Bone Lord 3

by Dante King

  Besides, there was a better way for my power to increase.

  “Tell Hegmun that I greatly appreciate his offer,” I told Rollar, “but I do not need his warriors to accompany me. However, I do need his warriors to do some fighting on my behalf. I will give each of them a Death Coin to carry. Every kill they make will give me power. Ask him if there are any assholes nearby. A few hundred fuckers that deserve to die should suffice.”

  Rollar relayed this question to Hegmun, who grinned and nodded. He answered me in his barbarian tongue. As he did, Drok’s expression hardened, and he growled.

  “He says,” Rollar said, “that there is indeed a blood feud that has gone unresolved for too long. Those undead troops of yours, the raiders we fought on the way here—they are members of a rival band who have raided Hothgrum many times. Drok knows this well, after the raiders… well, you heard what they did to his wife. They last passed a few months ago and captured many young women from Hothgrum as slaves. What kind of slaves, I’m sure you can also imagine. Heavy snows have prevented the Hothgrumian warriors from mounting a counter attack to get the girls back, but much of it has melted this last week. The passage to the rival tribe is now open again. Hegmun will send the warriors out on a rescue mission for the girls.”

  “Excellent,” I said. “Tell him that his warriors’ kills will aid me greatly. Ask them to kill as many of the enemy tribe as possible. No prisoners.”

  “They will be more than happy to do that; it sounds like many of the warriors lost daughters, sisters, and lovers to the raiders. They are hungry for vengeance.”

  “Well, let ‘em loose then.”

  Hegmun agreed to send his warriors out after dark. Perfect. Friya would be working with the blacksmith to add the froststone to my armor and imbue it with Cold magic tonight too. After that, there would be no reason to linger here in Hothgrum, as hospitable as Hegmun was and as transcendentally enriching as the Wise Woman’s solemn ceremonies in honor of the Death God were.

  “We will leave tomorrow morning,” I said to my inner circle. “Make sure your weapons are sharp and your magic sharper.”

  Chapter Fourteen

  As the feast proceeded, talk descended to lighter subjects. I had a good few tankards of mead and was able to forget the darkness of the situation for a while, though thoughts of my uncle and the Blood God always lingered somewhere at the back of my mind.

  That night, I wandered around Hothgrum. It was pretty awesome not to need sleep, but it could also be something of a curse. Being alone with my thoughts for too long, while everyone else slept, could take me to some dark places.

  I considered what would happen if my uncle succeeded in sacrificing Lucielle to the Blood God, how powerless I would be to stop him if he made it that far. I thought about how my quest had started with the now-suddenly innocuous-seeming desire to become Fated, to get vengeance against my uncle, to take back what was rightfully mine—and how it had turned into a mission to stop the entire fucking world becoming a literal bloodbath. Things worked out strangely sometimes. Thinking about the change also made me look upon Anna and Friya’s no-longer-secret hopes with more sympathy, like I recognized some of my younger self in them. There was also Rollar’s desire to become Fated, one that I considered more with every passing day.

  My walk and ruminations ended at Friya’s cabin outside Hothgrum, where I had a short rest before dawn. When I woke, she was there, holding my gleaming black breastplate, in which the cold-steaming froststone had now been set.

  Friya smiled. “Your new item of Cold-enchanted armor, Vance.”

  “Excellent,” I said, getting up. “What can it do?”

  “Because it is armor, its magic is mainly defensive.”

  “Good. My weapons up until now have leaned toward the offensive side.”

  “You will be able to call up an ice wall as a shield for you and your party members. It will be particularly effective in draining Blood magic’s potency. It will be of little use against Fire magic, however, as you can imagine. Another perk is the Freezing Touch effect. Enemies who touch this breastplate with their hands or handheld weapons will be turned to ice if they have no resistance to magic. And if they do have resistance, they will sustain significant Cold damage.”

  “I like the sound of that. Thank you for doing this, Friya.”

  Her eyes drifted down to my crotch, and her lips curved into a sultry smile.

