Wraith King 2

by Jack Porter

  And then we would plunge beneath the canopy again, and my feeling of being watched intensified to the point I was constantly looking over my shoulder.

  The horses became restless, as well, and even the elves’ calm hands and whispered words did little to settle them.

  Late in the day, we came to a block in the road—a rock fall that covered our narrow trail and the surrounding area. To continue, we would need to go around it through the forest.

  Because of the late hour, Nya decided to halt the party. The trees were even more treacherous at night, and beneath the trees was so black the horses couldn’t be coaxed any further under them tonight. Our only choices were to leave the horses—which we couldn’t do if we hoped to catch the slavers—and climb over the rocks, or wait until the brightest part of day tomorrow to go under the trees and around the rock fall.

  Everyone felt the frustration of the delay, no one more so than me as I fought the same pricking feeling on the back of my neck.

  As we ate a quiet supper of dried meat, the last of the ambient red light faded from the trail. As soon as I could, I went to find Nya to discuss my thoughts with her. But when I reached the place where she was camping near the rock fall, her scent almost made me weak at the knees with lust, and I had to struggle to maintain my composure.

  That was… odd. Fortunately, I managed to shake off the feeling before she looked my way.

  “Is it always this quiet here?” I asked.

  “Yes,” she responded grimly.

  “And,” I said, lowering my voice so that only she could hear. “Does it always feel like we’re being watched?”

  Nya shook her head. “There is a malevolence here that I’ve felt most of the day, but I couldn’t say what it is.” She looked at me strangely. “You said you feel watched?”

  I shrugged. “Don’t you?”

  “No. It’s more like a deep oppression that I can’t shake off.”

  I put my hand on my sword hilt, feeling more secure that way. “I feel that, too, but I kept looking behind me to make sure I wasn’t being followed.”

  “The elves were behind you,” she said wryly. “And the human woman.”

  I shook my head. “It felt like something else. Is that weird?”

  Nya smirked a bit, but it was without her usual good humor. “If you are sensing things the elves cannot, then I do not know what to make of it, Jon. Stay close tonight.”

  She had no idea just how much I wanted to. Really, I’d heard of animal magnetism, but this was too much. My eyes strayed to her breasts often, even though she had wrapped herself in a light traveling cloak. What the hell was wrong with me? One night with her, and I couldn’t stop thinking about—

  Oh. I remembered something she’d said to me a few days ago. About once a man had been with an elf, he wouldn’t want to be with anyone else. But I’d been with Syn, and that hadn’t stopped my attraction to Ilana. No, something else was going on. Had I been bewitched?

  “What are you thinking about?” Nya asked. She’d been studying me, and I’d lost the thread of the conversation.

  “Just…” What to tell her? That all I wanted to do was take her against the rocks, out here in the open for all to see? Was this some sort of inappropriate domination urge? That wasn’t like me at all. “Just don’t feel well,” I finally said. “The forest has been messing with my head all day.”

  Which was the truth, if not all of it.

  Nya nodded, taking my explanation. “You better bring Sarina close tonight. Watch her carefully.”

  Sarina. With the way my sudden sexual urges were screwing with me, I’d forgotten about her for a moment. However, the last thing I needed would be another female so close to me. “But if you’re right and it’s a trap,” I said, “she might not warn us if she changes. And then she’d be in the middle of camp. If it’s all right with you, I’ll keep her closer to the trees.”

  Although that thought made me shudder in horror. Grow a pair, Jon. They’re just trees.

  I turned to leave Nya, but she caught my arm. “Jon, if you’ve really felt watched, then I don’t want you close to the trees, either.”

  “You think something is after me? Why?”

  Nya scanned the trees. “Something could be hunting you, yes. I’ll put a guard around Sarina. Stay here with me tonight.”

