The years following those events had turned out to be the best of their lives. They had found a caring family, made great friendships, and discovered love. They had experienced a sense of profound peace that helped ease the pain of their parents’ murder. Living and training amongst the royal family at Castle Svelte had reinvigorated their souls.
The recollection took his breath away. What an amazing few years. And then the fairy-tale had come crashing to a halt with the advent of Helleden Misenthorpe.
His blood pressure rose. How could one man affect so many lives? How could one person be responsible for so much sadness, heartbreak, chaos, and death? It was inconceivable.
The sorcerer wasn’t the only one responsible for destroying his life. He had discovered that the hard way recently when he commandeered the great ship, Gerrymander, to transport his small company to the Under Realm. Helleden may have been the catalyst for the quest’s demise, but the wicked magic user had been under the control of a higher being. Or so the Soul had thought, right up until the moment of its death.
Melody stirred, opening her eyes, and sat up to look around. When her eyes met his, she stared at him with wonder. “Thank the gods. I thought it was a dream.”
He gave her a questioning look.
“You, silly. I thought you were a dream.” She smiled. “A dream come true, it would appear.”
“Ya, but at what cost?”
“We went over this last night. You can’t blame yourself.”
“I know, but I can’t help thinking that if I hadn’t taken the quest to the Under Realm in the first place, Zephyr would still be…” He shrugged. “Zephyr.”
“You can’t know that. It may have turned out worse if you hadn’t made the attempt. That kind of thinking doesn’t help anyone. We need to focus on moving forward. What happened, happened. The past cannot be altered.”
Silurian grunted. She sounded wise beyond her years. “You really take this Wizard of the North stuff seriously, don’t you? You sound like the old conjurer who used to haunt this grotto.”
Melody’s face lit up.
Silurian added, “I know. You’re right, of course, but I can’t help how I feel.”
“I’m right? Wow, I bet that hurt.”
“You’ll never know.”
“Look, Mr. Mintaka. What I do know is that you and I need to get off this mountain and see what we can do to help anyone left behind. Our biggest concern right now is to find a way to get that enchantment back on your sword.”
“Leave the mountain? You’re the Wizard of the North. I thought you weren’t allowed to leave the mountain?”
“Pfft.” Melody chortled. “All good things must end. Besides, do you know how boring it is sitting up here by myself, not talking to anyone? Hardly anyone visits me, and when they do, they usually want something I am loathe to give them. I tried telling Phazarus I wasn’t cut out for this wizarding business, but he insisted I was the one in his visions. Me!”
Comprehension settled on Silurian’s face. Phazarus, of course. That was the old wizard’s name. Silurian studied the cave with a new perspective. He had been here once before with the Group of Five.
Melody knelt before the shattered remnants of a large chest, carefully searching through the broken vials inside, salvaging what she could.
“Phazarus told me I was destined for great things,” she said as she pulled the cork stopper out of an opaque vial and sniffed at its contents. Turning her nose up in disgust, she replaced the cork and gently set the vessel aside.
She pulled her head out of the chest and raised her eyebrows, offering him a mischievous smile. “How do I know where he meant I was to do these great things?”
Silurian smiled and shook his head. She had become her mother, it was plain to see. “Can I help?”
“Um, no,” she replied at once. “Only I’m allowed to blow myself up, thank you.”
Silurian looked around the blasted grotto. Broken rock, shattered glass, and splintered wood covered the entire cave floor. “You appear proficient at what you do.”
“Huh?” She bumped her head on the chest’s lid sitting askew on its hinges. She followed his gaze. “Ya, I don’t do things half-assed.”
He laughed, marvelling at how grown up she had become. His eyes went to the ground beside her knees. “Hey, that’s Soulbiter.”
“Huh?” she asked, and then saw what he was referring to. She picked up a magnificently tooled knife sheath and tossed it to him. “Oh ya. I took that from you too.” She gave him a quick smile and buried her head in the chest.
