“You can’t threaten me,” Wilam said. “Guards, throw lady Brianna out of the inn.”
The guards moved forward and Brianna held out one hand, never taking her eyes off of Wilam. A ring of fire sprang up in mid air, surrounding the guards.
“You call for more and I will kill them,” Brianna said. “Do not test me further.”
“You must stop this,” the healer said. “You are making things worse, can’t you see that.”
“Tell me how you did it and I will leave,” Brianna said.
“Swear to me,” Wilam said. “Swear on the life of your parents that you will leave if I tell you.”
“I swear it,” Brianna said.
Wilam coughed, his breathing was weak and he held his good hand against the wound in his side. His face was flushed and it was impossible to tell if he knew what he was doing or was lost inside a fever induced hallucination.
“The royal crown,” he said. “Their names are inscribed on it. That is how I control them. Please don’t hurt me anymore. I’ll tell King Zorlan whatever he wants to know. My father is the King of Yelsia. He’ll give you whatever you want, just don’t hurt me anymore.”
Brianna stared at Wilam for a moment, her eyes narrow, her forehead pinched in fury. Then she leaned over the bed toward him.
“I never want to see you again,” she said bitterly. “I could never love a man who throws life away so easily.”
Wilam was about to reply when Brianna’s hand shot out. She snatched the crown off of Wilam’s head and dashed toward the window. A blast of flame blew the thin glass out of the frame and she dove through the small opening. The ring of fire around the guards disappeared and they dashed forward.
Even as Brianna jumped through the window she could hear Wilam shouting, “Seize her. Get my crown!”
She flipped once after she cleared the window sill and then Sorva streaked under her, the black dragon’s wings pulled in close to its body. Brianna grabbed hold of the short neck and locked her legs around Sorva’s back. The big, black dragon’s momentum carried them past the inn, which was the tallest building in the small village. Once they were clear of the inn, Sorva’s wide wings flapped open and then they were climbing.
Brianna held up the royal crown, her hand engulfed in flames. The gold became soft, the crown’s shape crumpling. Then the metal melted, pooling in the palm of her hand. They were past the village now and well away from the camps of the refugees. Brianna flung the molten gold away; it flashed out, hardening in the wintery air as it fell in hard drops into the forest-covered mountains which rose up around the wide valley.
After a few minutes Tig joined the pride of dragons. They were ten strong now, and Brianna swore to herself she wouldn’t let anything else happen to them.
Chapter 25
Zollin heard her voice but he couldn’t see her in the darkness. He let his light shine, but there was nothing for the light to reflect off of. He didn’t know how he had gotten into the void he found himself in, but the world had become a great expanse of nothingness.
“Zollin!” the voice said again, this time with greater urgency.
His eyes fluttered and he realized he’d had them closed the whole time he thought he was looking around. Now he could see the stone walls pressing in. He squirmed, but he couldn’t move. He was trapped. He tried to shuffle backward, but it was no use.
“Oh, Zollin,” cried the voice. It was full of pain and distorted by sobs, but he recognized it. He would have recognized that voice anywhere.
“Brianna?”
“Why have you given up?”
“What? I don’t know what’s happening.”
He struggled some more, but the stones were unmovable. Fear rose up inside him and threatened to push him over the edge of sanity. He wanted to scream and had to choke back tears.
“You have to come back to me, Zollin. I’ve lost so much. I don’t want to lose you.”
“You aren’t,” he said, but there was no confidence in his voice.
“Don’t give up,” she said.
He struggled again, but this time there was no resistance. He rolled across the stone floor and when he looked up he saw the archway only a few steps ahead of him. He looked back but there was nothing but a long, open corridor. He struggle to his knees and rubbed his eyes. He couldn’t believe what he was seeing. How had he come out of the tiny, narrow space? Where was the tunnel now? He used his light to search for an opening but there wasn’t one.
“I’m okay,” he said out loud, his voice echoing off the stone walls.