  17

  I couldn’t deny those blue eyes. So we sat up the night together, listening to the silence of the forest and the occasional snort from one of the horses, waiting for something to happen and hoping nothing would. Ilana joined our vigil, and the three of us sat with our backs to the rock. I had an arm around each female, feeling too anxious to sleep. And anyway, no one could have even if they’d wanted to. The entire camp was on high alert.

  My vigil was a bit different than theirs, however, because I was having a sort of internal battle every few minutes with either lust for a woman or lust for blood. It wasn’t a normal feeling, and I was starting to believe I was going mad.

  The tingling returned to my veins, as well, like pinpricks of fire. Finally, too uncomfortable to remain where I was, I rose from where we’d been sitting and began pacing in front of the rocks. Nya’s guard remained close, and they were taking turns keeping watch. But I could barely breathe with all these beautiful creatures around, so I stepped out of their protective circle on pretense of checking on my horse.

  With my newfound sight, I could just barely make out my mare tied in a line with others. She was calm and dozing, which I felt comforting. The horses would alert us to any dangers we didn’t spot ourselves. And Nya had posted scouts and guards throughout camp. Nothing was going to sneak up on us.

  But this night was fucking interminable.

  I turned and saw Sarina resting on the ground with two guards on duty around her. Sarina, still bound at the wrists, looked up at me with a brief scowl. I nodded to her and kept walking. No doubt she would always hate me, but it wasn’t my fault she was being treated like a prisoner. That was Nya’s doing.

  But I couldn’t say I didn’t agree with it.

  Halfway back to Nya and Ilana, I sensed that presence watching me again. It was so forceful that I spun around on my heel, thinking to catch the culprit as it was about to spring on me. But no one was there.

  “I know you’re there,” I whispered.

  And then I heard faint laughing, as if it was carried on the wind. Spinning around, I checked the camp. But everyone was as they should have been. Hurrying back to Nya and Ilana, I knelt beside them and told them what I’d heard.

  To my relief, they believed me and rose to their feet. Nya alerted the guards nearby, and they passed a signal down the line of the camp.

  “What do you think it is?” I whispered.

  “I do not know,” Nya said. And then she took a step forward and spoke in a commanding voice. “Stranger, show yourself!”

  The laughing returned, this time closer and sounding more like a woman cackling. “Did you hear that, too?” I asked. I unwound my whip from my belt and let the end drop to the ground.

  “No,” Ilana said, frowning.

  “I really think I’m going crazy,” I said.

  But the next sound we heard wasn’t a laugh, and everyone else heard it, too.

  From behind us, the rocks began to move.

  With a great rumbling noise that shook the ground, the rock fall shifted and lifted into the air. By this time, everyone was on their feet, their weapons pointed toward the trees.

  But the stones kept rising, and some of them stuck together as they crashed into branches and tree trunks. The horses went wild, and I heard some of them thrashing around on their lines, desperate to get free. But all I could do was watch what was happening above.

  “Get out of the way!” I yelled, thinking that whatever was moving the rocks would drop them on our heads.

  Instead, the boulders joined together like they were magnetized, and I found myself staring at a humanoid stone creature with clawed feet the size of horses and cl
ubs for hands. Between its legs, I saw the road stretched out, the one we needed to use, but there was a deep gash in it, as if the giant monster had dug out part of it to go to sleep.

  “Rock golem! It’s a trap!” Nya yelled. And then she shot an arrow to our right, into the trees.

  For a moment, I couldn’t figure out why she’d shot so wildly away from the biggest threat in our midst. Or why I thought an arrow would do any good against a stone giant.

  But then I saw the creatures that were charging us, and they were more terrifying than the golem.

  18

  Orcs. They couldn’t be anything else. Each stood at least seven feet tall or more, had bulging muscles, fangs, ugly faces, and gray or brown skin. Some of them wore crude armor, and all of them carried clubs, spears, battle-axes, or swords.

  They charged, taking advantage of our temporary disarray.

