A moment of silence fell over the room as the gathered men contemplated his words. These were not men prone to rash action. But neither were they as a general rule, men of long contemplation or timidity. It spoke volumes to Rodrick that it took as long as it did before one of them spoke up. “You are talking about risking everything.” Sir Baristan said. The bear of a man didn’t sound hesitant. Just stating a fact about the situation. A battlefield observation that did not bode well for their side.
“Our future, and not just ours. But that of the entire northern duchy as well,” came the voice of Sir Sedric. “On a personal level our members would lose their homes, their treasure—”
“What little we have left of it that is,” quipped the young leader of the Rising Suns. The men around the table chuckled at that before silence gripped the room.
“I do not ask this lightly. Nor would I, you know this. I will not force you to aid me in this. I made the oath to the wizard, binding me and my order to him. Not you. But, I ask. Will you join me in taking down this evil?” Silence fell again. The atmosphere charged with tension and indecision, as if lightning were about to strike. The threat of violence, of vengeance was thick enough to choke a lesser man’s words in their throat.
The last two members of the council stood together. The first, cloaked and hooded in simple brown robes, carrying nothing but a staff and short sword at his belt, bowed his acceptance. The man never spoke at these meetings. His was a nameless, silent life. For his order served the dead god. He had written his one complaint and handed it to the Lion during the deluge earlier. Rodrick had forgotten the man existed, as so many did. After his acceptance of the proposal, the robed and hooded man stood, face obscured, watching and listening. Waiting for a chance to serve the living in the name of the dead.
The last member of the council was the antithesis of the hooded, robed man. He towered over the others. Even Sir Bariston was small compared. The only man larger that Rodrick had ever seen was that barbarian companion of the wizard. Even then, the argument could be made. He was known throughout the northern duchy as the Lion, and his knights were his Pride. His voice had been the loudest in protest, as it always was. But Rodrick noticed it had been none louder or angrier than when ordered to stand down earlier. His name was Knight Commander Lavell’dric Jackson. His sigil was that of a roaring lion’s head, his armor coated in gold and ordained in a holy silver wash that painted everything he wore in a slight shine. Besides the Second Sons, his order was by far the most prosperous, though the smallest. Even the Order of Death’s Servants were larger, if just by two members.
The mountain of muscle, golden armor, silver trim, and long brown flowing bearded hair growled deep in his throat and all the eyes in the room turned towards him. “I will have vengeance against those who would harm my brothers. And visit pain upon those who would harm my Pride!” He lifted his massive two-handed axe and brought its shaft down onto the stone flooring, shaking the hall.
Lavell’dric the Lion was powerful. Large, strong, well built, exceptionally trained and groomed, and of a respectably high enough level to be of great service to the kingdom. The only reason they had banished him from the Ducal court to the northern part of the duchy was because Lavelle was a polygamist. All the members of his “Pride” were female warriors he had seduced into joining. Some married him, others slept with him, and still others only worked with him for the chance to train under such a powerfully built, well trained, and exceptional specimen of masculinity.
Rodrick knew that despite the rumors about the man and despite the odd life choices he had made, Lavell’dric was reliable. He loved the women who worked with him, even those who rebuffed his advances. He treated those who had married him with kindness. And protected all the children in his growing family with a ferocious love that would split the mountains, boil the sea, and crack the sky should if it were ever harnessed into a weapon. “Are you with me!?” the massive man shouted. His roar filling the stone hall. Several children and a fierce woman’s voice came from somewhere else in the keep in answer. An emphatic yes.
“ARE YOU WITH ME!” He bellowed in response. This time, the other orders all shouted along with the roaring lions. Save the silent brothers, who stood unmoving, unaffected by the Lion’s Roar of Triumph ability.
“YES!”
“FOR VENGEANCE!?”
“FOR VENGEANCE!” Rodrick and all the other knights, save the silent brothers, yelled.
“FOR JUSTICE?!”
“FOR JUSTICE!”