  “There are many ways you can thank me, Vance,” she purred, her nipples stiffening and pushing against the fabric of her robe.

  “Ways that we would both enjoy, yes,” I said with a grin. “But before we have some fun, you need to give me the part of a secret weapon you promised me. We’re leaving in a few short hours. How about we start with you telling me exactly what it is.”

  “Of course. Come, it is buried a mile away from here.”

  “Buried?”

  “It is an object of great power, Vance. It radiates so much power that it interferes with my own sources and channels. Also, it acts like a beacon, and there are many who would do anything to get their hands on something so powerful. I had to bury it deep in an abandoned mine, within a number of chests, all enchanted with concealment spells. But I must warn you, once I take it out of these chests and give it to you, all the concealment spells will fall away, and the item will draw the power-hungry to you like moths to a flame in the night.”

  “If this will help me kill the Blood God, I’ll take any risks.”

  We walked out of her cabin and traveled up the hill through the woods until we reached the entrance to the abandoned mine. Friya took a torch from the wall and lit it, and we climbed down a long rope that led into the depths. Then we journeyed through a few shafts to a chamber deep in the belly of the hill. Friya’s concealment spells had worked well; even I couldn’t sense anything special about these chests. As soon as she started weaving her magic, however, I started to feel it: a heavy pulse, as if the chest contained a giant, beating heart. Ripples of awesome magic surged through me.

  Friya uttered the last of the magic words, and the last of the concealment spells fell away. I sensed the full radiance of the power of the item as Friya opened the first chest, which was big enough to fit a body in. The second was large enough for a child to hide in, and the next would have fit a big helm. The final chest, the one holding my key to victory, was so small, I had to wonder just what sort of potent weapon would be able to fit inside.

  She opened it carefully and took out a single gauntlet. It was majestic, ornately wrought in a rich blue metal.

  “This was your ancestor’s,” Friya simply said as she handed it to me.

  A jolt of power surged through me as soon as I touched the blue metal.

  “Too bad Uger couldn’t have left both of them in one place,” I mused.

  “He couldn’t. The other belonged to Kemji.”

  “They each only had one gauntlet?”

  “Uger used the right, and Kemji used the left. They were both extremely powerful warriors in their time, yes… but they were both mortals. The power of the united pair of gauntlets would destroy a mortal man. I don’t need to remind you that you, Vance, are a god…”

  “And because of that, I can use both of the gauntlets?”

  “Not just because of that; you’re a powerful god too, one who’s gone some ways to prove his mettle, one who has not rested his divine tush on his divine laurels but has worked endlessly to grow his power. A fresh god wouldn’t have anywhere near the strength to use these gauntlets.”

  “Have I made it up to that point yet, or do I need to accrue more powers?”

  “The only way you’ll find out for sure is by putting them both on. If you are able to use both at once, well, then you are strong enough, but if you aren’t… you won’t know because you will be dead the instant you slip the other one over your hand.”

  I chuckled dryly. “Well, that’s quite the gamble, isn’t it? Ha, you know exactly how to entice me, Wise Woman, You’ve proven it in
several ways now. I like a gamble. I live dangerously. Now, though, for the million-coin question: what the fuck is it that these gauntlets actually do once they’re united?”

  “They will allow you to control something that cannot be controlled, not by any other means.”

  “Okay.” I stared at her through the fire-tinged gloom with a raised eyebrow. “And what are these things that ‘cannot be controlled’ but by the mysterious gauntlets?”

  No sooner had I pronounced the question than the answer came rushing into my mind: a vivid recollection of my brief journey into the memories of Uger’s last moments, when I had touched his skull in the crypts beneath the Keep of Brakith. Kemji’s grandson Tendo had mentioned gauntlets used to control. . .

  “Storm drakes,” I whispered, staring at the blue gauntlet in awe. “These gauntlets will allow me to control storm drakes.”

  My awe and excitement faded quickly, though, when another realization hit me with brutal force.

