by N M Zoltack
And then the battle ended, and still Tatum did nothing at all. She was paralyzed.
Nay, in truth, she was waiting to die.
Her door opened eventually, and Saxa approached. “I made you a tea.”
“I am not thirsty,” Tatum mumbled, her words coming out raspy. It had been some time since last she had spoken. Maybe since the screaming for the guard. No, she hadn’t screamed then. She had merely called for a guard. Then, she still had her mind and her wits about her. She had known to try to remain calm, and now, she was exactly that—as calm as could be as she waited for the sweet slumber that was death.
If she had the energy, she would locate a dagger or a knife and end her miserable existence now, but she hadn’t the energy to do that.
“You should drink anyhow.” Saxa shoved the cup toward Tatum.
“I don’t want to sleep.”
Saxa sighed. “It won’t make you sleep.” She took a sip and made a point of swallowing loudly. “See?”
Tatum turned back to the window.
“We could use you back in the healing hall when you feel up to it.”
“I won’t be going back.”
“No? I can’t suppose I blame you if you need some time. I am sorry about what happened to you.”
“You don’t know anything about me.”
“No, I don’t, not enough. I’d like to know more, for us to be friends—”
Tatum did not move a muscle. “Do you wish to die?”
“No—”
“Then we can’t be friends.”
Saxa harrumphed and was silent a long while. “The world is a terribly cruel place, I’ll give you that. I heard about this one woman, a peasant woman… she killed her family. Her husband, her son, and her daughter. The guards are too busy preparing more defenses against the dragons and the Vincanans too. They aren’t going to go after her. Maybe they think she’ll kill herself too.”
Tatum said nothing.
“I remember the girl’s name,” Saxa continued. “It’s the name I would’ve called my daughter if the Fates would’ve granted me a daughter. Corinna. Isn’t that a beautiful name?”
Corinna. That name sounded vaguely familiar, but Tatum’s mind was thinking so very slowly that she could hardly recall much of anything.
Eventually, Saxa left, and once the sun was roughly directly overheard, then Tatum recalled where she had heard the name.
The peasant woman who had used magic to save her husband. Agatha. Agatha, Killian, Jemmie, and Corinna.
It could not possibly have been Agatha to kill her family. Corinna was a common enough name, but the chance of seeing that loving woman with her husband and her children was what it took for Tatum to force herself to stand for the first time in ages. Her knees shook, and her feet felt as if they were being stabbed a thousand times a minute, but she forced herself to keep walking out the door, down the stairs, and outside of the keep.
Once she left the castle walls, she became good and lost, and it took her until the next day for her to find the house. If she could see a bit of happiness before she died, maybe then death would not be so frightening.
But the moment she approached the house, Tatum knew something was wrong. The door was open, and there was a horrific stench.
“I wouldn’t go in there,” a man called from behind her.
She glanced over her shoulder.
“I live nearby. I heard the whole thing. I… Agatha… She… I don’t know what made her do it…”
“Agatha?”
“She killed her family,” the man said bluntly. “Then she took off, running. I hope she never comes back. You might not want to go inside. The place is cursed. I’ve been thinking maybe I should burn the house.”
“You’d burn the bodies instead of burying them?” she asked, horrified by what he claimed Agatha had done, equally horrified by his lack of regard for the bodies.
He shrugged. “That place is cursed,” he repeated, and he hurried away.
Agatha. She had used her magic to bring Killian back to life. And Isabel. She looked as if the magic was eating away at her. Might magic not be a blessing from the dragons after all? Mayhap it was a curse. The dragons sought to kill every last human by any means necessary. They would even curse all of the humans.
Just as she was cursed to never be happy, to die alone and without love.
Once more, Tatum was paralyzed, rooted to the spot, staring at the open door of the house of horrors, smelling the horrific stench of death, decay, and blood.
79
Advisor Aldus Perez
The constable sat across from Aldus and raised his mug. “It is good to know that we lost less men than the Vincanans did.”
“Fewer,” Aldus corrected.
Emerson Feene frowned. “What was that?”
Aldus shook his head. “Drink, my lord.”
Emerson snorted and drank greedily. “I should be a lord,” he said. “I should have a title and a plot of land that I can then lent out to peasants so I can collect taxes. I deserve it, don’t I? I was an advisor to a queen!”
“So Rosalynne has not seen fit to continue with you in that regard?” Aldus asked. He tsked his tongue. “I will go and speak with her on your behalf if you wish. You are the lord of the knights.”
“If she does not want me…” Emerson grunted.
Aldus nodded solemnly. The two of them were seated in one of the few taverns that were still open in Atlan. Aldus had been spending more and more time outside of the castle walls lately than the norm for him, but it almost felt good to see what was becoming of the place. The effects of war could be very devastating indeed.
They were the only two here, and Emerson already had three rounds compared to Aldus barely finishing his first, and he held up a hand to catch the serving girl’s attention and lifted one finger. She nodded.
“If she…” Emerson repeated, and he placed his head down on the table with a thud.
