Gilmreth the Awakening

by Raymond L. Weil

  Gilmreth the Awakening

  A Dragon Dreams Novel

  (Dragon Dreams, Book 3)

  By

  Raymond L. Weil

  USA Today Best Selling Author

  Books in the Dragon Dreams Series

  Dragon Wars (Book 1)

  Snowden the White Dragon (Book 2)

  Gilmreth (Book 3)

  Firestorm Mountain (Book 4)

  All books were updated in July of 2019

  Website: http://raymondlweil.com/

  Copyright © October 2011 by Raymond L. Weil

  All Rights Reserved

  Cover Design by James, GoOnWrite.com

  This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are either products of the author’s imagination or used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales or persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental. All rights reserved. No part of this publication can be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, without permission in writing from the author.

  Table of Contents

  Gilmreth

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  PROLOGUE

  Gilmreth

  Deep below the snow-covered mountain, the ancient dragon stirred lethargically in its cold, dark lair beneath the mysterious, towering mountain called Firestorm Mountain. Upon the high, stony ceiling of the dragon’s lair dripping water had leached lime from the ancient stone of the mountain, forming grotesque and distorted stalactites. Upon the tips of these, water condensed into small droplets to plummet away into the blackness below.

  The occasional falling water drops echoed in the vast chamber as they struck the small pool on the cavern’s floor. It was the only sound other than the shallow breathing of the sleeping dragon. Upon the surface of the pool, shallow ripples raced as they formed after each splashing droplet.

  Small white fish, which had adapted to feeding in the dark, prowled the coal black water. The small, turbid fish spent their lives feeding upon the few sparse aquatic plants and microscopic organisms that thrived in the pool’s dark depths.

  In ancient times, the sleeping dragon had been the largest and most fearsome of its kind. It was a specter of deadly power, with flame spouting from its mouth to scorch the helpless earth below. The dragon’s flame turned everything it touched into black, smoldering ashes, leaving behind an unearthly, sterilized wasteland.

  For untold centuries, the ageless dragon spread fear and death as it ranged the world, searching for sustenance to feed an ever-growing ravenous appetite. Defenseless village after village fell victim to the dragon’s unending hunger. They were burned to the ground with their populations decimated, leaving the survivors fleeing in small groups in unashamed terror and shock.

  The dragon was all-powerful, and no power upon the Earth could threaten or stop it. Anyone that stood in its path met a horrendous and agonizing death from the dragon’s unforgiving fiery breath or its deadly talons.

  Other dragons had once existed, but these Gilmreth had killed one by one, feeding on their powerful life force. Even this hadn’t satisfied the dragon’s ever-growing craving for sustenance. A life extending force that humans seemed to satisfy more than any other creature upon the Earth and then only briefly. For that reason, Gilmreth fed in an uncontrolled frenzy upon humans, gorging himself on the life force he desired so fervently.

  A faint rumbling reverberated through the immense cavern, an indication of an avalanche of loose dirt, rock, and snow upon the steep, frozen slopes above. Sluggishly forcing open one large, yellowish-red eye, its horizontal pupil a dark slit of the deepest black, Gilmreth shifted his ponderous weight before succumbing back into a deep, nearly dreamless, slumber.

  For a brief moment, the dragon’s massive, evil heart had beaten a little faster, its cold blood pumped through its veins a little quicker. A partial thought had formed in the dragon’s ravaged, demented mind before everything returned to never ending, unconquerable darkness. Inside the creature, the deep burning fire had briefly flared, then lessened. It had never been completely stilled. Gilmreth’s dark, grayish wrinkled skin had the look of coarse, dry leather. The dragon’s massive wings lay folded about the great sleeping beast. Its tail, with poisonous twin red barbs, was laid out behind, ready to strike at any danger.

  For over a thousand years, the dragon had slumbered quiescently. Gilmreth was held captive by an incantation cast upon the deadly dragon by the world’s last great sorcerer. The ancient enchantment was finally beginning to weaken. When it weakened sufficiently, the dragon would awake and rise to feed.

  Up above, only in fading legends were dragons still remembered. Their stories told quietly, almost hesitantly around a late night campfire, or whispered nervously between weary travelers staying at the small inns in the few remaining villages and towns. Most of humankind questioned dragons ever existing, and the mastery of sorcery had become a myth a mere legend.

  The greatest of these ancient legends was the story of Gilmreth, the most deadly and the last of the immortal dragons. Over the fleeting centuries, even that fearsome legend had gradually dimmed. Gilmreth had become a fairy tale. A fairy tale that, unknown to most of humankind, slept in the dark, protective depths of Firestorm Mountain, waiting to awaken. That time was growing near. Sometime in the near future, the sleeping spell would lose its powerful hold on the great dragon. When that happened, Gilmreth would be free once more.

  Gilmreth the Awakening

  A Dragon Dreams Novel

  Chapter One

  Near an insignificant farming village, several miles away to the east of Firestorm Mountain, a young girl named Lynol Sylvar stared worriedly toward the towering mountain, still blanketed in slowly melting snow. Even now, in early summer, the white patches only stubbornly gave way bit by bit to reveal the hidden mountain of dark, frozen rock sheltered beneath. Firestorm Mountain stood dominantly above the other mountains, its jagged heights towering over the other barren peaks.

