Dragon Lord: An Epic Fantasy Saga (Origins Book 2)

by James Eggebeen

  “I ordered for you,” Kelnor said. “When you didn’t come down for the evening meal, I figured you were worn out and just wanted to sleep. I don’t know how you do that. Sleep on an empty stomach, but I recall it never bothered you, so I decided to eat without you. I knew you would wake up hungry.”

  “Mph,” Sulrad muttered as he stuffed the first bread into his mouth without butter or preserves. He was famished, and the bread tasted exceptionally good.

  “I’ve been thinking about the power of this place,” Kelnor muttered. “If what I read is accurate, there is a source of power here that we might be able to tap in to. If you can use that to charge your talisman, you can command the dragons once more. You won’t have to kill one to fill the charm. You should be able to charge it from the springs of power that well up from the ground.”

  “Did you notice the way the power flows through the city?” Sulrad asked.

  “No. You can sense it? I was planning on asking around today to see if we can discover where it might be.”

  “It’s everywhere. The power flows through the city in the pattern of a great spell.” Sulrad paused to slather butter and preserves on another piece of bread. “More than one spell, if my guess is right. I was confused at first. I thought there was only one spell, but the more I thought about it, the more I realized there are several.”

  Sulrad poured salt onto the table and quickly scratched a few lines into it with the point of his knife. “Recognize this one?”

  “Binding,” Kelnor muttered. “Not the strongest of spells, but this one binds another spell to a place.”

  Sulrad brushed the salt flat and sketched another figure. “This one?”

  “Power? Not power like magic, but power like politics. This one confers respect and obedience on someone. Not sure how that would work for a whole city.”

  Sulrad smoothed the salt again and sketched another figure.

  “No. Not that. You can’t have seen that.” Kelnor said.

  “I’m certain I did.”

  “That’s a transformation spell. It changes one form into another.” Kelnor squinted into the salt. “Not sure how that one works either.” He jutted a fingernail at one branch of the outline. “This one talks of gender. Men and women. That’s not part of any spell I know.”

  “Strange, isn’t it?” Sulrad asked.

  “Where did you see these?”

  “From above the city.”

  “So you’re a bird now?” Kelnor looked skeptical.

  “No. I let my ethereal body float up until I could see the city.”

  “Your ethereal body? What is that?”

  “Didn’t they teach you healing? How to separate your power from yourself? Let our magic enter the body of the one you are examining? How do you heal if not like that?”

  Kelnor blushed. “I was never good at that sort of thing.”

  “Well, take my word for it. That’s how you heal.”

  “And that’s how you saw the spell?”

  “Yes. I think if we could somehow change the direction the magic flows, we could change the spells.”

  “Why would you do that?”

  “To free up the magic. This place could be like the whole land was in days gone by. Think of it. What if everyone could do magic? Not just the small magic, but what if everyone here had the powers of a modern wizard?”

  “I think I would prefer it the way it is today. Do you really want to create another Amedon? Because that’s the way you are headed.”

  “We don’t need another Amedon.”

  “Then let’s not talk of changing the spell. Let’s just use it to recharge your talisman and get out of this place. For some reason, it makes my skin crawl. Something is very wrong with this place.”

  “After we have a look around. I sense the magic rises to the surface not far from here. I want to see what I can before we make any plans.”

  “After we eat?”

  Sulrad nodded. He needed to eat himself. Better to do what he planned without the distraction of hunger getting in the way.

  The meal was sufficient and Sulrad had tried to pay, but Kelnor insisted, claiming Sulrad had paid for the beasts and the room and it was the least he could do.

  “So where is this magic?” Kelnor asked.

  “This way.” Sulrad led him along a narrow street that surrounded a large palace. Once past the palace, the street curved back and climbed a rocky outcropping that had been left bare. As they approached the outcropping, he noticed the heat and the power of the spells grew stronger. “Here,” he said as they reached the crest of the outcropping.

