The Rising Stones (Ihale Book 1)

by A. Lawrence

  It hit the ground and cracked perfectly in half.

  Chapter Seventeen

  "Nice throw."

  Bel knew now was not the time, but she had never seen anyone fail at throwing something quite so spectacularly. If they were going to die then she had to say something witty.

  The two halves of the teapot listed away from each other. The liquid inside was splattered on the floor in an arch of droplets, each one glistening like diamonds.

  "Shut up, it was heavy." Heln stared uneasily at the constructs. They'd stopped moving when he had thrown the pot, frozen in mid step, staring at them with blank eyes.

  "No, really, you throw worse than Dad."

  "Shut up, Bel."

  Before Rhyss could agree with either of them or tell them to shut up, the liquid congealed into a single, luminous mass between the two halves and slowly rose into the air. The stone of the teapot turned white, the color leaching out of it and into the liquid. It formed into a perfect green orb that glowed virulently. With a grinding noise the pedestal sank into the floor until it was perfectly flush with it. The others were pulled back into the panels like they were made of clay, each panel draining of color the moment it was whole again. The sphere grew larger until it was bigger than the three of them, hanging in the air like a baleful moon.

  "Maybe we should go." Rhyss took a step back.

  The globe pulsed. Bel had never felt magic before, but she felt this deep in her bones, a resonance that felt like it was going to rattle her teeth out. She barely had the presence of mind to keep Heln from falling over. If this was what Heln felt half the time then she had no idea how he got out of bed every day.

  It pulsed again, stronger, and they both ended up on their knees. When she looked up again the globe was hovering in front of the door, cutting off their escape.

  The panels were white, now, almost chalky looking. The only light came from the floating stones and the orb. Their own bubbles had been washed away in one of the waves of magic.

  And they were gone, the odd limb or face sticking out of the white rock, completely immobile, nothing glowing in their eyes.

  Bel shuddered, climbing slowly to her feet and helping Heln to his. "You okay?" she asked.

  Heln nodded, though he didn't look okay at all. His face was paler than Bel had ever seen it. Rhyss was already up, dagger out, staring at the doorway.

  "So, it keeps us from getting out." Bel bit her lip, hard. She didn't like the feel of the globe. It was smooth and featureless, but she couldn't help but feel that it was hostile. She wasn't sure if it would do anything unless they tried to go through the door. "Maybe it's a helpful guide to get us home. Or we could try smashing through this white stuff, looks significantly less sturdy without the… glowing."

  Rhyss stamped her foot down and a cloud of dust puffed up around her boot. She charged up her dagger and it was only a shout from Bel that kept her from getting her hand taken off when a blade of light shot from the orb. Rhyss barely managed to keep the light from slamming into her ribs, but it knocked the dagger from her hand to clatter to the floor. The light then oozed around the dagger and retracted back into the orb with it, the metal dissolving inside of it.

  "It took my dagger." Rhyss shook her empty hand.

  "And nearly stabbed you to death so let's call it lucky," Bel told her. "Okay. No magic. Okay. Now what?"

  "Get back behind one of the stones." Rhyss suggested. Heln stumbled a bit, but Bel wrapped an arm around his shoulders and pulled him along until he was walking normally.

  "I think that's the power core," Heln's eyes were a little too wide. "It's hard to explain, even through my shields it feels like the constructs but… fuller, I guess."

  "Well, hey, one mystery solved, they were coming from a giant menacing room and an ugly, angry teapot." Bel patted Heln's shoulder, gently. "Great job, team, a fantastic effort with amazing results, now let's go home."

  The orb shot across the room towards them with astonishing speed, shifting as it moved. By the time it reached them, maybe a second later, it had four powerful limbs and huge, translucent bat wings. Its head looked like a combination of a wild boar and a nightmare, all tusk and horn.

  Bel was moving before it landed. It barely missed them with a slash, claws sparking against the stone where they had just been. Rhyss had to grab both Bel and Heln and yank them away from a head butt that would have ended up with one of them gored. The hooves on its back feet rang like bells, but otherwise it didn't make a sound.