Aldus smirked. He appeared to be dead drunk, but he was merely dead. Aldus had seen to it.
The serving girl placed the mug down. “Is your friend…”
“He’ll start snoring any moment,” Aldus assured her. He took the second mug and began to drink it in celebration.
With Emerson dead, the last council member of Sabine’s was dead. Like it or not, Rosalynne would have to come to him for advice. Yes, he was very pleased indeed.
Although he had the strangest vision last night. He hadn’t been sleeping. Once again, he had been testing the limits of his magic, and he still could not get anything at all to levitate.
But then the vision came over him, and it had featured the prisoner who looked vaguely like Aldus, the one he contemplated sending to see the Vincanans, the one Aldus neglected to set free and then, ironically enough, had freed himself but then had been caught only to be released outside the castle walls.
Apparently, he had been sleeping along the route the Vincanans took to the castle before their attack. He’d claimed to have a missive for them, but he had none, and the king sliced the man’s chest down to his hips. Aldus had seen it all, could hear them all, even smelled the blood.
“Vincanans! I have a missive…” the man had said before being killed, patting at his belt, paused, and then beginning to tug at his tunic as if that would make this mysterious missive appear.
“Who are you?” Marcellus had demanded. “What do you want of us? Who gave you the missive?”
That was when King Antonius had brandished his sword and sliced the man’s chest down to his hips. The man had dropped to his knees, sputtering still as he bled out.
“Who he was does not matter. He had no missive. Perhaps he was deranged. Do not suffer fools, boy, or else you are a fool as well.”
The king was a cruel and vicious man. Aldus wished to not have to talk to him ever.
Aldus had wondered greatly about why Marcellus would attack the castle, but clearly, that had been by order of the king. Whether or not the prince read the missive,
whether or not he trusted Aldus remained to be seen.
Still, whoever ended up on the throne, whether Rosalynne remained in power, someone from Vincana, or even the Li princess, or merely the dragons alone, Aldus could not be happier. He thought himself in a very favorable position indeed.
80
Prince Marcellus Gallus
The prince did not have long to reflect on what had just happened. He left his father’s body there, and he raced away, rushing to catch up to the other Vincanans.
Once he caught up to the stragglers, he shouted, “Fall back to the ship!”
It took a bit for the ones up front to hear him, but they all headed to the coastline. Marcellus wasn’t certain if they should flee back to Vincana, if he should go ahead and wed Rosalynne, or what would be best, but for now, he needed his legionaries to be away from any and all threats.
Only a threat of a different kind altogether was waiting for them near the ship.
A dragon.
“Should we flee?” Flavius asked Marcellus. “Where is your father?”
“My father is dead,” Marcellus said, “and why are you asking me if we should flee? You’re the commander!”
“I’m also a commander of men directing men how to kill other men. Men and women, I should say. A commander of men and women directing men and women on how to kill other men and only men because the enemy—”
“Not all of the enemy,” Marcellus muttered, thinking of Vivian and cursing himself for having opted for the ship instead of the camp where she had been imprisoned. He hoped she had freed herself and thought that highly likely, but if she hadn’t…
He clearly was not thinking things through, and now, they had to face a dragon? How was this fair?
But life wasn’t fair, and he knew that all too well.
“We have to try to ground it,” Marcellus called. “Do not go onto the ship!”
The dragon let out a burst of fire, and Marcellus dove toward the water.
Which was both a blessing and a curse. From the water, the fire would not hurt them, but they could not bring down the dragon while underneath the waves.
The dragon breathed more fire, right at the water, and Marcellus ducked down and swam away from the shore and away from the ship.
It was just as well he fled from the ship. Through the water, he could see that the ship was now burning.
Marcellus’ lungs burned, and he swam to the surface. “Spears,” Flavius was shouting. Somehow, he was passing the weapon to all of the Vincanans on the beach. Several were wet, having dove under the water, and Marcellus spied a few standing on the burning ship, throwing weapons and such over the side to others who brought the supplies to the beach.
The Vincanans got to work throwing the spears, directing the dragon out over the water.
Hmm.
Marcellus swam around to the front of the ship. The figurehead had been fashioned into the shape of a valkyrie with wings, a spear in her hand. The blade of the spear was not sharp, however, something that Marcellus cursed, but the mast that stretched up high and tall…
The ship was burning, yes, but Marcellus swam over and climbed onboard. By now, the other Vincanans had fled the ship, having taken off everything they sought, and Marcellus hacked at the mast with this sword, using it much like an axe. Blow after blow, he chipped away at the mast until it started to tilt some.
“Direct the dragon toward the ship!” he called as the mast started to slowly tilt more and more.
Flavius jumped into the Vast Waters and swam over to the ship. He struggled with the wheel, to get the ship into position, directing the warriors where to direct the dragon, who continued to rain down fire on the beach, the waters, and on the ship.
Sweat profusely poured out of Marcellus, but he did not stop chopping away, not until Flavius scolded him. “You’re going to ruin our chances if you don’t halt!”
