The Paladins of Naretia

by TP Keane

Chapter 13

  "Aria." Edwel skidded to a halt in front of her, sending shards of broken cobble skittling across the road. "Wonderful news, I have returned with the wizard called Mullrode, as you requested. And he most graciously offered to craft a new head for me. I'm thinking, perhaps one with a nose, and not quite so square."

  Aria pinched the bridge of her nose and shook her head. Edwel, so pleasant and optimistic, was not accustomed to sarcasm and took everything literally, including threats to his physical being. It was a characteristic that had annoyed Aria a great deal. But now, seeing his stupid grin whilst simultaneously manhandling a struggling junior wizard, it brought up a feeling of pity instead.

  "I don't think that's quite what he meant, Edwel," she said with a gentle sigh.

  "Oh, right then," Edwel said. His stone mouth turned downwards as he dumped the wizard unceremoniously onto the ground in front of Aria. It was the first time in her life that Aria had heard true disappointment in his voice.

  "Q-Queen Aria," Mullrode spluttered, his voice high and nasal. "I-I had no idea that the golem was sent by you. My apologies, Your Highness, if I had known I would have come with him willingly."

  Aria looked the man up and down. He appeared to be in his early forties, young to have passed his apprenticeship, with jet-black hair that reached only as far as his shoulders. His short, black beard was parted into three plaits and finished off with red beads that clinked annoyingly together as he spoke. He had the look of a man who spent most of his time indoors, away from the sun and any form of exercise.

  "Who else do you know that commands a golem?" Aria asked accusingly.

  Mullrode spluttered and raised his hands in a limp gesture of "I don't know". His severely arched eyebrows followed his hands movements. Aria noted a nasty bruise under one of his grey eyes - presumably a result of his struggles with Edwel.

  "I did tell him, Aria," Edwel said defensively. "He told me that he didn't give two?"

  "Ahhh, it doesn't really matter what I said," Mullrode interrupted with a nervous laugh. "What matters is that I'm here now. So, how may I be of service, Your Majesty?"

  "You can start by telling me how you came by this amulet?" she asked, gesturing toward her neck. "In all the years, and in all the wars that raged between us and the Dark Ones, I have never heard tales of it before. Yet now, as the son of Dantet makes himself known, it conveniently does the same. And just before my eighteenth birthday too, after which I would no longer be the sole ruler of Naretia."

  "I don't know what you mean, Your Majesty," Mullrode scoffed. "The amulet has always been in the castle vaults. Why, I have seen it there for many years. Perhaps it is because the amulet lay in an obscure part of the vault, in an area that hadn't been touched for some thousands of years? I only discovered it when Ol?rin himself asked me to catalogue the unending contents of the palace bowls."

  "Why would Ol?rin ask you to do that?" Aria asked, taking a step closer to Mullrode, who still sat on the ground. "Something about what you're telling me does not make sense, wizard. Any apprentice, or servant, could have done that job. So, why would the Supreme, all-knowing leader of the wizard caste ask a junior wizard to perform such a remedial task instead?"

  "I don't know, but Ol?rin has never liked me much. In the time that I studied under him, he seemed to delight in belittling me," Mullrode answered, squirming a little.

  Aria narrowed her eyes and drew her sword.

  "Tell me how you truly came to know about this amulet," she said slowly. "Answer me now, or I will slit your throat."

  "I came to know of it from cataloguing the vaults, Your Majesty, I swear," he said, his voice getting slightly higher with each word, and his hands beginning to tremble as he held them up defensively.

  "Fine! If you won't answer to me, then perhaps you will answer to a Dark One," Aria seethed, gripping her amulet. "Perhaps being undone by the very thing that you allowed me to control might loosen your tongue."

  "Aria, please," Edwel said. "He says he doesn't know."

  "I don't believe him," she spat, before turning to the nearest ogre. "You there, walk forward and remove this wizard's tongue. He apparently has no use for it at the moment."

