Reckoning

by David Adams

  Sons of Evil: Book 2

  Reckoning

  by David J. Adams

  Text copyright © 2013 by David J. Adams

  All rights reserved.

  Cover art and maps copyright © 2013 by Rachel Adams

  All characters appearing in this work are fictitious. Any resemblance to real persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.

  Also by David J. Adams

  The Soul Sphere: Book 1 The Shattered Sphere

  The Soul Sphere: Book 2 The Final Shard

  Sons of Evil: Book 1 Book of Dread

  DEDICATION

  To Dad, who worked and sacrificed and never complained, and gave all of us what we needed to have a great life. Thanks.

  Table of contents

  Chapter 1: Ghouls

  Chapter 2: The Tundra

  Chapter 3: Glaze

  Chapter 4: The Ice Cave

  Chapter 5: Into the Endless Hills

  Chapter 6: Hell’s Horde

  Chapter 7: Belzlak’s Tower

  Chapter 8: Winter’s Fury

  Chapter 9: Tradoon

  Chapter 10: Moving South

  Chapter 11: The Rebel Camp

  Chapter 12: Praad, Lord of Desolation

  Chapter 13: To the Vale

  Chapter 14: Orgoth, Lord of Fear

  Chapter 15: Changes

  Chapter 16: The Red Sky

  Chapter 17: The Blasted Lands

  Chapter 18: Old Bern

  Chapter 19: Kaelesh, Lord of Hate

  Chapter 20: Reunions and Farewells

  Epilogue

  Chapter 1: Ghouls

  The snow had been falling for two days. It was a gentle snow, and the wind that often howled, especially here in the Far North, had been mercifully still. There were less than two inches of accumulation on the ground, just enough to cover the tips of the grass, but this part of the world now wore a blanket of white.

  Darius, like the others, had donned the new elven boots Queen Aerlos had given them, and was surprised at how warm and dry they had kept his feet. They were light and thin, and he would have sworn they would do little good against the elements and that they would be worn out within days. Whether they were made of some material only the elves could spin or were imbued with magic—likely both, he thought—Darius was happy to have them.

  As they broke camp that morning Uesra told them to flip their cloaks inside out. Another gift from the elves, the cloaks provided warmth and some degree of camouflage for the travelers. They had been using the cloaks with the green side showing. Now the white would be used.

  “Any chance we’ll change these back?” Darius asked Xanar, indicating his cloak.

  Xanar looked at the sky and smiled grimly. “Doubt it. Don’t think this snow will be gone until spring.”

  “And how far away is that, here in the glorious north?”

  “You don’t want to know.”

  As was usually the case, Uesra stepped to the front as they set off. She pointed to the Grim Mountains, which each day loomed larger before them. “We’ll be going more north than east now,” she said. “Around the northern edge of the range.”

  “Might the mountains provide any protection from the elements?” Barlow asked.

  “Not really,” Uesra replied with a shake of her head. “Might be less wind if we were to go south again once past them, but that would put us in the Endless Hills.”

  “Troll country,” Adrianna said.

  “Right. Unfortunately, the oddities of the landscape will provide us little relief. The land is very flat north of the mountains and hills, all the way to Myzor’s Cleft. Good for quick travel, but exposed.”

  “I know you said earlier the southern route is far longer,” said Silas, “and we’ve ruled it out. But I am curious if it might be somewhat more sheltered.”

  “From the wind, in areas. But not from the snow. Much worse that way.”

  “Why is that?” Adrianna asked.

  “Lake effect,” Xanar answered. “Picks up the moisture from Lake Fostoria, which makes the snowstorms far more fierce.”

  “Given the choice,” said Uesra, “I’d take the wind.”

  “Given the choice,” Barlow muttered, thinking he spoke only to himself, “I’d take four walls and a warm fire.”

  “Come now, friend Barlow,” Xanar called. “Winter is merely starting to stretch its muscles. The real fun is yet to come.”