Marcellus glowered at him, but the commander had already tossed the prince a spear, and Marcellus had no choice but to toss aside his sword to grab the spear. Despite the fire, the deck of the ship was slick and wet, but he managed to plant his feet, and he threw the spear. It flew through the air straight and true, and it almost hit the dragon in the eye.
The dragon released a bellow and barreled down toward the ship. Marcellus rushed over to the mast. It wasn’t quite at the right angle, and he chopped a bit more, and the dragon flew right into the mast. A massive fireball belched out of his mouth, and Marcellus jumped over the side. The ship was falling apart as the dragon struggled to free himself, and the dragon’s massive wings ducked beneath the waves, the sound of his wings singeing each time audible despite Marcellus being under the waves.
The prince swam to the surface. Flavius was nearby, and the two watched as the dragon broke free from the mast, but the water on his wings, his tail dipping under the water… the entire dragon fell into the water.
The ship had been anchored not far from shore, and the dragon tried to crawl and waddled toward the beach, but the Vincanans there braved the dragon’s fire and shoved the dragon back. All of them working together to push and shove and swim, and the dragon tried to blast them, but the water affected the dragon too much.
Soon, the entire dragon was submerged beneath the waters, and the Vincanans made their way to the beach, Marcellus and Flavius included. It wasn’t until hours passed and the dragon still did not burst free from his watery graves that Marcellus could truly believe they had done it.
The second dragon was dead.
Epilogue
Olympia Li
The sound of a horse approaching had Olympia smiling eagerly, waiting for Bjorn to return on a horse, maybe with a second horse, maybe with her brother.
Instead, she saw an older man somewhat sitting on a horse, his back stooped and hunched over.
When his eyes met hers, his grin seemed to erase years from his face, and he beamed.
“You are every bit your mother and father’s daughter. You look just like them.”
Olympia’s eyes widen. “Sir, I do not know you—”
“No. How could you? You were taken away.”
Her heart pounded in her chest. “Who… Who do you think I am? Who do you think my parents are?”
“Do not play games with me, child.” He slid down from the horse, his back stooped even more now. “Your parents are dead.”
She glowered at the man and jumped to her feet. Her hand went to the hilt at her waist.
He chuckled. “Well, now you don’t look like your parents, do you? They weren’t fighters, now, were they? Yijun and Melitta Li.”
Olympia’s lips parted.
“You are their daughter, are you not? I must confess,” the man said as he straightened to his full height, his back not stooped at all. He had white hair and a bumpy nose, the bushiest eyebrows she’d ever seen. “I was never told of your name. I don’t know if your mother had time to name you and her son before you two were rushed out of the room so that Jankin, that interloper—”
“Who are you?” Olympia blurted out.
“First you,” he said kindly. “You are such a lovely sight for my old eyes. It’s as if I can see Melitta all over again.”
“Olympia,” she murmured. “Olympia Li.”
“Yes, yes. Melitta must have named you. Oh, how she would have loved you! But I… I will tell you my name. My name is Aldwin Lehr, but no one knows me by that name.”
“What name do they know you as?”
“Albert. Albert Leeson.”
“Why did you change your name?”
Aldwin’s face turned serious, making him look aged again. “Albert had been my brother. Together, we served your parents, but he wished for us to survive. He begged me to serve Jankin Rivera.”
“What happened to Albert?” Olympia asked.
“I killed him,” Aldwin stated firmly, without any remorse or shame or a hint of doubt. “Everyone knew that I, Aldwin, would never turn against the Lis. I had to assume his identity, to pretend t
hat I had been the one to die. So Aldwin Lehr became Albert Leeson.”
“Leeson… Li…”
He touched the side of his nose. “I could not deny your family entirely, my girl.”
“You killed your brother…”
“I killed my twin, yes, and I have served Jankin, yes, and his daughter, but all of this time, I have been a Li sympathizer and supporter. I have kept a watch over your twin… Ah, yes, Olympia. I know your twin.”
Olympia’s head was swimming. This man, could she trust him? Why did the likes of he and Bjorn both like to confess murder to her?
“I promise to take you into the castle and straight to your twin if only you’ll trust me,” Aldwin stated, holding out his hand.
“Trust is all I have,” Olympia murmured.
“I know that well, my dear. I know that well. Will you accept my help and see your twin, your brother? Or will you disavow me despite my serving you and your brother in secret these twenty years?”
“So my brother does not know,” she murmured.
“He does not,” Aldwin admitted, “but I will take you to him, and we can set that matter straight if you trust me.”
Olympia hesitated. Should she trust him?
What choice did she have?
The Might of Magic paves the way for Blood and Ashes, the final installment. I love how this series turned out!
If you loved The Might of Magic, please write a review. Thank you!
Until the next book,
N. M. Zoltack
Other Books By N. M. Zoltack
In the Eye of the Dragon
A Time of Turmoil
The Deceit of Tongues
Keepers of the Flames
The Triumphant Return
When Claws and Swords Collide
The Might of Magic