  Sulrad was impressed. He’d read about the pools of Rohir, but to see them before him, that was a sight to behold. Ledges of rock ran with the bluest water Sulrad had ever seen. Water welled from deep within the earth, forming pools on each ledge. These pools overflowed, the water trickling down to the ledge below. The water must have contained minerals, as each pool was hung with a blazing array of white icicle-like crystals that stretched to the pool below.

  The mineral deposits acted like crystals, although to a much lesser degree. There was magic here, more than the Charm of the Joiner could hold. If only there were a way to tap into this magic. Sulrad could use it to command the entire dragon clan.

  “I’ve never seen anything like it,” Sulrad said. “Have you?”

  Kelnor shrugged. “In the void. I took a crystal from the pools to make my apparatus. That’s why I wanted to come here. It may help the magic.”

  “Can you feel it?” Sulrad asked.

  “I do now. So much power.” He took a deep breath as if sucking the magic into his lungs. “It’s amazing.” Kelnor’s eyes glazed over and his knees buckled.

  “Take it easy there.” Sulrad caught Kelnor as he crumpled to the ground.

  Sulrad knelt beside Kelnor. The rotund wizard was breathing slowly, as if asleep. Had the magic affected him so? Was he in danger? Sulrad wondered what to do. Try and wake him? Let him rest? Carry him back to the inn?

  As he pondered his course of action, the charm at Sulrad’s neck vibrated, much the way the statue of Ran did when it wished to get his attention.

  He lifted the charm from around his neck. The jewel at its center glowed with a deep red light, pulsing to the rhythm of Sulrad’s own heartbeat.

  It was calling to him.

  “This what you want?” Sulrad lowered the charm toward the nearest pool.

  As the golden talisman neared the water, the water leaped up, creating a spray to wash over the charm. In no time at all, the jewel set in the charm grew so bright, Sulrad could not bear to look at it.

  Then it started to whistle.

  That was the last thing they needed.

  “You there. What are you doing on palace grounds?” A guard exited the nearby building and leveled a spear at Sulrad. “Come down at once. These are for the royal family. Commoners use the southern pools.”

  “Sorry. I’m a guest. I didn’t realize.” Sulrad tried to cover up the charm. The whistling only grew louder.

  “Are you stealing magic?” the guard demanded. He reached inside his tunic and withdrew a small horn and let forth a series of blasts. “Stay where you are. The guards have you surrounded. You’re not going anywhere.”

  Sulrad glanced behind. Sure enough, there were more guards clamoring up the rocks.

  “Kelnor,” he said. “Looks like it’s time for us to leave.”

  Sulrad bent down and grasped Kelnor’s hand.

  He reached for the magic in the pools.

  He imagined his room in the temple in Frostan.

  He quickly sketched a figure in the air before him.

  The figure glowed green. It spun in a circle, growing ever and ever wider until Sulrad stepped through it and into his room with a dazed Kelnor in tow. He let the wizard slide to the rug and turned to his bed.

  Ignal sat cross-legged on the rich red bedspread, fingering her sky iron knife. “Care to tell me where you’ve been? You had me worried to
death.”

  41

  Sulrad dropped to his knees beside the unresponsive Kelnor. He’d thought he cared little for any wizard, but when Kelnor collapsed, he realized that he did. The rotund wizard had never been anything but a friend to him. As a fellow student, he had tried to ease Sulrad into the life at Amedon, and even stood up for Sulrad when he had been bullied by another student. No one had ever been his friend before. Sure, Ignal watched out for his interests, but she was not a friend. She was an adherent, an acolyte, and a high priestess. Kelnor was the only true friend he had ever had.

  “Something is wrong with him.” Sulrad stretched out his hand and began the process of examining Kelnor. The ghostly glow separated from his flesh and plunged into the rotund wizard. His heart rate was slow, but strong and steady. His breathing was slow, but also strong and steady. There was nothing to indicate any disease that Sulrad could detect, but as he dove deeper, Sulrad sensed a tension, a tightness in Kelnor’s chest. Beside his heart lay the organ that Sulrad now knew helped a wizard concentrate and control his magic. Kelnor’s was engorged, enlarged, and throwing off an ethereal heat. The organ was hotter than the rest of his body.