  “I can hardly wait,” the paladin said. He thought he could already feel the cold stiffening his joints. “For spring.”

  * * *

  Adrianna spotted it first. The low-hanging clouds kept the snow-blinding effect the sun created to a minimum, and she was gazing into the distance when she saw something interrupting the blanket of white. She stopped, squinted to be sure her eyes weren’t playing tricks on her, then pointed. “What’s that?”

  It was a fairly unthreatening anomaly in the landscape, uneven patches of brown that disturbed the uniform appearance they had started to grow accustomed to since the snow had made its first appearance. “Something fallen in the snow?” Xanar suggested.

  “More than one something,” Uesra said. “But I don’t see any movement.”

  They continued ahead, until Barlow finally identified what it was they were looking at. “It’s dirt.”

  “That’s not good,” Xanar said, verbalizing what they were all thinking.

  The dirt was clumped in haphazard piles. They approached the nearest mound cautiously, hands ready to draw weapons at an instant’s notice.

  Silas held a hand up when they were within twenty feet. “Stay here a moment,” he said as he continued on alone. He studied the snow, the dirt, and then peered into a hole in the ground.

  “What do you see?” Barlow called.

  “Tracks in the snow. Appear to be made by human feet, some shod, some not. Looks like they were digging with their hands.”

  “And the hole?”

  “Shallow, and empty. Can’t say whether or not it always was.” He rose up and said, “Come on and have a look. I just wanted to check things out before we trampled all over the area.”

  After they were done inspecting the ground Silas had covered, they continued to advance slowly, finding they were confronted with a field of open, shallow holes. The footprints in the snow were jumbled and didn’t move in any particular direction, and all the holes were empty, at least so far.

  “Any chance these are graves?” Silas asked. “Or that they’re being prepared for such use?”

  “Not likely,” said Xanar. “Burying bodies in the dirt is unique to your kind. I doubt other humans are wandering here these days.”

  “And there are a lot of holes,” Darius added.

  Uesra was rubbing her chin thoughtfully, and though she said nothing, she soon had everyone’s attention. “They might be graves, of a sort. Men fought and died here in the north, or so it is said, ages ago. Before recorded history.”

  “Well, let’s assume that’s the case,” said Adrianna. She gestured at the dirt and asked, “What does this mean?”

  “That something’s digging for the bodies,” Silas answered.

  “Treasure hunters?” Darius offered, with an expression that was all hope and no conviction.

  “I pray we’re that lucky.”

  “Well, whomever or whatever is doing this has done their work in the last day or so,” Adrianna said. “Otherwise the dirt would be covered with snow.”

  “As would the bottom of the holes,” Barlow added.

  Silas looked north and south, hoping to see the edge of what felt like a cemetery. He could not, “I think we should backtrack and go around, if we can.”

  “I agree,” Barlow said.

  * * *

  They retraced their steps until clear
of the dug-out holes, then moved north. They covered just over one mile before the mounds of dirt finally halted, and until then the brown landmarks continued to stretch into the distance eastward. With the sun still holding just above the horizon they decided to work their way along the edge of the graveyard—as they now thought of it—but planned to trek north for several miles before complete darkness fell if they didn’t reach the eastern boundary of the graves. They had not gone far when Darius halted, spotting a different sort of disturbance in the snow-covered landscape.

  “What is it?” Xanar asked, seeing the perplexed look on his friend’s face.

  “I’m not sure,” Darius replied. “Might be nothing.” He walked about thirty feet past the closest holes and crouched down at the edge of a foot-wide fissure in the ground. Unlike the small craters they had seen, this one was more a split in the earth, a torn section with a hollowed-out space beneath it. Darius inspected the opening a long while before saying what he believed he was seeing. “Looks like this opening was made from underneath. See how the gouges the fingers made are different than the other holes.”

  “Like something was digging its way out,” Xanar said.