  It was a light construct this time, made entirely of magic. Bel had read about them, but they had been deemed impossible to make, the power involved would take several Ihalins and the conflicting magic wouldn't possibly be stable enough.

  Her teachers and textbooks were apparently very, very wrong.

  It charged again. Rhyss and Heln went one way and she went the other. It whirled at Rhyss, nearly catching her with its claws. Its long tail whipped into Heln and he hit the floor.

  The construct got so close Bel could see the shimmer of magical script across its glimmering green surface. It looked like glass full of glowing vapor. It would have been beautiful if it weren't in a horrifying shape that was trying to kill her.

  Rhyss yelled and Bel yelped, falling to the floor and rolling before the hooves could touch her. When she sat back up she was dizzy, but the adrenaline helped her roll to the side and scramble back to one of the floating stones. She crawled underneath and the construct crashed into it above her.

  The magic in the stone reacted with a loud boom. The construct staggered back, lopsided, the arm and wing that had hit the stone inflating to almost comical proportions. The stone cracked, the pieces groaning together before one of them slid down and hit the floor. The remaining piece still glowed. The inside was hollow, a mess of magical script, tangled threads swirling along the inside.

  The construct wheeled away, trying to absorb the new magic. Bel was left standing, horrified, that she had managed to aid in the destruction of one of the stones.

  "Bel! Come on!"

  Rhyss and Heln were at the exit. Bel knew she needed to move, but it was as if everything was happening slowly, every detail jumping out at her. The light construct shook its head. The magic it had absorbed made its entire body larger, the vapor swirling faster within the glass cage.

  Even if they made it out of the exit and ran down the stairs without breaking their necks, they would never outrun it. They had been ridiculously lucky just to get this far. It would never stop, it would never tire and there was absolutely nothing they could do to fight it.

  The best they could do was somehow get back past the dragon and into the room with the trees.

  If Rhyss wasn't going to lay down and die, then Bel wasn't going to even dream of it. She dashed across the room and they were all out the doorway before it recovered. The three of them hurled themselves down the stairs, only Heln's light stick keeping them from careening into the dark spaces where the stone didn't match up. The light bounced wildly in his hand, throwing dizzying shadows across the tunnel walls and ceiling. She heard a crash in the doorway behind them.

  "How do I kill it?!"

  She wasn't sure how Rhyss found the breath to ask, and she had no idea how she did the same to reply. "You can't! Our only hope is to get to the trees and hope we can hide!"

  They all knew how impossible that was, but no one stopped, even as it bounded down the steps after them, a crash of bells and stone punctuating each landing, getting closer with every step.

  They got to the landing and turned to follow the stairs, the construct smashing into the wall just behind them.

  Rhyss stopped.

  Bel wanted to scream. Instead she grabbed Heln's wrist as he ran past jerking him to a halt and nearly threw them both down the stairs.

  Bel couldn't stop, so she ran straight into the glowing red circle that Rhyss had been trying to avoid.

  It was warm, and now that she had stopped long enough to actually breathe she could smel
l the decay, not nearly as strong as the chamber where it originated from, but it reeked enough that she couldn't believe that she had missed it until that moment. She could see every facet of the gem that had been used to create the power core, see the flaws in it, though she couldn't say that had always been there or formed over the ages. She thought she saw movement, deep within it, but it was gone before she could really process what she was seeing.

  She needed to move.

  Somehow, she backed up a step, and another, not even sure how she was alive. At any minute, she expected claws or teeth to descend upon her. In less than a moment, she would be dead and it would all be over.

  "Bel." Heln's voice was directly behind her. He lifted his light stick, the golden light highlighting every curve of the plating around the power core. The dragon's head rose far, far above her, its horns brushing the ceiling as it swayed from side to side. The loop of metal was still around its neck, but the chains ended somewhere down in the dark, rattling when it moved.

  Bel scrambled back up to where Heln and Rhyss were standing. The dragon took up the entire staircase, whereas she hadn't even thought that in some places it would be wide enough for it to get through. It had new scrapes and tears on its wings and forearms.