  “Got too close, didn’t he?” Ignal asked.

  “Too close to what?”

  “To the magic. Our lore speaks of it. When a wizard attempts to take on too much magic, this happens. They engorge themselves. It’s almost always fatal.”

  “What?” Sulrad reached for the glowing organ within Kelnor. It seemed to have increased in size in just the few heartbeats since they had returned. “Is there a remedy?”

  Ignal hopped from the bed and made her way to the supine form. She took her knife and traced lightly over the man’s chest. “One story says that a wizard was once saved by removing the organ that stored his magic. He was no longer a wizard after that, but he lived.”

  “You want me to open his chest and remove an organ? Take away his powers?”

  Ignal shrugged. “That is what the text says.”

  “I’ll not do it. I’m not taking away his power.”

  “Are you just going to let him die, then?”

  “Give me your knife.” Sulrad drew his own sky iron knife and reached out to Ignal.

  “So you are going to cut it out.”

  “No. Just give me your knife.”

  Ignal slapped the hilt of her knife into his hand and sat down. “This is going to be interesting.”

  “Please.” Sulrad carefully positioned the tip of Ignal’s sky iron knife in the valley between two of Kelnor’s ribs. He placed his own near it, one on either side of the glowing organ that was at the heart of Kelnor’s troubles.

  “Forgive me if I am wrong.” With those words, Sulrad slowly slid both blades into Kelnor’s flesh, watching with his magical senses as the twin points gently pierced the organ that pulsed with power.

  As the sky iron came into contact with the organ, Sulrad murmured the words he had so often used before. “Fiat ad magicae ad me.”

  At first, nothing appeared to happen, but as he repeated the phrase again and again, the magic began to siphon itself from Kelnor; thin streams of brilliant crimson wrestled themselves from the organ in his chest and worked their way up the sky iron and into Sulrad’s hands. As the magic entered him, Sulrad gained a sense of his old friend. The rotund wizard had grown up in a wealthy family, but his childhood had been anything but pleasant. Having been raised by a strict disciplinarian and distant mother, the boy had much the same experiences as Sulrad himself. Abandoned and disowned when the magic came upon him, Kelnor had sought out Amedon even before he had been summoned. He had arrived early and was unwelcome. The boy had fought for everything he learned and had struggled to make his way where most students were welcomed with open arms and encouraged.

  As if taking advantage of Sulrad’s distractedness, the magic rushed into him, wrapping itself around his heart. The bands of crimson squeezed and Sulrad’s heart skipped a beat.

  “Me, me iubes ea. Ego to mea.” Sulrad commanded the magic to become his own.

  But it did not. The crimson thread tightened around his heart. It grew difficult to breathe. Sulrad directed his attention to Kelnor. The organ still glowed brightly, but it had begun to dim. It was working. He was drawing the magic from his friend and taking it into himself. If he could only control it.

  The magic tightened.

  His heart strained against it.

  Tighter.

  Stars formed around his vision. It was as if he peered down a long tunnel that was growing smaller with each strained heartbeat.

  “That charm,” Ignal’s words came to him as if from a distance.

  “It’s full.” Sulrad managed to squeeze out between gritted teeth.

  “Did you not just travel here? Certainly some magic must have been consumed.”

  Sulrad let his senses touch the charm. It was nearly full, but there was room for more magic. He let his own magic bleed from him into the charm, allowing Kelnor’s to blend with his own.

  The charm started to glow, just as it had in Rohir. The gem shone with a light brighter than the sun. It began to whistle, quietly at first, but growing louder as Sulrad pushed the blended magic into it.

  The pressure on his heart lightened.

  He breathed a sigh of relief.

  The whistling subsided, but the pressure increased.

  “Lapidibus temetipsum. Molestum non es mecum,” Sulrad shouted. The charm was fully charged and could take no more. There was only one place left to direct the magic. If he could steer it to the stones within the altar, he might be able to bleed enough off.