  “Damn it, Friya,” I muttered, “you got my hopes up for nothing. Fuck, you might as well throw this damn gauntlet down the deepest shaft in this mine, for all the good it’s going to do me.”

  “What are you talking about, Vance?” Friya said.

  “Dragons have been extinct for hundreds of years. And before I put my hand on Uger’s skull, I had no idea that anything like a storm drake had even existed. And even if one did exist, it’s just a freakin’ animal, not some demon of the ancient world like the Demogorgon.”

  “You’re right about dragons being extinct, but you’re wrong about what dragons are, or were.”

  “The fact remains that they’re all dead and gone.”

  Friya’s gorgeous face radiated a broad smile. “You’re forgetting something very important, Vance.”

  “And what might that be?”

  “You’re the Raiser of the Dead. You’re the one person—the one god—with the power to bring any creature back to life. You alone have the power to resurrect a storm drake from the dead.”

  “Well shit on me,” I murmured, staring at the glossy blue gauntlet with renewed awe. “Shit on me, I didn’t even think of that! But… hell, if I did resurrect a dragon, it’d be a brittle skeleton. Could it do anything beyond moving around, like my skeletal horses?”

  “As I just said, you’re wrong about what dragons really are. First, they’re not just animals; they’re beings of the ancient world, just like the Demogorgon. They, like the Demogorgon, possess powers that existed before most of the gods, and it is with these powers that they can fight and destroy a demon like the Demogorgon. These beings were semi-immortal; they lived for many thousands of years before either being killed, or, like the last of the storm drakes a few hundred years ago, simply withering away from old age. But their spirits, like the spirit of the Demogorgon and other ancient entities, endure on another plane. You resurrected the Wind Goddess, whose soul, I imagine, was very weak after having been dead for so long, and of whose mortal remains little was left but bones, yes, but now I have met her, and she exists as a living, breathing goddess again. Surely you can do this for a dragon?”

  “I could, if I could find the dragon’s soul. But you said that dragons, like the Demogorgon, inhabit a different plane. I only know how to get to the Sea of Souls. And there’s another problem: to resurrect Xayon, I had to merge her soul with the soul and body of a living woman. There’s no living dragon body and soul I can merge a dead dragon’s spirit with to complete the resurrection. If it did exist, that would make our whole conversation irrelevant, as I would have a living dragon to work with already.”

  “There is a solution to these problems,” Friya said. “Do you remember me mentioning the Jotunn, the Frost Giants? The King of the Jotunn, Engroth, has a magic item, the Cloak of Changing. This cloak, an ancient wolf skin imbued with powerful magic, allows the wearer to shift forms and become a wolf.”

  “I don’t see how this wolf skin would help us.”

  “It is one item of two that we need to overcome the problem. The other is a dragon heart. The Cloak of Changing, used on its own, allows the wearer to shift into the form of a wolf, but that isn’t the only thing the cloak can do. If combined with another creature’s heart, it will allow the wearer to change into that creature.”

  “So, we have to find an embalmed dragon heart. I’m curious, but where would I find that? Dragons have been dead and gone for centuries.”

  “Rumor has it that in the deepest vaults of Luminescent Spires, one of the most heavily-guarded items of value is exactly that.”

  “An embalmed…”

  Friya nodded excitedly. “A very real, very rare, and very well-guarded dragon heart.”

  “So,” I said, “assuming we’re able to steal or otherwise get this Cloak of Changing from the King of the Jotunn, then march into one of the most heavily guarded and secure vaults in all of Prand, and finally get our hands on this dragon heart… After that, we need someone who’s both powerful enough and willing to be a dragon. They’re not playing a game, dressing up; once I resurrect the dragon into their body while they’re wearing the cloak, they’ll change forever who they are.”

  “It’s true, you need someone who’s courageous enough, powerful enough, willing to sacrifice their current identity for the greater good… but they will also be accepting to become something potentially far greater than what they have been their entire lives. I will do this. I will become the dragon.” Friya’s gorgeous, ice-blue eyes burned with a powerful sincerity as bright as the fires of our torches.