Silurian caught the bundle and examined the priceless relic. An ivory handle protruded from the sheath, gilded ribbons inset with tiny gemstones swirled about the hilt. He pulled the dagger free, admiring the fact that the blade’s etchings matched those carved into its leather holder.
Melody’s question, her voice muffled by the interior of the chest as she stuck her head deeper inside, threw him. “So why isn’t your blade enchanted? I thought that’s why you went to the Under Realm in the first place?”
Silurian didn’t know what to say. The sword had channeled a powerful magic when he reached the mystic river. The events under Iconoclast Spire were foggy at best, but the sword had certainly reacted like it had been enchanted by the river. He swallowed and clutched its pommel, trying to sense a magical presence. Nothing.
At a loss, he muttered, “I have no idea.”
Whether she heard him or not, Melody said, “There, I believe that’s all I can save.” She stood up holding a small leather bag, its worn hide covered in strange symbols.
To Silurian’s eyes, the bag appeared empty. “What about that one?” he asked, pointing to the opaque vial she had set aside.
“Oh yes, I mustn’t forget that one.” She placed it into a pocket hidden in her robes.
“What’s it do?”
“That one?” she sounded evasive. “I’m not entirely sure.”
Her answer puzzled him. Letting the matter go, he bent over to retrieve a damaged tome. “What about all these? Surely you can’t just leave them here?”
She looked around at the scattered books, most of them charred to one extent or another. There were dozens of them.
“No choice. We can’t hope to carry them all where we’re going. Don’t you remember the path we need to take to leave this place?”
A cold sensation gripped him. He had almost forgotten the route to get off the heights of Dragon’s Tooth. He pressed on, nonetheless, “Aren’t the books important? Full of wizard stuff?”
“Deadly important. If they fell into the wrong hands, the repercussions would be catastrophic.”
“Come on, then. I can help you carry some of the more important ones at least.”
“Don’t you worry, big brother.” She tapped her temple with a forefinger. “They’re all up here.”
Silurian raised his eyebrows. “Up there? Every one?”
“What do you think I’ve been doing for twenty years? I can rewrite every single book. Word for word. Backward.”
She grabbed her staff and scrambled up the rockfall blocking the bottom half of the cavemouth. She stopped to look over her shoulder and winked. “Besides, the most important spells are only up here.” She pointed to her head. “Those spells are passed down orally from one Wizard of the North to the next. How do you think you got here?”
He didn’t have a response for that. Ensuring St. Carmichael’s Blade rested secure in its sheath, he hooked it over his shoulder, turning the scabbard into a baldric, and followed his ever-surprising sister from her wizard’s grotto.
Outside the cave, cold winds blew mercilessly across the mountain face. Grey clouds obscured whatever lay below, and also hid the mountain peak a few hundred feet above. They stood on a narrow ledge, its precarious route descending into the roiling mists.
Melody led him down the first steep section and stopped.
Following her gaze up the mountainside to where the darker shade denoted the cave entr
ance, Silurian started to ask her why they had stopped, but her raised hand silenced him.
Her lips mouthed the words of a language he didn’t recognize, extreme concentration written on her face.
The wind cut through his thin clothes, whipping them about his body. They wouldn’t last long up here. He was about to say as much when an explosion shook the mountainside.
A great geyser of flame shot out of the cavemouth, taking the surrounding rock face over the brink and into the clouds below.
Instinctively Silurian grabbed his sister and dropped to the ground, sheltering her from any fallout. Other than insubstantial debris cascading down from the heights, they weren’t affected by the blast.
“What was that?”
“That, silly, is how we prevent those books from falling into the wrong hands.”
“You did that?”
Pulling herself from beneath him, she offered him a meek smile.
“You could have blown us off the mountain.”
She raised her eyebrows. “Aye, but I didn’t, did I?”
He stood up and brushed himself off, his uncontrollable shivering returning in earnest.
Melody stood up beside him and plunked her staff into the loose scree. “Come on. Let’s get you off this rock. You think you’re up for it?”
