Battle Mage Broken Empire (Tales of Alus Book 14)

by Donald Wigboldy

  Holdy's musings continued past the fallen buildings until he was passing along the northern edge of the orc quarter. It was a misnomer since there was another orc populated area in the west, but these tended to be those families of the more elevated of their kind. Orcs weren't just dumb monsters like most humans assumed. It was said and believed that the first orcs had come from elves tested upon by the emperor in the distant past. Others said that they were an ancient race from the Old World that had nothing to do with the more noble races of elves.

  Whatever their true roots, many orcs had made it into elevated positions within the emperor's military. Some mingled with humans as well and from those unions men like General Corven had even gained the emperor's ear as advisors.

  For all that, there had always been a shaky peace kept between the races and shakiest of all was that border shared by the orcs and the human ghetto occupying the eastern most part of the cave city. Holdy knew both sections well, though he hadn't had to walk near either for quite awhile. Most apprentices never returned home during their studies. Even full wizards and warlocks tended to remain apart from their families and childhood friends, but sometimes the power of a certain family could bring more strength to the graduates of the school. It was all about power and royal or rich families could be part of that.

  Holdy felt orc eyes on him as he walked along the street. It wasn't completely unusual to see a lone human walking through their territory, but an apprentice's clothes were different enough to be recognized and his kind rarely visited either the quarter or the ghetto beyond it. Holdy held his magic ready, but doubted there was anything to worry about. Things felt a little more tense than usual, however, though the apprentice wondered if that was more a concept in his mind. The invasion had been only a couple days earlier and had touched much of the city. Those not affected directly knew the outer walls had been blown up as both a distraction and a way to keep more troops from re-entering Ensolus from the outside.

  When his eyes mostly saw humans walking about, though in lesser numbers perhaps since they felt the cold more than an orc's thick skin allowed; Holdy wanted to breathe easier. He was with his kind at least racially, but even then there were eyes noticing his clothing and looking on him with a bit of worry.

  It was midmorning, however, and those merchants with stalls or carts were in the market trying to sell their wares to anyone willing to shop in the cold. While most people in Ensolus were used to being cold in the cave city, not everyone brazenly stepped outside where frostbite could eat away at them potentially. The merchants were forced to retreat inside to allied stores or restaurants from time to time as well. Some had assistants to cover the time to warm up, others might close up their stalls and risk missing out on a sale rather than risk having their wares stolen instead.

  The woman of middle age bundled in her thick warm cloak and long, brown, winter dress had rosy cheeks because of the cold; but her clothing was enough to keep her from retreating inside as she called out to those walking by keeping a warm smile even if the air wasn't.

  "You, sir, wouldn't you like to add a winter coat or perhaps a thick sweater to keep you warmer. I have clothing in your size on hand, though I can have other types tailor made if there is a style that you would rather have that I don't have as well," she called to a taller man with his hands buried in his jacket pockets. Holdy agreed with her assessment that he looked like he could use something warmer, even so the man's head shook enough to decline as he moved along.

  Before she could try to pull in another customer, Holdy said, "That's his loss, though I would guess that he can't afford a new coat either to be fair."

  The merchant did a double take and even squinted at the boy approaching her stall. He had a feeling that he might still grow a bit more, but Holdy had been shorter the last time he had seen this woman.

  "Holdy?" she asked questioning her eyes before a grin crossed her face sending the woman towards him quickly. Pulling him in for a big hug, the woman laughed happily. "What are you doing here?"

  "I had a little time on my hands. I thought that I would check up on you," he replied noticing that the woman was shorter than he was now. The last time he had seen her, she had been just a hair taller than him. Her hug placed her head against his shoulder now, if she wanted. Lowering his voice as if they might be heard, he asked, "Do you still want me to call you Renelley and pretend you are my sister, or should I call you mom?"

  Releasing him with a little shake of her head, his mother gestured at the lightly populated street and replied, "I guess you can call me mom when it's like this, but if a handsome man comes along you need to pretend to be my little brother. I mean, who would believe that I am old enough to have a boy taller than me now. When did that happen anyway?"

  Holdy gave her a tolerant smile and answered, "It was bound to happen sometime. I was beginning to wonder for awhile if my magic was stunting my growth instead."

  "You're practically a man now," she added with a pouty lip for the idea. "You're fourteen. Do you need to shave as well?"

  Sighing, the apprentice replied, "Come on, mom, do you need to keep treating me like I am a little boy?"

  Renelley crossed her arms. "If only I could have kept you a little longer, then maybe I wouldn't have had to lie that you were my little brother. You make me look older than I feel, that's for sure."

  "Last I saw, you did fine with men. You still look young, though standing out here in the cold won't do you much good," he said glancing around the street again. "You look fine enough. Did the battle come near the area?"

  The first real frown crossed her face and his mother spoke in a lower tone, "There was some strangeness east of here. People who saw it said the dead had come to life to fight some intruders. They also appeared scared nearly to death themselves after seeing it. Children and the old were among the dead they said. How could anyone desecrate the dead like that? Sending babies to fight of all things?"