  The first of the elven guard ran to meet the orcs with spears while another contingent loosed arrows at them. I was in awe of the elves, as always, and their ability to look like they were flying as they attacked. With a swift, decisive punch, the first of the orcs fell under a volley of arrows and spears. The elves finished them off with blades and then moved for the next wave.

  Nya was shouting instructions, and I felt a battle-rush settle over me that was stronger than any I’d felt in Hell thus far. Seeing a gap in the fighting, I moved toward it, flicking my wrist back and the whip with it. As the new power flowed through me, the whip ignited, lighting up the road beneath the trees.

  There were hundreds of enemies.

  By now, all the elves had engaged with the orcs while also trying to avoid being trampled by the stone golem in our midst.

  “Ilana!” I called as I whipped the nearest orc, a nasty brute that was already bloody. I expected it to catch fire like the wraiths did, but it wore little clothing, and its skin seemed more like stone than flesh. Instead, my blow merely opened a gash in the orc’s side, and the smell of burning flesh reached my nose.

  The orc roared and came for me with great lumbering strides. I struck with my whip again, aiming for its face. This time, I caught its nose, the fire dancing across its black eyes. It reared back, stumbling, and one its eyes burst. Lashing the whip around my own body, not fearing the fire, I unsheathed my sword and attacked. The orc was still blinded, so I cut off its head with a two-handed stroke. The orc’s hands went, too, as it had been trying to wipe blood from its eyes so it could see.

  Looking for my next target, I saw that the elves guarding Sarina were becoming overwhelmed. Even with her hands bound and her leg in a splint, the red-haired warrior was fierce. She stood with her back to a tree, wielding a sturdy branch like a baseball bat. Two elves stood in front of her, cutting down orcs as quickly as they attacked.

  On my way to help them, I encountered another orc that was hacking away at two more elves. What the orc lacked in technique, it was making up for in strength. The elves were nimbler, but one was injured, and the second elf was defending her. I ran up from the right and thrust the tip of my sword into the orc’s ribcage. Continuing with my momentum, I planted a boot on the orc’s side and let my sword slice its way out the top of the creature’s chest cavity.

  We fell together, and the orc tried a few feeble swings at me as I tried to dislodge my sword from its destroyed ribs.

  The two elves recovered and turned to face another foe. Pulling my sword free, I ran toward Sarina once again. But fuck it all, she had moved. Her two guards were still protecting her, but all three of them had been forced further down the road. Seeing she was as safe as she could be for the moment, I turned my attention to the nearest enemies. Nya was fighting side-by-side with Ilana, and I joined them to protect their backs.

  19

  The stone golem was deadly but looked to be blind, and it mainly just created more chaos as everyone, elf and orc, tried to stay out of its way.

  The orcs were difficult to kill, much harder than wraiths, and they were everywhere. If it hadn’t been for my newfound strength from the wyrm’s blood, I wouldn’t have survived this far. Even with my enhanced strength, the orcs didn’t seem to die very quickly, as if their nervous systems weren’t the same as other creatures. My only real advantage here was that I was quicker. I certainly wasn’t as skilled as the elves and there had been little time to train since the last battle.

  So I was getting hands-on experience with my new strength and speed. The whip aided me some, and it continued to burn and sear the orcs’ flesh when I could use it, but soon everything became such close quarters that I couldn’t get a good shot at any of the orcs without hitting an elf.

  And anyway, with the fiery leather, I was the only thing glowing in the forest, and it was making me a target. So I took a few precious seconds to coil it back and attach it to my belt once more.

  Then there was no other thought about anything for a long time except hacking and staying out of reach of the orcs’ longs arms and out from under the stone golem’s stomping feet. The three of us reverted to our proven strategy where Nya and Ilana would use their superior skills to deal stunning blows to the orcs, and I would finish them off. But soon we couldn’t even do that.

  There were too many, and they kept spilling out of the forest as if the trees were bleeding evil. I dodged a club from one armored orc while swinging my sword into the belly of a second. Its intestines spilled out, but I didn’t have time to complete the kill before the first orc had come around for another chance to bash my brains out.