He felt a little silly talking in such an isolated place, but he was certain Brianna was nearby. He had heard her voice. He had spoken to her. He was certain about that.
“Brianna?” he said. “Where are you?”
There was no answer. He wanted to scream, but instead he just raised his voice a little.
“Brianna? Are you there?”
Silence filled the long, empty corridor. He wanted to cry. He missed her so much, but it must have been a dream. He realized he must have been under some type of spell and only imagining the tunnel was closing in on him. He wanted to scream, he was tired of being in the underworld. But he wasn’t finished yet.
He got to his feet and his head felt light. He dug in his pack and found some bread crumbs in the bottom. He didn’t care if they were covered in mold, he ate them anyway and drank almost all of his water.
It will all be over soon, he told himself.
Then he went through the archway. There were more stairs, but instead of the wide, curving staircase, these stairs were broad and led straight down into a large cavern. There were stalactites and stalagmites near the walls, but the central part of the cavern was open. The floor was once again rocky under his feet and he realized he must have left the tower. There were torches illuminating a portion of the cavern. Zollin could see the form of a man in the light. The person was very thin and stooped, and paced back and forth. Zollin approached slowly, staying in the shadows.
The man had a ratty looking cloak over his bony shoulders and a hood pulled up over his head. Zollin noticed the man’s feet were bare, and his hands were deformed the way the hand os the elderly sometimes become from years of work and arthritis. Zollin could see the swollen joints and the way the fingers had curled in and grown stiff. His first impulse was to help the man, but he hesitated. He didn’t know if this was even real.
He let his magical senses flow toward the man, but his magic seemed to recoil before it came close. As soon as the magic neared him the man whirled faster than Zollin would have thought possible and stared in his direction. Then he lowered the hood and Zollin felt his breath catch in his throat.
“Offendorl,” he said softly.
“I know you’re there!” Offendorl shouted, his voice pinched with tension.
“It’s okay,” Zollin said. “I don’t want to hurt you.”
Offendorl laughed a strange, high pitched cackle that made the hair on the back of Zollin’s neck stand up.
“I need to find Gwendolyn,” Zollin said, trying to keep is voice steady.
“The witch, the witch, the witch, the witch,” Offendorl chanted.
“I thought she killed you.”
A pained look came into Offendorl’s eyes.
“No,” he said.
“But I saw it,” Zollin said. “I saw the Leffer take you.”
“She needs me,” Offendorl said in a high pitched voice. “Wouldn’t let me die. No, no, no, I begged her, I did. But she’s too cruel.”
“So she trapped you here?” Zollin asked.
“I can never leave,” he mumbled. “Never, ever, never, ever.”
“How can I help you?” Zollin said.
“You can die!” Offendorl shouted.
Zollin felt an invisible force squeezing him and lifting him up off the floor. He struggled and then pushed back with his own magic. He felt the pressure lessen and then he was falling. He caught himself with a levitation spell and came do
wn softly. He heard cracking and grinding sounds, like glass being stepped on and crushed against stone. Zollin raised his bubble of protection just as shards of broken stalactites and stalagmites came hurtling toward him.
Offendorl cackled again, he was hopping up and down. He looked like a child watching a juggler and it occurred to Zollin that Offendorl wasn’t actually working magic against him. Gwendolyn was a sorceress, which meant that she had very little power of her own, only the ability to control the magic in others. It made sense, Zollin thought to himself as he knelt down to weather the storm of stone fragments being hurled at him, that Gwendolyn would have kept Offendorl alive. The old master of the Torr was the most powerful wizard in the Five Kingdoms.
“I don’t want to fight you,” Zollin shouted.
“Don’t fight, just die.”