  Holdy mused, "A necromancer might not care. If they were all that he could find to fight Southwall, he or she might raise the dead considering them just tools to use to fight."

  "Still, children of all things?"

  "I wouldn't want to fight them. Maybe that is what the necromancer was hoping for? Maybe he hoped to dishearten them by making Southwall fight against children. Even if they were dead, it could make them falter if they felt that they were killing children instead."

  Renelley looked uncomfortable with the idea and shook her head saying, "That would be a cruel trick, I suppose, but still... Wait, you said that it was Southwall who fought here?"

  A little surprised that she didn't know, Holdy nodded. "You know that the emperor is dead, right?"

  Sighing, his mother nodded. "To think that our enemies could sneak into the city even with our defenses..."

  "They used magic to enter the city like our wizards can with their spells."

  "If your wizards can get inside of walled cities, why hasn't the emperor destroyed them already?" she asked looking a bit angry to his eyes.

  "The spells don't usually work that way," the apprentice replied. "Someone needs to discover a point inside a city to enter it with a gate."

  "How did they get inside to do that then?"

  Shrugging in ignorance, Holdy answered, "I'm not sure anyone knows. A gate was opened inside the emperor's castle as well. That was how they managed to attack him directly without our defenses being able to help. The emperor had a large force kept inside the spire, but the enemy was able to kill most of them to get to him."

  "Do you think that they will be back?" she asked worriedly.

  "I'm not sure that they are the biggest threat right now," the apprentice said quietly more to himself than to her. From what he had been hearing of the generals and grand masters, Holdy worried that a civil war would be a bigger problem for Ensolus than having Southwall return.

  "What?" Renelley asked having trouble hearing his mumbling.

  Looking about to see if any ears could hear natura
lly, though magic would be hard to account for, and hoping that his wizard's vision might catch another wizard nearby at least; Holdy answered, "Without the emperor in charge, the question is who will rule now."

  Wrinkling her brow in confusion, she questioned, "Wasn't there a princess that he found or something?"

  "She is gone too and even his rejected brother is missing. There could be a power struggle if no one powerful enough comes forward to take charge soon."

  Copying his earlier mannerism of checking for eavesdroppers, his mother asked, "Do you think that there will be trouble here?"

  "There has always been tension with the orcs and to a lesser extent the elves. There are generals, wizards, warlocks and others with enough power that might think they could take the throne for themselves. Perhaps if Lord Devolus would return from Litsarin, he would be strong enough to bring the others in line under him," Holdy mused as he considered the idea.

  "Does Lord Devolus know that he is needed here?"

  "I think so..." The question made the boy wonder. He had been a part of the gate teams which had sent the reinforcements. If they still held their positions, he might be able to go there and find the lord. Surely Lord Devolus wouldn't kill him for daring to interfere and find him, would he?

  His mind returned to his immediate surroundings and he asked, "If war should break out, can you get to some place safe?"

  "Your uncle Poultus has different properties; but if it truly is war, I am not sure anywhere in the city would be safe," his mother said thoughtfully. She was an intelligent woman capable of creating a business that had kept a roof over his head and logs on the fire in a city of stone. With that kind of mind, it was no wonder that her son had chosen to read as much as he had to expand his mind even before he was known to have magic.

  "Well, it is safe enough for now," he mused. "Maybe I can..." stopping before he committed himself to becoming a protector of human kind in the city, Holdy changed his words, "Perhaps someone can look into it."

  "Maybe you should take the time to speak with your uncle about it," she proposed reading his mind. While Holdy had magic, he still lacked the confidence to lead. He had spent most of his time in the background learning all he could and had never expected the loss of the emperor while he was still young. Certainly no thought of what might be left behind with his death had ever been considered by the boy, but Holdy's mind had been racing ever since the attack on Ensolus and the loss of their emperor.

  The question was whether he felt that he needed to step up in some way. He was no hero. Even in Ensolus, humans in particular told stories of ancient men who had once fought and died battling for the land south of the mountains. The emperor's shattering of the world and arrival in Alus had changed that. He had unified everything south of a wall raised to keep his armies out. People to the south had come together to make that wall and defend it all because of him.

  Holdy could respect much of that, but he didn't truly understand it. Men craved power and influence in Ensolus, the concept of men dying to save others just seemed too strange to believe.

  His mind reminded him of Maya. Even Turless, who often protected the younger boy, might be worth putting himself in danger for and then there was his mother. He was here now out of worry. The timing might be blamed, but he had come without being asked when there were other things that he could be doing even now.

  "You think Uncle Poultus might have some ideas?"

  She shrugged. "I'll tell you what; if you have the time, help me close up the shop. It looks to be a quiet one anyway. We'll go to see Uncle Poultus and maybe he'll even treat us to a lunch.

  "You can ask him what he thinks then. At worst, I think he'd be happy to see his grand nephew."