The man wordlessly roared. The sound carrying through the keep, and out into the yard and over the homes and hovels of the huddling refugee camp. Every throat in the tower, or in the surrounding grounds that heard him, joined in reply. The silent brothers quietly and dutifully readied honeyed salves for the throats of those who would need them after the display. A crowd appeared in the hall, still shouting, everyone excited.
Rodrick knew it was one of the Lion’s abilities. This was an excuse to improve morale and lift spirits now that an enemy was revealed. It was a wise move, and Rodrick knew that the ability required almost immediate use upon engaging or revealing an enemy. So he didn’t blame the man for doing what he thought was right for the entire fort. In fact, Rodrick had thought it might happen. With an order to one of the few servants who had self-control, he had six more casks of mead brought in to enhance the party.
The crowd fed off its own excitement. Someone brought out drums as more and more of the tower’s inhabitants came down to the hall. Someone else broke out a small cask of harder spirits than mere ale. Through the chaos, the leaders, excited themselves but still in control, slipped into the now empty kitchens.
“So, we are agreed then?” Rodrick asked once he shut the doors behind him. With smiles all around, and more than a few glares at Lavell’dric at the disturbance, all gave their consent. “Good!”
“Now what?” asked one of them. Who Rodrick didn’t know, as he was already turning back towards the party.
“Now? Let’s get more than a little drunk!”
Interlude 2: The Pain of Honor
“The marks humans leave are too often scars.” ― John Green, The Fault in Our Stars
Sorcerers Tower, Outskirts of the City of Sowers Vale, 9th Novos, 2989 AoR
Pina
The knife cut deeply again, down to the bone. Scraping as he moved it back and forth, carving something into its surface. Pina fought from screaming, trying to force her mind back into its protective trance. But that mindset had grown harder and harder over the weeks to attain, since the bastard boy had ‘worked’ on her.
The powerful sorcerer worked the knife back and forth as he infused the now exposed bone with his mana. No, the child! She forced herself to think. Infusing the words in her mind with hatred and vitriol that was growing harder and harder to find. He had failed for weeks now at learning her True Name. But she had slipped from time to time. Given him glimpses of things he never should have seen, memories that defined her, shaped her, molded her into the person she was today. He had learned bits and pieces of her True Name, little snippets from these moments of weakness.
Pina cracked a tooth as she bit down harder to keep from screaming. As the rune in her right hip burned with dark fire. She didn’t scream; she didn’t slip this time. That was the greatest victory she had all day. The child, she forced herself to think of him that way, spoke the few syllables of her True Name he knew as he fed the last of the needed mana to activate the rune and brand her there forever. It wasn’t soul deep, for anything or one touching the soul with magic would be punished, or so the ancient stories said. But it was bone deep, core deep, this insidious magic. The rune work ‘rewarded’ her whenever she thought kind, or at least obedient, thoughts surrounding the sorcerer. It also alerted him when she did not.
She had used that to her advantage the last few days he had been working on her. Keeping him awake and annoyed by the very magic that he had carved into her to break her. She thought hateful
, spiteful thoughts at random times in the day. Powerful enough to wake him, and disturbing enough to shake him, or so she hoped.
“There, now I’ll let you heal up.” He applied a magical bandage to the cut, and it started the searingly hot process of healing her. Again. “That one will increase my awareness of you, my pet, and increase your awareness of your duties towards me. Even if I never break your True Name by the time this working is finished, you will speak it to me from your own lips. And thank me for taking the time to listen.” He smiled at her as he dragged the knife lightly over her exposed flesh again. Cold and dull side biting into her without breaking skin. “I only need to do one more working and we’ll begin your real training.” He giggled like a madman as he touched the reverse hips exposed flesh. “Here. Once the two are finished and I have connected the runes to the ones in your skull, there won’t be much you won’t be happy to do for me. I look forward to the day that.”