  “You know that you’d never be able to go back to being a woman once I change you, right?” I asked. “You understand the full implications of doing this?”

  She nodded. “And I also know that it is my destiny. I grow tired of this human form anyway. I could almost say my human form has known its best moments. Less than a day ago, actually.” Friya’s dreamy eyes rested on my crotch for a moment before they looked up at me again with both new hunger and melancholy. “I’ve always dreamed of flying, lightning, storms—all things in the hands of storm drakes. They control the sky in every sense you can imagine. They wield the power of lightning, as the creators and originators of it, in their hearts. I do not just want to become Fated, Vance. I want to become more. I want to become something altogether different.”

  Friya had ambition, that was for sure. The thought of losing this already divine body made me hurt all over. She was hot as anything and a spectacular lay, but I realized the enormity of the sacrifice she was willing to make, and I respected that. More than that, if it helped defeat the Blood God and the Demogorgon, then it was a sacrifice worth making. Maybe I could find some way for her to shift into a dragon form without it being permanent?

  Still, I was getting ahead of myself.

  “There’s no guarantee we’ll be able to get any of the items needed to do this,” I said. “Dragon bones, dragon heart, the other gauntlet.”

  “Well, when Kemji and Uger each wore one gauntlet, they were each able to control a dragon enough that it would not kill them on the spot and would allow them to ride it but not much beyond that. What the gauntlet allowed the men to do was to communicate with the dragon, even reason with it. Essentially, they were able to convince the dragons to fight alongside them against the threat of the Blood God.”

  “Come to think of it, would I need the gauntlet at all if you would be the dragon? Wouldn’t you retain your spirit and will, like the surviving Rami inside her current merged form of Rami-Xayon?”

  “Not necessarily. The spirit of a storm drake is an immensely powerful spirit. It might completely overwhelm mine when we merge. There’s no telling what will happen. If the will of the dragon dominates, then you will certainly need at least this gauntlet to ride the dragon. Because my spirit will be merged with the dragon’s, even if my part of the resurrected spirit is weak, the dragon would at least not want to kill you, as it would with any other mortal.”

  “And with both gauntlets?”

 
; “You would have complete control over it, like you have control over Fang, no matter how powerful the resurrected dragon’s spirit ends up being.”

  “That’ll decide it. If I get this weapon, we will surely defeat the Blood God. Might Rami know anything about the other gauntlet? She’s one of Kemji’s descendants, right?”

  “She doesn’t have any direct knowledge of this. But my dreams have shown me that the missing gauntlet is somewhere in Yeng.”

  “Hmm. Another mission, another delay. As much as I’d like to see you as a dragon, the quest for the cloak, the other gauntlet, and the embalmed dragon heart will be long and prone to failure. If I can kill my uncle and his followers before they sacrifice Lucielle and completely destroy the Temple of Blood, the threat of the Blood God will have been quashed.”

  “Sadly, the Blood God doesn’t depend on your uncle or the Temple of Blood near Aith. He will still live if your uncle doesn’t carry out his sacrifice, though he will be weakened. He will be able to lie low until one day, another weasel like your uncle comes along and starts this whole thing again.”

  “Well, fuck it, I’ll take both these missions on. But one thing at a time, huh? Before I can think about resurrecting dragons and robbing the vaults of Luminescent Spires, I need to finish this thing with my uncle, rip him into a thousand pieces, and eat the motherfucker’s soul. Then, with the immediate threat taken care of, we can take all necessary steps to get rid of the Blood God root and branch.”

  “Indeed,” Friya said with a sultry smile.

  I noticed the way she was looking at me, and it brought a special kind of heat between my thighs.

  “You like it when I talk about kicking ass, huh?” I said with a grin.

  “It makes me… excited,” she whispered, stepping closer to me. “Your immense power and physical strength, your ferocity as a warrior… greatly excite me indeed.”