  With no excuse to avoid helping her, Holdy wound up assisting his mother like he had when he was much younger. He had been an assistant when needed by her as a child too, now the apprentice fell back into the rhythm of closing up the shop before walking with her to the southeast where his uncle had his home.

  The messenger had come just before the class was planned to end, though with magic and apprentices' learning involved, the time was usually just a sort of guideline. Lunch could be had sooner or later, so if her students needed her, Megannah was usually happy to remain longer if necessary. The note wasn't sealed unusually, but magic held it closed waiting for her touch. It was a common practice for the wizards and warlocks when sending information that they didn't want opened by the wrong person, including curious carriers.

  Megannah would have to hold off on lunch most likely, but it wasn't because of her students this time.

  "You look ill," Fordenna commented without pulling punches as usual. The woman seemed like her tormentor at times, but Megan had a feeling she did it more because she actually liked her teaching partner.

  "Torva left this morning and now Grand Master Echolus is sending me messages personally to come to his office? I can't imagine why my stomach would be bothering me," the younger wizard commented sarcastically.

  "You don't think Echolus has questions pertaining to Torva's mission?" the woman asked raising an eyebrow above her suddenly worried brown eyes.

  "Torva was supposed to tell his captain that he was on a mission for Master Lesolas if he was pressed or just to say for the wizards if he wasn't. If Rorsted got curious, I suppose that it could blow up in our faces if Echolus found out about it and decided to investigate."

  "What did the message say? Is there anything to read in it?"

  Megan handed her friend the piece of paper. There was little on it to read into, she thought.

  "Just that I should report to his office as soon as possible."

  "It doesn't call for me," Fordenna reminded her reading the writing quickly. "Perhaps it is just a coincidence. Calm yourself or Echolus might question why you look ready to be sick as well and I doubt that you will be able to act enough to convince him of anything in particular right now."

  Taking a deep breath to steady herself, the younger woman nodded and tried to clear her mind. Going in with a plan when she didn't even know why she was being summoned wasn't going to work. It was best to simply be calm and wait to see if she should panic, Megan supposed. While it wasn't a situation that she wanted, it was what she had and needed to face the grand master as clear of conscience and mind as possible.

  After leaving Fordenna, whose wish of good luck didn't help her in the least; Megan eventually found her way to the grand master's office. It was a large room, she discovered, and the wizard quickly realized that she had never been to Echolus' office before in truth. There were other rooms that he could meet with students or his teachers. Using his personal office meant losing that private space, she supposed, and might be a way to keep his distance.

  Entering the room after being passed through by another wizard serving as the grand master's secretary, Megan found that Echolus wasn't alone. Three warlocks of the wizard hunters turned at the sound of the door opening, while Echolus and the other grand masters stood behind his desk as if they used it to keep distance between them and the hunters.

  "Ah, there she is, Hunt Master Zarl," Echolus said gesturing with his hand towards the door though the other men were already looking at the woman as she entered.

  Megan felt small as she approached the hunters. All three appeared orcish at least in part, but their heights seemed more like they came from large human stock unlike the typically shorter orcs. The hunters flanking the one in the center were over six foot tall and had a few inches on the man in the middle, but his height was made up for by his aura.

  Though an orc, Megan read a powerful aura of magic surrounding the hunt master. Zarl was an older man; but other than a little graying around the temples, his thick black hair and powerful looking body didn't betray any loss with the years. His magic was surprising, since orcs were rarely born with noticeable talent, she thought. It was another reason human and elf alike tended to look down upon the other race as being lesser beings.

  Echolus ad
ded as the petite, pretty wizard joined them standing to the side of the hunters, "Wizard Megannah was one of those who served on the gate teams that sent the reinforcements to Litsarin."

  He turned his attention from the hunters still ignoring the smaller elf to the girl and informed her, "Hunt Master Zarl is under the impression that we should make an effort to bring Lord Devolus back to Ensolus. He feels that the lord could help bring stability to the city as our warlocks work to rebuild the broken walls, towers and, of course, our destroyed gate buildings.

  "Wizard Megannah, can you open a gate to Litsarin near Lord Devolus, since he remains with the army there?"

  Megan paused a moment letting the question digest and replied thoughtfully, "So long as the army hasn't fallen back from the enemy, it should be safe enough to send someone through to the island. Do you want me to do it right now? Here?"

  Raising a hand to stall the woman, Grand Master Echolus looked at the hunters again and asked, "Is that what you hoped for, Zarl?"

  The loss of title in his address of the hunt master caused the man to turn with a frown on his face. It had been a calculated omission to gain his attention, Megan assumed.

  "If the girl could join us at the west barracks, I can send a proper representative. I can't afford to leave the city with the generals already starting to act like they wish to become the next emperor."

  Echolus didn't seem frustrated by that information. If the grand master had hoped to contend for the position, surely hearing that Corven and Amelyer might be pushing to take the throne would likely make him a bit tense to say the least, the woman would think.

  "Has either one taken the lead between the two?" the grand master questioned in a surprising way in Megan's opinion.