Silurian gave it serious consideration. What would be worse? Staying where they were and freezing to death, or descending into the Gap in an ill-fated effort to locate another source of magic to enchant his blade?
The Sentinel
Krakus glared at the tent flaps, daring them to open. Word had reached him that Helleden had come down from his hiding spot on the mountain.
What did the skinny wretch do up there, anyway? Did he spend his waking hours reading dusty old tomes like wizards were wont to do? Did he perform strange rituals and sacrifice animals? Or worse? Did he even sleep?
No matter. Krakus the Kraken wouldn’t be cowed by the sallow-faced, finger-wagger a second time. No one told an emperor how to handle his affairs. Not if they preferred their head where it was.
He looked over at the hulk of Karvus lovingly whetting the edge of his colossal battle-axe. Krakus had never seen an axe as large as his son’s. He doubted anyone else could swing the beast. He should have allowed his son to dispatch the pasty freak yesterday. It would have spared him a sleepless night.
He didn’t plan on losing sleep tonight. The guard had been tripled around his pavilion. His elite shock troops had taken over the responsibility of escorting the sorcerer through the fortified camp.
Karvus’ doge lay restlessly by his side, occasionally snarling for no apparent reason, perhaps unsettled by the close proximity of their brethren hounds surrounding the pavilion. It would be good sport watching the robed malcontent try to cast his witchery fast enough to deal with a pack of dybbuk hounds.
The emperor smiled at that. He rubbed his hands together in anticipation. He couldn’t wait to see the pompous spell-caster grovel. If Helleden begged hard enough, perhaps he would allow him to serve in his personal bodyguard. With a sorcerer in his vanguard, who knew what an emperor with Krakus’ ambition could achieve?
When the tent flaps parted, marking the entrance of one of Karvus’ shock troops, Krakus almost yelped.
“What is it, man?” Krakus barked.
The man dropped to a knee upon the entrance rug, a nasty edged cudgel in hand. “My emperor, the sorcerer has entered the camp.”
“Alone?”
“Nay, my emperor.” The man kept his eyes to the mat.
Krakus frowned. “No? Who else? How many?”
“Just one, my emperor.”
“And? Who is this second person? Another sorcerer? A guard? A whore? What?”
“A demon, sir.”
Krakus swallowed. Helleden’s army were all demons of one persuasion or another. The big, red, trident-bearing ones were the worst, but surely his own shock troops were their equal. One by itself shouldn’t prove to be much of a concern, though the morose tone of the man on the carpet suggested otherwise.
“Obviously a demon, you buffoon. What of it?”
The man, a seasoned warrior, looked into the emperor’s eyes, fear evident in his own. “This is no ordinary demon, my emperor. It is huge.”
Krakus shrugged. He had enough muscle to deal with it. “It’s huge? Is that all?”
“Nay, my emperor. I can’t explain it, but—”
“Try, dammit!”
The man lowered his head. “It seems to shift about. One moment it’s behind the sorcerer, the next it’s beside him, and before you blink, it’s on his far side.”
Krakus scowled. Surely Helleden must know he can’t intimidate a man such as he. “The wretch is playing with your mind, you fool. It’s an old sorcerer’s trick to distract you from concentrating on him. Now get out!”
“Aye, my emperor.” The man rose and rushed from the tent.
Karvus’ bulk rose slowly, battle-axe in hand. The dybbuk hounds jumped up, instantly alert. Karvus grunted a command to settle them.
“I will see to this magic man.”
Krakus looked at him with wide eyes. “No. You remain here with me.”
Karvus glared at his father. He slumped heavily into his chair, scowling.
Helleden seemed to float above the ground as he walked, his booted feet hidden beneath flowing black robes festooned with crimson runes.
Beside him a dark figure loped along, its elongated snout exposing two large upper fangs—its great head bobbed about at twice the sorcerer’s height. Narrow, red eyes scanned the huge men escorting the pair toward the pavilion in the distance. The Sentinel was, without a doubt, the ultimate beast the Soul had ever created—besides himself, of course, and now he had control over it.