  Dutifully, one of her ogres walked forward with large resounding steps and a gleam of want in his eye. His black armour clinked loudly in the now silent town. Traveling on the gentle breeze Aria could hear whispers of the name she had come to loath and know so well - The Blood Queen. She could feel the angry eyes of the residents staring at her from behind their dirty window panes.

  "No please, don't, I beg of you," Mullrode whimpered, scrambling away from the approaching ogre. "I swear to you, I know nothing more of the amulet other than its existence. I wasn't even sure that it worked. Please, My Queen, Please!"

  Aria ignored the wizard. She didn't want to have to resort to torture, but she also knew that fear was a powerful way to loosen a man's tongue, and nothing about his story seemed honest right now.

  Without warning, the wizard fell onto his back and pulled up his sleeve. He held up his arm and revealed a bizarre symbol etched in black ink on his forearm. Within an upside-down triangle two lines were drawn, each one curving away from the other at the top, like the horns of a goat. The wizard closed his eyes tightly and waited. When the ogre saw the marking, he stopped in his tracks and blinked stupidly at the wizard.

  "What are you waiting for?" Aria shouted at the ogre. "I said to remove his tongue."

  The ogre took another step forward and then hesitated again. He glanced between Aria and the wizard in an intense moment of sheer confusion. Brandishing his cleaver, he took another step forward and scratched his forehead before thumping it a few times with the heel of its hand. The ogre moaned and groaned like his brain was about to explode. Mullrode remained calm and still, his branded arm held up toward the ogre. Quiet unexpectedly, the ogre ended the baffling standoff by swiftly driving his cleaver deep between his own two eyes. His green body swayed for a moment and a smile of relief crossed its toothy, blood-stained face. He collapsed, dead, in a heap in front of Aria.

  Edwel stood between his queen and the wizard to protect her from whatever magic Mullrode had cast, but Aria walked around him and stared at the fallen ogre in disbelief.

  "What did you do?" she screamed at the wizard. "I thought only the amulet could control Dark Ones. How is this possible? Answer me!"

  "My apologies, Your Highness, but I didn't much feel like dying today," the wizard replied, standing to his feet and dusting himself off. "This is a protection mark against all creatures of Dantet. It is called a Custos, and should a Dark One try to harm any person bearing this mark, they will instantly feel an overpowering urge to commit suicide. It is a brutish spell, and one of my own invention, but in these uncertain times it is a necessary one. Most wizards who fight against the rise of Dantet will bear this mark. Tell me, do you know if Ol?rin Talfan has one? I have studied under that self-important blowhard for many years and I can unequivocally tell you that I have never seen one."

  Mullrode's tone changed at the mention of the Supreme Wizard's name, like it had made the taste in his mouth turn sour just by saying it.

  "That has to make you think, does it not, My Queen?" Mullrode said more coolly. He strode away from Aria and Edwel to examine the line of growling ogres. He smiled at them, holding his long, pointed nose firmly in the air in the same manner as Aria had remembered from the first time they met.

  "Ol?rin is the one who sent me into the vault to discover that amulet. He is also the one who protects the son of Dantet and, as the leader of the wizard caste, he is the one who prevents you from achieving justice for your parents. It has become obvious to me, and to many more within the wizard caste, that something otherworldly has persuaded him to save that monster.

  "We believe that Ol?rin has fallen prey to the seductive whispers of the Dark God. His actions belie the integrity he spouts. I know that if I was the Supreme Wizard, I would have taken the death of Nar
etia's king and queen more seriously."

  "And what, pray tell, would you have done differently, Mullrode?" Aria said, keeping her eyes mistrustfully fixed on the wizard as he meandered casually back toward her. "All wizards are forbidden to murder, are they not?"