Zollin sent a bolt of blue, magical energy crackling toward Offendorl. The old wizard laughed as he held out a hand, stopping the energy in midair and redirecting it into the ground. Zollin sighed, realizing that fighting Offendorl wasn’t going to be easy. When they had fought before Zollin had caught the ancient wizard off guard with his brute power, but there was nothing to give him an edge deep in the underworld. The only positive thing that he could cling to was the fact that Gwendolyn had to be close. And, if Zollin could defeat Offendorl, it would weaken the evil sorceress.
He was plotting his next move when the ground shook under him. He dove to the side, scrambling back into the darkness as the floor of the cavern split open right where Zollin had been crouched.
“I can see you,” chanted Offendorl, like a child playing hide and seek. “The darkness doesn’t hide you here, wizard.”
Something about Offendorl’s chant made Zollin realize that perhaps Gwendolyn was doing more than controlling the old wizard. Perhaps she could see and feel what Offendorl saw and felt.
He sent a wall of magic hurtling toward Offendorl. The old man’s twisted hands came up and he blocked the magical attack. The wall had been invisible, just as Offendorl’s defense had been, but Zollin felt the shock of the two spells clashing together. It was like a wave rolling through the space of the cave as if they were underwater. Offendorl wasn’t hurt by the attack, but he staggered back two steps from the shock wave.
Flames shot out of Offendorl’s mouth directly at Zollin. The younger wizard could have blocked the spell, but instead he ran, hurdling the crack that now ran down the center of the cavern and diving behind a row of stalagmites. The billowing stream of fire followed him, illuminating the cavern and reflecting off the drops of water that clung to the ceiling and dripped off the stalactites.
Then, as the fire dissipated Zollin sent two waves of magic rushing toward Offendorl from opposite directions. The clash this time was even more massive than before, as the ancient wizard blocked both spells, but Offendorl had no where to go to avoid the impact of the magic which was effecting the physical world. His ancient body was slapped hard by the impact and Zollin saw Offendorl stagger. Then he sent another wave of magic, this one smaller and more focused than the others. He kept it low to the ground. Offendorl blocked the magic, but the effort knocked one foot out from under the old man. He fell hard, trying to catch his weight with his cripple hands.
Zollin jumped up, thinking to rush in and attack when the roof of the cavern split open. Water came pouring down with such force that even with his bubble of magic around him, Zollin was swept backward. The cavern quickly began to fill with water and Zollin was forced to use magic to hold himself up above the churning waves. The crack in the floor of the cavern sucked the water down, creating a whirlpool as the water swirled around the cavern. Zollin couldn’t see anything, the torches that had given Offendorl light had been extinguished.
Zollin floated just above the surface of the swirling water, and levitated back to the stairs that led up into the stone tower. He lowered himself onto the stone steps well above the rushing tide below him and let his magical light shine out. The area where he had been fighting Offendorl was flooded with water. Zollin had no idea what had happened to the old wizard, but he doubted that Gwendolyn would have sacrificed him so easily.
For nearly an hour the water gushed from the space above the cavern. Zollin was vigilant but he was out of danger and no more attacks came. He rested, waiting for the water to recede. Eventually it did, but as the water went down, and the torrent from above turned into a steady drip, Zollin saw that the floor of the chamber had changed. It was now a writhing mass of the eels he’d encountered in the cave lake. There were thousands of the creatures, so many that they were squirming all over each other. The stalagmites had been waist high to Zollin, but now they were buried under the eels.
Zollin knew the eels would attack him. They weren’t covering the cavern floor for no purpose. He could levitate over them, but something in the back of his mind was warning him of danger. Then the mass of eels seemed to rise up. Zollin let his light shine brighter and sent out a wave of his magic to ensure what he was seeing was real. The small eels, which averaged about two feet in length were sliding off of something larger. It was another eel, but it was gigantic. The creature, easily as large around as a cow, and long enough that its tail section was still hidden under the mass of eels, hissed. Zollin saw and felt the mist sprayed from the giant eel’s mouth. He didn’t know what the mist or venom was, nor did he want to find out. He sent magical energy into his bubble shield to ensure the spray wouldn’t touch him or be inhaled.