A crackle of lightning and the sound of shattering glass filled the air. Half a heartbeat later, the purple and blue hue that had infused everything the last week disappeared and the natural darkness of night filled the sky outside. Pina’s heart raced as she watched the sorcerer. His eyes lit up with delight as he rushed to the window. Giggles of manic glee escaping his lips.
“It’s gone! That blasted shield is gone! Finally!” He turned towards the door that lead to the depths of the tower. “Slave! Activate the constructs, we’ll be—” An explosion rocked the sky outside lighting it up with bright gray and white light, and shaking the tower. Jekkel’s expression darkened as he turned back to the window. “What is this! Who are you that assaults my tower!?” Another explosion followed by new nearly maniacal laughter from someone who was clearly much older.
“You know, my apprentice told me about this song. And I think it’ll work here nicely! Dark tower falling down” another rocking of the tower followed an explosion of light. “Falling down,” another flash of light and shaking of stones. “Falling down. Dark tower falling down, my dear lady.” A final explosion hit the tower and rocked it more violently than before. It caused little in the way of actual damage, as far as Pina could tell. “I still don’t understand what the lady has anything to do with the song, but. Wait, a minute. I didn’t know how much my apprentice screwed up your expensive lawn. I mean look at that, was that Thicklee Root?” The old voice asked. Another voice, even older, answered, but Pina couldn’t make out the words. “You know, you’re right Po’tak I’m sure those mana sands my apprentice melted are worth far more. Say, sorcerer, how much did my apprentice cost you? I just want to know for bragging rights sake. You know, to impress my friends.”
“GAH!” Jekkel yelled as he pulled power to his fingertips.
“Geez, try eating an apple, boy. One of these is supposed to keep the doctor away you know.” An apple appeared through the window, smacking Jekkel in the forehead before flying off behind the enraged sorcerer.
“I’ll kill you, old man!”
“That’s old men! There are two of us here, you know. Now, it’s about time you put down that knife and come down here so we can have a chat about all the mischief you’ve been up to in this city.” Jekkel unleashed a torrent of Dark magic from his fingertips. The effect of which Pina could not see.
“Oh, you like to summon things, do you? Well, two can play at that game.” Magic light erupted in small bursts that Pina could only see the edges of.
“How did you!? Those are golem!” Jekkel growled in nearly incoherent rage before turning and leaving through the doorway to the stairs. “SLAVE! To the defenses!” Pina heard him yell as he began taking two or three stairs down at a time. The disheveled, hunched, spite filled creature that Jekkel called his Slave, and sometimes his Steward, was probably hiding. Pina couldn’t blame him. A battle between high-level spell casters was not a place for the average person..
Pina looked up from where she hung in the center of the room. Her arms extended above her head, attached to the ceiling by chains and a leather strap. A leather strap she had been working at weakening for weeks. She worked again as lights and shouting from outside filled the room dully. A moment later, something bumped into her cramping toes. She looked down to find the apple that the old mage had thrown. It really was an excellent shot, Pina thought, allowing a ghost of a smile to cross the corners of her mouth. The large, juicy, and oddly ripe despite the season apple bounced off her toe. The apple slowed before coming back towards the drain at her feet. It mixed with the blood still pooled there, her blood as it touched her toe again.
Instantly she felt a flood of power she had not felt in a long time. No, it wasn’t a flood of power; it was a connection for her mana, her power’s ability to express itself. She grinned as she flooded the apple with her mana, sending her will through her toe to the dormant seeds at the center. A moment later, green sprouts appeared out of the red surface of the fruit and began working their way up her leg. It felt like eternity as the three powerful magic users outside dueled with one another, and the thin yet overly mana saturated vines wormed their way up her body towards the weakened straps. When the tips of the vines finally reached, they wrapped around the weak spots she directed them towards, grew needle sharp thorns, and worked back and forth. Cutting through the leather.