  "You are correct, My Queen. Such wisdom in one so young," Mullrode said, facing Aria. Knowing that humouring him was more fortuitous in extracting information, Aria had to try very hard not to snarl at his condescending words. "As it happens the wizards of today follow the stringent law of the Goddess Edwina, but they don't have to. Magic cannot be created from nothing, but Edwina is not the only source of power in this kingdom. There is a new faction emerging from within the wizard caste called, The Order of Everto. And, like all new ways of thinking which threaten the sentiment and tradition of old men, it has been falsely associated with Dantet."

  Edwel looked meaningfully at Aria, or as meaningfully as his rigid stone face would allow. She remembered his warning about some wizards who, in their thirst for power, favoured the law of Dantet.

  "Let me reassure you, Your Majesty, that the order does not, nor will it ever worship that foul beast Dantet," he said as though he could read her thoughts. A few grumbles of disapproval rippled through the stoic line of ogres at the insult, but Mullrode ignored them. "By denouncing Edwina's rule we are no longer governed by any God, but rather by the magic we syphon from Naretia itself, and there is much of it here. So it is in our best interests to ensure the safety of our world and, by extension, the ruler of it.

  "But regardless of how Ol?rin may try to prevent it, a new reign is coming to the wizard caste, and, as old men often are, the Elders are frightened of what that will mean for them. They grow desperate to keep their long-winded traditions and power over the common folk, which have afforded them such an unquestioning rule. That is why they have created these lies about the order, vilifying us without any evidence at all. I also suspect that it is those very same wizards whom Dantet has turned.

  "However, I am just a humble servant to the true ruler of Naretia, and Ol?rin's motivation is not for me to decide. You are the rightful heir, and only you can decide which of us truly works in your favour and in the favour of Naretia. I only ask that you carefully consider the evidence so far."

  Aria wondered if Mullrode was telling the truth and, just like the worgen, dissention was also creeping into the unwavering rule of the wizards. Aria was only too aware how young blood often sites change in a society of traditions, as she had done within her own palace. She also wondered if the unseen hand, which had created the fateful eddies in her path, hadn't also steered Aramus's actions too. It would mean that, as a pawn, he was innocent of premeditating the terrible crimes he had committed. But he had still committed them and, as such, should be punished.

  'Why have I only learned of this dissention now?' Aria thought. 'You may have the same goal as I, wizard, but I fail to see how helping me would benefit you.'

  "Had I been the Supreme Wizard," Mullrode continued, "the winged man would not have been allowed to go free. I would have imprisoned this criminal for life, at the very least. There are also many spells that could have been cast, which would have left him writhing in pain for an eternity as punishment. When the new order comes to power, as it inevitably will do, if you make me the Supreme Wizard, I can swear our eternal allegiance to you and you alone."

  And there it was.

  "Tell me, Mullrode, should I decide to make someone else the Supreme Wizard, would you still swear your allegiance to me?" she asked.

  "Of course," he answered with a bow that almost lowered his nose to normal level, but not quite. "As long as you reign, you are, and always will be, my Queen."

  "Is that a threat, wizard?" Edwel said, taking a step closer to Mullrode.

  Aria didn't stop Edwel approaching him this time. She also got the distinct impression that he was hiding something more sinister within his words.

  "No, no, of course not," Mullrode replied, taking a reluctant step away from the stone golem. "I only mean that we, as wizards, will outlive the ruler of Naretia. But no matter who is in power our loyalties will always lie with the crown."

  "Then you won't mind me testing your loyalties, would you?" Aria asked.

  "I welcome it."

  "Tell me how to defeat Ol?rin in battle."

  Mullrode paused for a moment, flitting his sickly grey eyes between the golem and Aria.

  "You hesitate," she said, narrowing her eyes.

  "I do," he replied. "But only because to know how to disarm Ol?rin is to also know how to disarm any wizard, and it would leave us all vulnerable."

  "Tell me, and you will be free to return to Lothangard."

  The junior wizard pursed his lips into a thin line and shifted uneasily on his feet.