A squad of more than twenty huge warriors, each almost as large as Karvus, escorted them toward the emperor’s pavilion. They kept a wary eye on the creature flitting about Helleden, having sense enough to give its heavily muscled, grey legs a wide berth—mindful of its long feet tipped with three talons each, matching those of its hands. One moment the beast lumbered beside Helleden, the next it was behind him. The emperor’s elite troops quickly realized that if they walked anywhere within sword’s reach of the sorcerer they were likely to be trampled without warning.
The Kraidic encampment was on high alert as the strange entourage approached the emperor’s pavilion. The cacophony made by the numerous hounds straining at their leads, threatening to break free of their handlers, irritatingly deafening.
Helleden stopped out of reach of the hounds. The Sentinel did not.
The dybbuk hounds went wild. One broke free of its handler and leaped for the beast’s face.
The Sentinel caught it in midflight. Long talons wrapped around the thrashing dog, the Sentinel oblivious to its gnashing teeth.
Before anyone else reacted, the Sentinel opened its mouth and snapped at the hound’s head, tearing it from its body.
The remaining hounds were released at once. As a pack, they attacked. The impact of their collective bulk took the Sentinel to the ground.
Karvus stormed through the tent flaps to see what the commotion was about, his battle-axe at the ready. His own two hounds bounded past him and into the frenzy as he stared at Helleden.
Krakus the Kraken emerged from the pavilion behind Karvus with his battle hammer in hand and surveyed the scene.
The emperor’s shock troops had surrounded the pile of hounds but were unable to attack the sorcerer’s beast without hitting the dogs.
“What’s the meaning of this?” Krakus demanded.
Helleden’s bloodshot eyes cast him a baleful glare.
“That’s what happens when you threaten the Kraken. Seize him!” The emperor ordered those nearest the sorcerer. He stepped up to Helleden and spat—the odoriferous spittle smacking loudly against his cheek.
Before the men around Helleden moved, the writhing pile of growling hounds collapsed upon itself. The hounds’ barking
dropped off as they searched for the creature. It had disappeared.
“Hah! Nice trick, magic man.”
The two guards nearest Helleden grabbed his arms and pulled them behind his back.
“We’ll see who gets left behind, now, won’t we?” Krakus roared in Helleden’s face. “Bind his hands.”
“Father!” Karvus cried out.
All eyes looked to the emperor, or rather, to the massive creature towering behind him, its hide bleeding from multiple puncture wounds.
Krakus smiled. “I know what’s behind me. You finger-waggers are so predictable. Impressive that you conjured the illusion with your hands behind your back.”
The hounds turned as a pack, baring bloodied teeth and snarling. Heads lowered, they advanced toward the Sentinel standing behind the emperor.
Illusion or not, Krakus realized his fate too late. The hounds went through him to get at their prey. He attempted to dodge sideways, but the Sentinel’s large paw came down on his head, clamping three talons around his skull and holding him fast.
The enraged pack of indiscriminate hounds leaped at the Sentinel, tearing the screaming emperor’s body to shreds in their frenzy.
The guards restraining Helleden relinquished their grip and brought their weapons to bear on the Sentinel as it backed away, fending off the few hounds that had passed beyond the emperor.
Karvus’ battle-axe joined in the carnage. His mighty weapon spun like a whirlwind, cleaving hound and emperor alike.
“Control the hounds, you fools!” Karvus shouted as he stepped free of the bloody mess that had been his father. “Call them off!”
Whistles sounded, along with urgent pleas from the handlers, but the dogs were oblivious to the call, their crazed bloodlust wouldn’t be denied.
The mangled bodies of several hounds lay at the Sentinel’s feet. Although the beast bled from many wounds, it didn’t appear bothered by its injuries. It went about its business, methodically destroying one hound after another.
Karvus raged at his men to control their dogs.
The Wizard of the North Page 5