  It regarded them and for just a moment she thought he saw intelligence in its dead, white eyes. Then it was gone and it threw its head back. A moment later the click, click, click began and its throat lit up. This close up she could see the chest cavity expand, could feel the heat from the hot air that escaped through the tears in the dragon's plating blowing her hair back off of her forehead.

  There was nowhere to go, even if it shot the fire above them the tunnel was so narrow that they would suffocate on the heat.

  Heln grabbed her hand and held it too tightly. She squeezed back.

  As the dragon snapped its head back, the light construct crashed into its desiccated neck. It had changed again, becoming something that was all teeth and powerful front claws, the wings had shrunk to be almost nonexistent. It whipped around to the dragon’s shoulders, tearing at the plating at the nape of its neck. The dragon's body was thrust towards them and they barely got up the steps in time before it turned and smashed the construct against the wall.

  "Up!" Rhyss yelled. "Up up up up!"

  The entire tunnel was shaking, cracks spider webbing all the way across the ceiling and down the other wall. More deep, endless chasms opened up. One of them would have swallowed Rhyss up if Bel hadn't caught her ruined cloak and snapped her back from it. Their momentum nearly sent them both tumbling down the stairs.

  The dragon barely fit behind them, its wings rasping against the top of the tunnel when it righted itself and twisted its head around. The construct seemed fainter, smaller, and it didn't have time to move before a stream of fire splashed over it.

  That was all Bel saw before she was racing up the stairs after Rhyss and Heln, trying to recall how to create a temporary barrier behind her, but her mind slipped and slid across the knowledge. Heat hit them a moment later, like a wall pushing her forward.

  She glanced back when they got to the landing, the light construct had grabbed the dragon's head and was attempting to yank it from the rest of its body. Parts of the its body looked melted and it had a scorch mark across its head, but it didn't seem to be deterring it. The melted parts were already reforming.

  Then they were charging up the last set of steps. Bel had to stop and breathe, just for a moment, but when the light construct slammed into the wall right below where she was resting it forced her to keep going, even though every step felt like she was lifting stones on her back and every breath stabbed at her, dry and rasping in her throat. The scrape across her ribs felt worse than fire. She staggered up the last few steps and into the chamber, leaning against the wall.

  The rest of the constructs were still half formed in the white stone. The black framing felt like a cage, wrapping around the room and offering no escape. Bel honestly couldn't tell if the dragon would fit in the room.

  "Bel, we need a barrier." Rhyss was telling her. It sounded like she was hearing her from underwater. "Bel. Bel! Dammit. Heln, how is your pendant?"

  "Fried, it might be able to produce a shield for about a second, but after that, well, we'll be about as fried."

  Bel crawled to her feet, feeling every inch of effort. "Was that a joke? Terrible. Terrible timing. I got it. The doorway, right? I think. I think that I can, it won't last without a real anchor but…"

  Heln tossed his pendant to her. "Use that."

  Bel fumbled it and had to pick it up off of the ground. She stared at it for a little longer than she really had time for. It was a very plain one, a leather strap attached to a tag of silver with a small white crystal set at the base. The script for protection and barriers were carved into the back of it.

  When he found out they wanted to go to the Festival alone, their father had insisted on it, just in case. At the time Bel had asked just in case of what. She'd even laughed and teased Heln for wearing it.

  "I'll probably ruin it." She dragged his eyes away from it to look at Heln. Part of her had to make sure that Heln knew.

  Heln nodded. "I know. Dad can get me a new one. It's okay."

  Bel nodded and walked to the doorway. She placed the pendant more or less in the center, set her fingers to it, and drew a barrier.

  Chapter Eighteen

  Bel leaned against the wall and stared at her barrier, even though the surface was too opaque for her to see anything that was happening beyond it.

  Something smacked against it and she jumped. Script rippled across the surface, but it quieted and as far as she could tell was still strong.

  The stones had stopped glowing. Two of them had shuddered, then slowly dropped to the ground with tremendous thuds, coming to rest haphazardly against the wall.