  "Very well," he replied, sliding a pale hand into the pocket of his blue robes. "In the beginning, when Edwina entrapped Dantet, she created a magical barrier between the two worlds. A shield called the Valefire, through which Dantet, or followers, could not cross. In the soil next to this barrier lay small pockets of a metal ore. Over eons this ore absorbed some of the barriers qualities, making it as impervious to all kinds of magic as the barrier itself. When the dwarfs discovered this ore they smelted it down, and so Etherium was created.

  "This scarce metal was only ever known to have been made into two sets of armour, one for the dwarven king and one for his champion. But by good fortune, and a sympathetic patron, the Order of Everto came upon one of these suits of armour, and it was fashioned into weapons for us. This is just one of the Etherium arrows," he said, withdrawing a silver metal shaft from his pocket. "As with all the other arrows, it has been enchanted with the Valefire shard to make it a formidable weapon against any mortal creature in existence."

  The thin rod shone brilliantly in the sun, and sung with the hint of a creature that was living. It was tinted blue and, although he called it an arrow, it had no fletchings that Aria could see, nor did it have a sharpened head either. For all intents and purpose, it looked like a simple rod, and Aria wondered if Mullrode was trying to fob her off with some junk he had picked up along the way. But she remembered hearing of a powerful gem called the Valefire, known only to the leaders of the castes and her father. It was a broken fragment of the Valefire shield itself, that protected Naretia from the dark creatures of Dantet's world. If Mullrode knew of it too, then he must be telling the truth.

  "The arrow will pierce any armour, magical shield, or hide, and is impervious to misdirection," he continued. "Thrown toward your target, it will strike it true every time. For most creatures one blow from the arrow will end their life, but for a wizard of Ol?rin's formidable power, I suspect that it will only weaken him for a time."

  "How do I know that you tell the truth?" Aria asked. "And how is it that you conveniently come to carry it right at the point where I would need it?"

  Mullrode smiled and turned his back to Aria's army of ogres.

  Without warning, he threw the arrow away from him, and it soared through the air with a long, high-pitched zing. Aria watched as the slender metal rod turned course of its own accord and took aim at the nearest ogre. The ogre too noticed that it was coming straight for him at an ever-increasing speed and tried to hide behind the soldier next to him. The arrow skirted around the soldier and passed through the head of its target without slowing down. Without slowing, it returned to the outreached hand of Mullrode in one seamless movement.

  The town grew silent as the ogre stumbled backward, green blood oozing from either side of his temple, and he fell to the ground, dead. The rest of the ogres bellowed, and made to advance on Mullrode before Aria stopped them with a raised hand. Edwel stepped closer to his queen in a vain attempt to protect her. Even though Aria knew the weapon would most probably find her regardless of his stone body, she was still grateful for the presence. Never in her life had she seen a wizard kill, and the sight disturbed her.

  "You see, Your Majesty,
the arrow will never miss." Mullrode smirked. "It is something that every member of the Order of Everto carries because we are a constant target of ill-wishers. It is not convenience that sees this weapon on me, but rather necessity. I would not part with it easily, but for you, My Queen, it is yours," he said, handing the arrow to Aria.

  Aria took the metal rod and examined it closely. It was heavy, cold, and etched along the shaft were a multitude of unfamiliar, swirling markings that seemed to embrace the blue metal, like the many arms of an octopus clinging to some treasure. It was indeed a formidable weapon and would be of a lot more use than the Trithonian's advice.

  "I must warn you, though," Mullrode continued, "that I do not believe the arrow will survive its encounter with Ol?rin; his power is too great. And so, it is imperative that you only strike at the most opportune moment. Otherwise, I fear your efforts to thwart him will be in vain."

  "Tell me, Mullrode," Aria said, eying both the strange weapon and the wizard suspiciously. "What good fortune led this metal into the hands of the order? I am familiar enough with dwarfs to know that such a find would only leave their hands if they were cold and dead. Who is this patron that has given you such a prize?"

  "Why it was their king, Your Majesty," Mullrode answered flatly.