  The sky was a deep, hungry blue, with only a few, inconsequential fleece white clouds drifting aimlessly in the light wind, barely grazing the distant mountaintops. Lynol was standing upon the well-worn stone path near the large, rambling stone farmhouse, which she called home. She watched the sun as it began to drop away reluctantly toward the rugged peaks, their flanks a patchwork of desolate gray and black rock. Lynol’s light blue eyes seemed to glow with a quiet brilliance of their own in the fading afternoon sunlight as she gazed upon the distant mountain. Her fine-textured skin was darkened to a warm brown from daily exposure to the sun, and her shoulder length brown hair was tied back with a single bright blue ribbon.

  “What mysteries do you hide?” asked Lynol, voicing the question quietly. She stared poignantly at the mysterious mountain with ever-growing apprehension. She took a deep breath, slowly letting it out, her youthful breasts rising and falling, listening as the mountain rumbled menacingly in the distance. “Gilmreth, is that you causing the mountain to rumble? Are you stirring in the deep bowels of the earth?” she whispered uneasily, her eyes wide gazing questionably at the ancient mountain.

  Well was she aware of the dragon that slept beneath and the dangerous threat the evil creature represented.
Scarcely a day passed that she didn’t think about or worry about the dragon. It was a part of her heritage, embedded in the long Sylvar family history, for her family and the sleeping dragon were very intricately linked.

  Lynol had just passed her sixteenth spring and lived with her father in the family farmstead just outside the small agricultural village of Galvin. Her meager education consisted of six years of schooling by the older women of the village, who served as Keepers of the village’s long history. Lynol had learned how to read, write, and do elementary math problems. The older women had also taught her how to prepare the healing herbs and perform the other duties expected of a young adolescent woman of the village.

  Much of the teaching Lynol assimilated quickly, almost effortlessly. The elderly Keepers had become uncomfortably nervous by Lynol’s ability to learn so easily and her voracious appetite for knowledge. She had read every book in the village’s small library and every other book she could locate in the small agricultural community. Lynol was extremely inquisitive about nearly everything. Her father humorously had once said it seemed as if Lynol’s mind was always full of a thousand questions waiting to be answered; answer one question and ten more would pop up. Lynol would only smile back at her father and then ask another question.

  “Why such a glum look?” a warm, masculine voice asked curiously from beside her.

  Startled, Lynol blinked in surprise as she looked about, seeing her father with his thick, sandy hair graying slightly at the temples standing beside her. His walking staff was held loosely in his large, suntanned right hand, his brown eyes twinkling in his squareish face, mouth turned upwards in a slight smile as he gazed at Lynol. Her face flushed slightly as she wondered just how long he had been standing there and if he had heard her talking to herself. She needed to break that particular habit. At least she wasn’t answering herself yet!

  “It’s the mountain father; it rumbles louder every day. I fear that Gilmreth may be awakening,” she replied with deep concern touching the edge of her youthful, vibrant voice.

  “Gilmreth, again,” her father grumbled, noticing her expression, the ghost of a smile vanishing quickly from his rugged face to be replaced by a worrisome frown.

  He turned to gaze with annoyance toward the distant, towering mountain, where a muffled fading rumble was barely audible. A puffy white cloud momentarily covered the summit, moving slowly across the mountain. Well did he know, in grim detail, the family legends of what hideous peril lay hidden in its bottomless black depths. Almost in tune with his thoughts, the small white cloud began to cover the sun, casting a long, ominous shadow over the countryside, almost like a warning of dark and dangerous things to come.

  “The legends say that Malcon Sylvar put Gilmreth into a deep sleep over a thousand years ago, incarcerating the dragon in his lair. In doing so, he sacrificed his own life to appease the powerful spell that he was forced to weave to bind the great dragon,” Damon spoke in a calm voice, his eyes sharp, almost glowing, repeating part of the old legend with which they were both familiar.

  Lynol stood listening and watching Firestorm Mountain as the sun reappeared from behind the small, protective white cloud, casting its warm rays of light across the mountain once more. Another dim, threatening rumble echoed in the distance. She wished the mountain would quiet down. She shifted uneasily on her feet, trying her best to ignore the rumbling and pay attention to her father.

  Raising an eyebrow and relaxing his face into a weak reassuring smile, Damon continued trying to take Lynol’s mind off the mountain. “For generations our family has lived in the shadow of Firestorm Mountain; there’s nothing to fear.”

  “I know, Father, but there is so much rumbling coming from the mountain recently,” Lynol replied apprehensively, looking into her father’s warm eyes.

  “We can only do what we have always done, Lynol,” Damon spoke, his forehead creasing slightly. “We tell the stories of Malcon Sylvar and Gilmreth to the villagers lest anyone forgets the dragon that sleeps beneath, and the final sacrifice of Malcon.”

