awful monsters were pouring around a corner, screaming and waving swords, torches, and tridents. Laughing wickedly, they tossed their torches into an area of still-intact homes. Immediately the dwellings burst into flames. Armed with pitchforks and knives, a group of male gnomes started bravely for the demonslavers, but were hacked to death amid the fire, blood, and screaming. Some of the white-skinned monsters were walking about in triumph, holding up their tridents with dead gnomes impaled upon them.

  Lowering her head for a moment, Shailiha was sure she was about to be ill.

  But abruptly, unexpectedly, the sounds of havoc stopped, leaving only the snapping and roaring of the flames and the crying and moaning of the gnomes. Shailiha risked another look.

  The demonslavers had gathered the surviving gnomes into a group and forced them to their knees. One of the slavers shouted a command. Then another group of slavers rounded a corner, carrying dozens of large canvas bags, stuffed full and tied shut. They piled three of the bags on the ground and gleefully touched their torches to them. The odd-looking bags went up in flames, emitting a riot of unfamiliar odors and colors.

  As the flames went higher and the bags were consumed, more were thrown on the burning pile. Shailiha knew it wouldn’t be long before all the remaining bags had been turned to ashes.

  Then a realization seized her, and she closed her eyes. The slavers hadn’t been sent here simply to kill gnomes, or to destroy Tree Town. She and Celeste had to act, and act soon.

  She turned to speak to Celeste, but suddenly a sharp, penetrating scream forced her eyes back down to the horrifying scene.

  Two of the slavers had stepped forward, taken hold of one of the male gnomes, and were swinging him over the burning bags. The more he screamed the closer to the fire they lowered him.

  Then his clothing erupted into flames, and, laughing, they dropped him in.

  Shailiha turned desperately to Celeste. “Can you kill them?” she whispered urgently.

  At first a look of concern came over Celeste’s face, but then she nodded. “I can try,” she said. “But I cannot be sure I will not kill some of the gnomes, as well!”

  “Better that only some of the gnomes die quickly at your hand, than all of them die that way!” Shailiha responded. She looked down in horror to see that the two slavers were dragging another screaming gnome—a female this time—toward the burning bags.

  “When you see me coming out of the woods at their right, stand up and do your best! Then run down the hill as fast as you can, continuing to kill any of them that might have survived! I’m sorry, but that is as much of a plan as I have, and there is no time!” Silently she drew her sword. “And whatever you do, try your best not to kill me!” Before Celeste could say anything more, the princess was gone, crawling off to the right through the grass.

  Celeste raised her head up a bit. She tried to follow Shailiha�
�s progress, but the brown leather of the princess’ jerkin made her blend in with the surroundings. And then, finally, Celeste saw her, standing just inside the edge of the woods at the bottom of the hill.

  Her chest heaving and her palms wet, Shailiha stood with her back against a tree, her sword held upright as she tried to steady herself. Slowly, silently, she turned her head to look.

  The two demonslavers were laughing and swinging the screaming gnome over the fire as the others cheered them on, and it seemed that they might drop her in at any moment. Embers were already teasing the hem of her dress and threatening to burst it into flames. Looking up at the ridge, Shailiha caught a sliver of Celeste’s red hair just over the tops of the swaying grasses. Thinking of Tristan and Morganna, she closed her eyes for a moment, gathering her courage.

  And then, her sword held high, she ran out into the glade.

  Celeste acted immediately. Standing straight up, she raised her right arm and pointed her fingers. A magnificent azure bolt shot from her hand in a continuous stream, just as it had yesterday in the courtyard with her father looking on. The bolt screamed down over the grassy field, straight toward the demonslavers taunting the gnomes. Continuing to sustain the bolt, Celeste ran down the hill as fast as her legs could carry her.

  Sawing into a group of slavers, the bolt exploded. Dozens of slavers flew into the air, their torsos blown apart, organs and blood splattering all over the glade. The surviving slavers scattered, looking around for the source of the magic. Still running down the hill, Celeste manipulated the bolt by turning her hand, trying to avoid the gnomes and kill the straggling slavers. Many of the horrible monsters went down.

  But not all of them.

  Screaming, Shailiha ran at the first of the two who had been torturing the gnome. A surprised look came to the slaver’s face. Then his white eyes went wide with horror as he realized he was already too late. With a single, perfect stroke, Shailiha took his head off at the shoulders. Blood erupted everywhere and the scalded gnome went flying, landing to one side in the grass.