  “Lapidibus.” He mouthed the words even as the world around him grew dark.

  “You’re awake.” A soothing cold cloth rested on Sulrad’s forehead. A hand gently rubbed his arm.

  “What happened?” Sulrad took in his surroundings. He was in his own room in the temple. It was late night or early morning. It was dark and cool and the air had the faint odor of ozone as if a storm had recently passed through.

  “You scared me half to death.” Ignal hoisted herself onto the bed and crawled over to Sulrad, lying down beside him. Her eyes were dark as if she had not slept in days.

  “We were in Rohir. Then Kelnor.” Sulrad sat up. “How is Kelnor?”

  “He’s fine. He recovered more quickly than you did.”

  “He’s alive?”

  “Very much so. He seems filled with boundless energy. It’s a sight to see.”

  “How long have I been here?” It felt as if he had only closed his eyes briefly, but he knew it had been longer than a few moments. His stomach growled with hunger and he was thirsty. His mouth was dry and tasted as if he’d had dried camel dung for his last meal.

  “Three days,” Ignal said. “Kelnor has been busy the whole time. He fabricated a host of tiny boxes with intricate gears and springs in them. When he had two dozen, he carefully placed them around the temple, wound each one up, and attached a cord to it. When they were all in place, he yanked the cord out. They all whirred and started to trace intricate patterns with their tiny crystals.”

  “What happened?”

  “I smelled the magic more than saw it, but Kelnor says he has fortified the temple. The whole temple is now like the crystals, capable of storing magic. Not just the stones beneath the altar, but the whole thing. And he placed a magic shield around it so that only the priests can access magic within the temple. No outsider can draw on it, and no outsider can use their own magic inside of it.” She frowned. “He tried to explain it to me, but it makes little sense. Suffice it to say, he has created protection for the temple that will last a hundred summers, if what he says is true.”

  Sulrad shook his head. Leave it to Kelnor to discover something like that. Was that what had been done to Amedon? The power there was natural. He would ask, but he wasn’t certain he would get an answer, or that he would understand it if he did.

  “Can you fetch him?” Sulrad asked.

  “Are you
well enough?” Ignal felt Sulrad’s forehead. Her hand was cold to the touch.

  “I’m well enough to talk. And I’m famished.”

  “I should have thought of that.” Ignal jumped from the bed. “I’ll send Kelnor in and have someone bring you a tray.”

  “If you don’t mind.”

  “Forgive me.” Ignal closed the door behind her as she left. Almost immediately, a soft knock sounded and the door opened once more.

  A young woman dressed as an acolyte entered bearing a tray of breads, preserves, sweet butter, and a steaming pot of tea. “Father?” She paused on the threshold as if afraid to enter.

  “Come in. Please.” Sulrad jutted his chin to the dresser beside the bed. “I’m sorry. I don’t recall your name.”

  The acolyte blushed. She could hardly be more than fifteen summers in age. Her closely cropped brown hair jutted at odd angles, giving Sulrad the impression she would have sported curls if her hair were allowed to grow out.

  “Darida,” she said, almost in a whisper.

  “And, Darida, how long have you been with the temple?”

  “Three moons, Father.”

  “And before that?”

  “My family is from Frostan. My father is a merchant who specialized in cloth used to make dresses for the wealthy.”

  “And how were you discovered?” he asked.

  “I…” The acolyte looked at her feet. “It’s rather embarrassing.”

  “Come. It can’t be that bad. Did you hurt someone? Is that it?”

  “No, Father. Nothing like that. I was reading. Studying. It was late and Father told me to go to sleep. He put out the candle and set it across the room so I would have had to get out of bed to re-light it. When he turned his back, I used magic to reignite the wick. I didn’t think. I should have known better.”

  “And how did he react?”

  “He was very cross. Said I had ruined his plans for me. He brought me here to the temple and left me.” She paused, tears welling in her brown eyes. “I haven’t seen him since, nor my mother.”

  Sulrad shook his head. “That is often the way of it. My own mother disowned me when she learned I had magic.”