  Darius nodded.

  Xanar called the others over, and they drew the same conclusion.

  Adrianna had been spending more time watching Silas than inspecting the open grave. “You think you know what did this, don’t you?”

  He sighed and nodded. “Possibly. The walking dead. Ghouls, some call them. If anyone doubted great evil has befallen Corterra, this should put an end to such questions.”

  “I have not heard of such creatures,” Uesra said. “Do they pose a danger to us?”

  “They could. They feed on corpses, thus the holes. My guess is they’ve been digging where others fell in this ancient war you spoke of. Whether they’re feeding or not, it’s hard to say. But if they’re hungry and they spot us…”

  Darius let his eyes drift over the sea of holes to the south and east. “That’s a lot of digging. Please tell me these ghouls are quick at it.”

  Silas grimaced. “Not that I know of. It appears as if there are a lot of them.”

  “Great.”

  “Any idea why some rose, and others apparently did not?” Barlow asked. “Seems as if those that have returned to the surface are trying to dig for those that did not.”

  “I wonder,” Uesra said, “if some who died long ago were preserved by the cold, perhaps were buried a bit deeper in what became permafrost.”

  “Possibly,” said Silas. “It could be that only those of a more wicked nature in life were raised. Or maybe they’re just digging randomly, driven mad by hunger.” He shrugged, then added, “And before anyone asks, I have no idea what would cause them to rise, other than it likely involves some very powerful dark magic.”

  Xanar smiled ruefully. “You anticipated my next question. Unfortunately, I agree with your conclusion about what might cause such a thing. That such magic is being employed at all is not a good sign.”

  Uesra rose from her inspection of the fissure and brushed off her hands. She glanced at the sun, which suddenly seemed to be racing to hide beyond the horizon. “We should go north as far as we can before nightfall. Try to put this place behind us. We’ll gain little from confronting such creatures. It’s best if we can avoid them.”

  They put five miles behind them before they made camp. The moon was just past full, but the clouds in the sky kept it hidden, and so they braved a fire, less concerned about what they might attract than what might approach unseen in the darkness. The watch that night was as much about sound as sight, each listening for the slow tramp of feet in the snow or the scrapping noises of digging. When dawn broke they were all tired but relieved.

  The relief didn’t last long. They had started east as they set out that morning, and only a few hours in they were again confronted with the tell-tale brown mounds. Darius tried to shrug it off. “Guess it was too much to ask that they’d work in a nice, neat square.”

  The travelers soon discovered the ghouls not only weren’t digging within some well-defined geometry, but that the path they had chosen had actually probed into a concave-shaped, undisturbed area, with open graves to the south and north. If they wanted to avoid crossing the open graves, they’d need to backtrack again.

  They turned to do so, but Adrianna stopped. “Maybe we should just cross, especially while we have so much daylight before us,” she said. “We have no idea how much time we’ll lose going back and forth if we keep following the edge of this thing.”

  “You’re right,” said Silas. “But we also don’t know how wide. If we can’t be across before nightfall…”

  “If it’s that big, there’d have to be thousands of these ghouls,” Darius said. “If that’s the case, it may not matter which way we go.”

  “We don’t have enough information to properly decide,” Uesra said. “It is risk versus time. We must choose one.”

  “I say we cross while it’s light out,” said Adrianna.

  “I say we go back and stay clear one more day,” Silas replied. “If we have not found a way around by tomorrow, then we go through.”

  Adrianna sighed, but wanting to avoid putting things to a vote that might split the group, she agreed.

  “It is decided then,” Uesra said. “We will—”

  “Looks like the decision wasn’t really ours to make,” Barlow interrupted. He pointed to the northeast.

  A pack of ghouls shambled across the snow about a quarter-mile away. There were at least sixty of them, and though they did not move with great speed, many walking with limps or unsteady gaits, they did not pause to dig or otherwise consider their surroundings. They were moving directly toward the companions.