  Dodging low, I rolled to my left and came up behind the orc as its body followed its swing. The closest part of it to me was the right hamstring, so I slashed that with my sword, and the orc went down. Then, I pounced on its back, driving my sword into the side of its neck where the flesh was exposed. The orc twitched and tried to move, so I stabbed again for good measure and then turned my attention to the disemboweled orc who was stumbling over to me with a spear in its hand. The monster’s intestines dragged on the ground at its feet, and with a roar of rage, it charged me. I parried with my sword, evading the spear, but the brute’s momentum carried it crashing into me.

  We went down hard, with the orc landing on top, pinning me to the ground. It reared up and with a leer that could have been some form of hideous smile, it bared its fangs as if it was going to bite my face off. The only part of my body I could move was my head and part of my shoulders, so I steeled myself for pain and head-butted its flattened nose. There was a sharp pain in my forehead, and I felt a pop as the creature’s face cracked. It bellowed again but still didn’t move off me, so I head-butted it a second time, this time feeling my brains rattle in my skull. But I’d also felt bone give way. Hoping I wasn’t cracking open my own skull, I tried one more time. This time, realizing what I was going to do, the orc moved its head, but its body shifted, too, and I pushed for all I was worth.

  And then Ilana was there, tearing at the orc’s damaged face with her claws. I unsheathed my dagger and finished it off by stabbing the blade up through its jaw and into its brain.

  All around us, the orcs were dying, and the elves were gaining an upper hand. Now that our breathing space had become a bit easier, Ilana, Nya, and I joined forces once again. We pushed back on the tide of orcs, with the elves’ superior skills proving to be better than the enemy’s greater numbers.

  All through the battle, I was faster and stronger than I had been in previous skirmishes. I still didn’t match Nya, but I felt that I never would even if I lived to be a hundred years old.

  The problem was that I wasn’t an elf. Nya was amazing, and as I watched her spear a small orc from a distance of fifty yards, I got turned on a little even though she was covered in orc blood.

  That could have been a result of the adrenaline racing through my body, but either way, she was a damn fine sight.

  So was Ilana. Neither looked injured, and I couldn’t have wished for anything else.

  Except…

  There was still a blood lust on me that wasn’t
quenched even as the final orcs died. I imagined the feeling was like a shark smelling blood in the water, and I couldn’t shake it. So, I went around to the enemy bodies and began double-checking that they were all dead, taking out some of my remaining aggression on them.

  I didn’t get much time to do that, however, before a warning shout echoed through the ranks.

  I looked up, and there, in the trees, another enemy was approaching.

  20

  At first, I thought they were wraiths, but as the first arrows hit their targets and then went completely through them, I realized we were dealing with something else entirely.

  The creatures had glowing red eyes and floated through the trees.

  “What are they?” I asked as Ilana reached me.

  “Hell-fiends,” she said. “Demon-wraith hybrids.”

  “How does that happen?” I asked somewhat breathlessly as the wispy, nebulous beings surrounded the elves on all sides.

  Ilana shook her head. “The Wraith King’s power is growing. I’ve never seen this many before, nor this far away from the Black Mountains.”

  “Well, shit,” I said. “What do we do about them?”

  But while I’d been asking questions, the elves had been acting, forming a line in front of the hell-fiends. The elves weren’t brandishing their weapons, either, but holding out their hands as if to ward off the monsters. Then they began to chant spells, causing the hair on my arm to stand on end.

  And it seemed to be working. The hell-fiends had halted their attack, their nebulous forms floating menacingly in front of the elven warriors.

  Nya and her guard were confronting the stone giant, which was again shifting. The boulders separated into parts and began hovering over the elves. There was no doubt the objective was to crush the elven line, but Nya’s guards held their hands over their heads as if they were trying to reach the stones.