Then, another giant eel reared up, this one much closer to Zollin. The eel didn’t hesitate, it dove for Zollin who scampered back up the steps and through the archway into the tower. The eel lay flopping and jerking on the steps.
Zollin considered his options and looked back behind him. The corridor now seemed to narrow, just as it had done when he came through from the other direction. He could see the walls and ceiling moving closer and closer together.
He realized here was nothing for him in the tower that would help him deal with the eels. He needed to cross the cavern that was now infested with them. As he watched, a third giant eel rose up and then a fourth. He needed to find a way to cross the space and quickly, before the task became impossible.
Then he heard the cackling laugh of Offendorl echoing through the chamber. The ancient wizard was still alive and Zollin realized he was behind the attack. He steeled his resolve and rushed into the chamber.
Chapter 26
Mansel and Quinn spent the morning preparing the feasting hall to be burned to the ground. Barrels of flammable oil had been spread all over the walls and thick wooden beams of the feasting hall. The western pass was a well packed dirt road that lead straight through the center of Walheta’s Gate. Oil had been poured into the street, and each of the ruined houses and shops that once lined the road had been transformed into small piles of oil saturated kindling.
General Hausey was stationed well back on a ridge overlooking the village. There were soldiers everywhere. Most of the cavalry had been spread along the line of defense between the eastern and western passes. Many were tasked with carrying messages, but others were being used as reserves in case the enemy broke though the main lines. Archers were strategically placed on the mountains around the pass. Quinn and Mansel sat with the soldiers. General Hausey had been all too happy to have them fighting with his troops and Nycoll helped the healers who were stationed well back from the front lines, farther along the pass.
“You ever wish you had just stayed in Tranaugh Shire?” Mansel asked Quinn. “You could have, you know, you were respected. You could be home now, or drinking in the inn we built.”
“No,” Quinn said. “I couldn’t let Zollin strike out on his own. He had plans to leave on his own, but I was going to follow him. I would have given him some space, but I couldn’t stand the thought of being alone in Tranaugh Shire.”
“You had friends there. You could have gotten remarried, had more kids.”
“No, I’m too set in my ways. I tried to settle down
again, it didn’t take. If I couldn’t be happy with Miriam, then I wouldn’t have been happy anywhere.”
“But you’re happy here, in this muddy camp full of soldiers facing an army of monsters. That makes you happy?”
“No, I never said that,” Quinn replied. “I’m happy to be here with you. It wouldn’t be right to leave you alone now, even if I could.”
“You did once before,” Mansel said, but there was no bitterness in his voice.
“Yes, and I have regretted it ever since. I thought I was doing the right thing. I’ve thought that all along, but here we are. All my best efforts didn’t seem to make much difference in the long run.”
“They made a difference to me,” Mansel said. “If you hadn’t left Tranaugh Shire I wouldn’t have either, and I know I’m better off now.”
“You might be dead soon,” Quinn said with a smirk.
“No, I don’t think so. I can do things with the sword that Zollin made for me that I never thought possible. You know he put this magic stone in it even though we didn’t really know what it did. But I can fight all day and night with this sword and never get tired.”
“What if you’re tired to begin with?”
“You don’t have to stay,” Mansel said. “You’ve done more than any man here. You could go north now, before the fighting starts. No one would blame you.”
“I have no one to go back to,” Quinn said grimly.
“Then take Nycoll,” Mansel said. “I would feel better knowing she was safe.”
“She wouldn’t go and you know it. Besides, she’s needed here. We’re all needed here. I’m not needed anywhere else, but here I can make a difference, even if it is a small one.”
“And what if we’re overrun?” Mansel asked. “Won’t what we do here be for nothing if these monsters get past us?”
“Of course not,” Quinn said. “We may not be able to stop the enemy all by ourselves, but everything we do here makes a difference. Even if we die here, our lives will have had purpose.”
Five Kingdoms: Book 07 - Wizard Falling Page 19