  “Looks like we can outrun them,” Darius noted.

  “But which way should we run?” Xanar asked. “If continuing back around to the north is now blocked, we either cross the grave area or go south.”

  “Which is where we just came from.”

  Silas shook his head and glanced at Adrianna. “Looks like you were right. We need to cross.”

  “I wouldn’t say I was right,” she responded. “I certainly didn’t expect to see them behind us.”

  “It’s worse,” said Xanar, who like Barlow now pointed, this time to the southeast. Another pack of ghouls, this one even larger, approached from that direction.

  “Following us?” Barlow asked.

  “Wouldn’t surprise me,” Silas answered.

  “Let’s see if we can outdistance them,” Uesra said. “Move swiftly, but be cautious of the holes. Wouldn’t be a good time for someone to twist an ankle.”

  Even dodging the holes they were able to set a pace that was noticeably quicker than that of the pursuing ghouls. After fifteen minutes they would have put the creatures completely out of sight had the ground not been so flat. Even so, the separation they gained brought dubious comfort. “I doubt they need to rest,” Silas said, giving the others an unneeded prod. “Their pursuit is slow but dogged.”

  Another ten minutes put more distance between the travelers and the chasing ghouls, but the graves they crossed now seemed to go on endlessly in all directions. And to make matters worse, three packs of ghouls now could be seen approaching from the east as well.

  “Not quite surrounded yet,” Darius stated. “We could pick a direction and try to break through.”

  “Best option we’ve got,” Barlow concurred.

  Uesra pointed to the northeast. “That seems to be the biggest gap. Move swiftly, but stay together. Silas, if we have to fight…”

  “Our weapons will be effective against them, but keep them at a distance. They are riddled with disease. Even a scratch can be quite harmful, even fatal.”

  As they changed course Darius saw Adrianna fall out of the corner of his eye, the sorceress letting out a quick gasp of surprise. He moved to help her up, thinking she had tripped herself up by stepping into one of the graves, but was urged to quicker a
ction by the surprised look on her face, and then by the realization that she had been tripped. A hand, protruding from the dirt, had a firm grasp on her right ankle.

  Darius leaped forward, drawing his sword and shouting for the others. He could only strike the ghoul’s forearm a glancing blow, needing to be cautious because of the proximity of his blade’s edge to Adrianna’s leg and foot.

  The hand twitched once, but then clutched her leg all the harder.

  Adrianna grimaced in pain and disgust, trying to break free of the creature’s grasp. Still unable to do so, she twisted her body so that the ghoul’s exposed forearm was more level with the ground, giving Darius a much clearer target.

  He brought the sword down and severed the arm. No blood flowed from the cleaved limb, which now gave off an even more offensive odor.

  Adrianna worked at the still-clinging fingers until she freed herself. By the time she could inspect her skin—and see to her great relief that it had not been broken—her companions surrounded her. None needed to ask what had happened, and none had the time.

  The ghoul was working its way out of its grave, undeterred by something as trivial as the loss of a hand. And nearby, other ghouls were doing the same.

  Xanar reached for his bow, thought better of it, then pulled a pair of daggers he kept on his belt. “Looks like the running away option is no longer open to us.”

  Darius moved close to the elf and said, “I hope you’re as good with those daggers as you are with that bow.”

  Xanar shrugged, pointed out the sheer number of approaching ghouls, and said, “We’ll see if it makes any difference.”

  The ghouls were emerging all around them, and those already on the surface continued to close. Silas surveyed their immediate surroundings, found a small plot to his liking, then ordered the others to follow him to it. It was no more than fifteen feet square, but as yet it remained undisturbed. “Give me a few moments,” he said as he set to work, drawing in the snow with two extended fingers. “Barlow, if you see anything trying to rise up with in the area I’m outlining, hit it fast with Gabriel. That’s likely the best deterrent until I’m done.”