  "At least we ruined the Festival for everyone next year," she joked as the one that had broken finished its descent to the ground, tumbling over to lay broken and empty on the ground. The script on the inside looked like tangled black thread.

  "Oh yes, I'm feeling really good about ruining a tradition that's been in our culture for hundreds of years." Rhyss was taking the loss of her dagger pretty hard, probably harder than losing the Rising Stones, so Bel tried to not hold it against her.

  Tried being the key word. "But you get it, don't you? We've been giving magic to a bunch of big crazy rocks for years, and what was it doing? Being filtered into a light construct, an impossible creation, for Eleti knows what reason. I mean, maybe she did know, maybe she set it up."

  "And I'm sure it was a good reason." Rhyss didn't sound sure at all. She picked up a fragment of the broken stone, going through a few passes with it like it was more than just vaguely pointed. She seemed satisfied, at least. "How long will that barrier last?"

  Another boom against it and bright light washed through for an instant.

  "I don't know. I'm not connected to it," Bel admitted. "Didn't want to be knocked out when it fell."

  "A few more hits." Heln said, very quietly. "Maybe only one more. It's hard to tell."

  "You'd better pull your shields back up. Once it goes down we'll have to run." Bel gave Heln a worried look. He was even paler than he had been. Bel honestly didn't think that he had a run in him, no matter how short it was.

  Heln nodded, and Bel hoped he'd listened to her.

  "I think we'll have an easier time getting around the zombie dragon, to be honest."

  "Maybe, it's a little harder to outrun fire." Rhyss stopped her pacing, finally, only to stare at the barrier.

  "We've done that like, twice. I think technically three times, four for you? I dunno, but I'm really preferring our odds for the fire than the unstoppable death light."

  "It wasn't that—"

  The barrier was hit again and the pendant broke.

  Bel got to her feet, making sure Heln was next to her. They were both getting out even if she had to carry Heln down the stairs herself. T
he barrier itself faded enough that they could see through it. The construct crouched down in front of the light, pressing one hand that was little more than two large, flat fingers against the remains of the barrier, soaking up the magic.

  The pendant shattered further, and was crushed under a large, spade-like foot.

  Even with the magic it had soaked up, it was in a sad state. It had morphed into something tall and thin that was all spindly limbs. Its surface was blackened in places and it was much smaller than it had been.

  It turned just as the dragon got to the top of the stairs, leaping onto its head and wrapping around it, its thin, razor tipped appendages going for the eyes. The dragon shoved its head into the room, ripping one of its horns free in the process, and slammed its head against the floor hard enough that one of the white panels cracked. The construct was fluid and snake like in an instant, sliding down the neck to wrap itself around the dragon's power core.

  The last four stones fell and the room shook.

  The dragon screamed. The light construct was attempting to pry the gem out of its chest. The dragon thrashed wildly, throwing itself into the walls. The pieces of the constructs still stuck in the wall shattered, one of the panels cracked all the way across its length. Rhyss barely ducked under a swing and Heln was knocked onto his back behind one of the fallen stones.

  Bel never thought she would come to the defense of an undead dragon that was entirely focused on killing her, but here she was.

  "Hey!" She threw the only script she could make at the thing, an illumination bubble. It hit the glass skin and was absorbed, blue flaring underneath the surface of the creature for an instant.

  Distracting it just enough that the dragon slammed its own power core hard against the floor. The stone buckled under the impact. The dragon twisted its neck around at an impossible angle, sinking its teeth into the construct with a horrible crunching sound like a giant bug being crushed.

  Green glass spikes shoved through the dragon's skull, destroying one eye completely. The light construct whipped away from the dragon, making its first noise, a high-pitched whine. It was losing substance through a row of wide holes that went from a shoulder to what amounted to a hip. The glowing mist dribbled onto the floor and spread around its feet. Bel could see straight through its head and upper body like it was an empty bottle. There was a disc about the size of her hand made of the same material as its skin where its heart would be, distorted by the curve of the first construct's body.