  “But what if the dragon does awake, what shall we do?” Lynol persisted the fear creeping into her young voice. She had felt so uneasy since the mountain started rumbling. It was even affecting her sleep.

  “Fear not, my daughter; the dragon has slept for over a thousand years,” continued Damon, feeling some of Lynol’s concerns himself but not wanting to alarm her by voicing them. “Malcon’s sleeping spell was a powerfully woven one, and not so easily broken. There are no longer sorcerers in the land, and it would take a mighty sorcerer indeed, the likes of which this world hasn’t seen since the Golden Age itself, to break Malcon’s final spell. The dragon will continue to sleep long after we’re gone.”

  “But what if there is a new sorcerer, or even a sorceress?” Lynol asked with an odd catch in her voice, her light blue eyes looking questionably at her father, daring to voice her hidden fear. “What if there is someone we haven’t heard about who has learned how to wield the ancient power? Perhaps there is some way to awaken Gilmreth that we know nothing about. If this sorcerer is responsible for the mountain’s rumbling, couldn’t Gilmreth awaken prematurely? What would we do?”

  She didn’t share in her father’s deep conviction that the dragon would continue to sleep, or that Malcon’s spell was unbreakable. There was a reason why their family had stayed in the shadows of the ancient mountain and Gilmreth’s lair all these long years; Malcon Sylvar was Lynol’s distant ancestor! That was why the Sylvars had stayed at the ancient homestead, to keep alive the story of Malcon and the great dragon and to wait for the day when the dragon would rise again.

  If the old legends and prophecies were true, it could also hold a very dangerous and dire significance for Lynol. Something ominous had been stirring deep within her recently. She had been experiencing a troubled foreboding that wouldn’t go away, almost as if some mysterious force was trying to forewarn her of impending danger.

  Somewhere out there, her inner self was telling her, an unknown sorceress was practicing the ancient arts, stirring the lines of power that flowed through the air, water, and earth. She didn’t understand how she knew; she just did. Somehow, Lynol could faintly sense the awesome magical power being used. She was only sixteen, and this newfound knowledge frightened her. She didn’t know how to tell her father what she suspected.

  The sorceress was causing the mountain to rumble inadvertently as a side effect of her use of sorcery on Gilmreth. Lynol had been sensing this sorcery; it was like a fiery beacon blazing in her mind. At first she hadn’t realized what it was, but as she learned to focus her mind upon the beacon, she could sense the sorcery being used. The sorceress was trying to desecrate Malcon’s spell! For the first time in over one thousand long years, a new and powerful sorceress had come into the world; a sorceress bent on awakening Gilmreth!

  Lynol shuddered at the very thought of that danger. How could she convince her father, how could she explain how she knew this to be true? She shifted uneasily on her feet, focusing her eyes back on her father, unsure of what to say. There was just so much she didn’t understand. She dare not voice her newfound knowledge. How would she explain it? It was in her deepest dreams, an inner sense that she couldn’t explain. Just as you knew the sun would come up in the morning, she knew the sorceress was real.

  “Even the villagers no longer believe the story of Gilmreth and Malcon Sylvar. They scoff whenever we mention the ancient story of the battle and of Malcon’s ultimate sacrifice,” Lynol said sadly, flashing her light blue eyes defiantly back toward the distant mountain in the slowly fading sunlight. She took a deep breath and slowly let it out.

  The rumbling had finally stilled; a welcome silence came at last from the ancient mountain. Lynol began to feel calmer as she gazed at the waiting peak that so overshadowed her young life. She had so many questions, but as always, most remained unanswered. She knew now wasn’t the time to worry her father or talk about this new sorceress; it would have to wait until she co
uld explain everything better. How could she tell her father she just had a feeling there was a new sorceress? It would sound like a story made up by a frightened young girl. Sometimes she wished she were older.

  She had always known she was different somehow from her father and friends. Animals were completely unafraid of her. She could coax birds into landing upon her extended arm if she concentrated upon calling them with her mind. She could induce a squirrel into leaving the cozy shelter of its nest and take a cracked nut from the open palm of her hand. Lynol’s heightened sense of perception could tell when a storm was brewing before it even came down from the distant mountains. She had some mysterious inner power that was slowly strengthening day by day. Was she the one spoken of in the ancient prophecies? Had she inherited some of Malcon’s ancient powers?

  The ancient prophecies foretold that a powerful sorceress of Malcon’s blood would come forth with the awakening of Gilmreth. That was why the rumbling from the mountain frightened her; why the actions of the other sorceress made her so anxious. Other than her father, she was the only direct descendent of Malcon currently living.

  Lynol focused her attention back on her father, waiting for his response. She often wondered if her father had the same fears. Was he worried that Gilmreth might be awakening? However, sorcery had been absent from their family for many generations. No one in her family in recent memory had been able to use sorcery. It was as if it had completely ceased to exist. A power that had once been so rampant in her family had vanished after Malcon’s sacrifice.

  Lynol wondered where the other sorceress she had been sensing had come from. It was mystifying and troublesome. She shook her head slowly, trying to clear her thoughts.