“Ugh,” she grunted, as her weight finally came off her shoulders. She sprawled to the ground and allowed the pain in her body to wash over her. Nature magic was far different from the normal base elements. It was an odd mix of earth, life, and death magic that required a direct connection to nature. With that connection restored through the simple living apple seeds, she could finally cast spells. She cast Nature’s Embrace 1, which brought her to full health. Pina gasped as relief flooded her, the pain eased in her aching and cramping limbs.
Her legs shaking, Pina pushed herself to her feet, the vines still growing to cover her entire body. She cast another spell, shaping the wood that was slowly thickening out of the vines and the seeds at her feet. The vines and wood flattened and became flexible as it conformed to her skin. Oh, bark skin, how I’ve missed you, she thought as she flexed her now thickly armored body. The relief from the pure cold of the snowstorm outside was another unexpected thing that brought a short-lived smile to her lips.
Now, to find a way out of this hellhole.
Interlude 3: The Battle for Gulhaven
"It is well that war is so terrible, otherwise we should grow too fond of it." Robert E. Lee
Outskirts of the Gulhaven, 9th Novos, 2989 AoR
Count Winslow
The horns of war blew through the night shaking the earth, even as the vanguard of dawn shook the night’s stranglehold on the sky above. The sun was still some time away from rising over the horizon, but the light of false dawn illuminated the horrific scene. Gulhaven burned and ash fell thick to the ground around Count Winslow and his men.
“Leupold, any word from the scouts?” The count asked his most trusted guard. The man was a level 29 knight of the realm, with a tremendous amount of experience. Leupold’s gray tips of his once golden hair were now matted black with the ash that fell like snow. The knight commander shook his head, and the count cursed under his breath. “Master Lana, any update from the magic corp?” The old woman laughed lightly before turning to meet his eyes. Her’s were a bright blue that shone with an almost unnatural light, given the darkened gloom that surrounded them.
“There have been five magical attacks on your person in the last fifteen minutes.” The elderly woman said. “All of them have been novices and easily battered aside. Divination and evocation primarily, though, there was one summoning that would have brought an interesting undead swarm of beetles from the shadow plane.” Leupold growled uneasily as he looked about him, As if scanning for magical attackers who he could smite with his sword. “Other than that, and protecting your men, me Javik and our apprentices don’t have a lot of time to do much else. But I can tell you this. There are at least six undead magi in that city, maybe more.”
“Good to know,” the count said as he pulled out a small piece of paper and wrote a message in his quick scroll. A moment later, he handed it off to a squire. “Send that on to the left flank. Tell Commander Grayson to be careful. We don’t know what horrors these undead Magi and their masters have summoned and bound to the world beyond simple undead.” The squire nodded, saluted, and then took off to see the message delivered. Winslow would have preferred to use the communications stones, but with all the magic being thrown around, the interference the stones experienced had made them all but useless for the last few hours.
“Sire, look. At the base of the wall. Shadows moving. Do those look like zombies?” Leupold asked, pointing towards the massive walls. The walls cast shadows from the burning fires behind them, casting whatever mass of undead filth that resided there into darkness. “I can’t tell if they’re organized or just milling about.” The Count pulled out his looking glass and peered through it. The Night Vision enchantment illuminated the scene before him as if it were noon.
Hundreds of zombies mulled about by the main gate to the city, hundreds more wondered in the plane between his army and the city walls. At the base of those walls, however, stood thousands of undead. Rank upon rank of spear and shield wielding skeletons, fleshy zombies with maces and metal coating their bodies. As if someone had dipped them in a molten forge. These were arrayed in disciplined rows and columns three or four deep. Dozens of larger undead beasts, abominations of stitched together flesh and metal bits, loomed twice as tall as their smaller undead cousins. The behemoth undead were ridden by crews of three to five skeletons. Either sitting in baskets sporting bows or manning small scorpions attached to the forged bodies of the larger undead.
“It is a host. But not one too great for us I think.” Winslow kept his voice even and steady. He handed the looking glass to the others in the line of advisers. Each one took the glass and surveyed the army in front of them. Leupold was the first to break the silence that followed.
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