Azerick completed his spell and sent a jet of flame toward the abomination. The smell of burning hair filled his nose as the fur of a minotaur in the path of the blast was singed across its huge torso. The sickly, grey-skinned creature screeched out in either rage or pain. The repulsive monster focused its gaze on the sorcerer, and Azerick felt a massive weight press in on his head as if someone were reaching into his skull and squeezing his brain. He blocked out the tremendous pain and focused on his next spell. He knew if he could not get a lightning bolt off on the monster, all would be lost.
Concentrating through the pain, he brought his hand up before him, ready to loose the powerful bolt when a massive, invisible wave of force swept over him. The spell he was about to release dissipated in his mind as he lost his hold on the Source. He felt himself falling and saw the wood planks of the deck rushing up to meet him. As he thudded boneless onto the deck, he was able to remain conscious just long enough to see every sailor in his field of view collapse in a similar fashion. The hideous abomination had them all. What it would do with them now, he did not want to contemplate. His eyes closed and blackness took him deep into the embrace of unconsciousness.
CHAPTER 2
Azerick woke to the gentle rocking of the ship. In an instant, he was aware that someone had bound his hands behind his back and tied a gag in his mouth. As his eyes cleared, he also realized he was no longer on the Sea Star. Through the throbbing haze and pain in his head, he could make out the trussed up forms of Captain Zeb, Balor, and several other men from his ship. He shook his head from side to side in an effort to clear the fogginess and immediately regretted the action as a wave of pain and nausea washed over him. It was only with the greatest effort of will that he kept from vomiting, an extremely unpleasant and dangerous action considering the gag in his mouth.
He turned his head with far more care and scanned the deck of the ship. As he surmised, he was on the deck of the minotaur ship. He saw several of the beasts wrapping up the one he had killed in the battle. Once they securely enfolded the beast in sailcloth, three of his comrades stood to each side and carried their dead burden to the rail. The six bearers then heaved the body over the rail and into the sea.
Having executed their duty, the funeral contingent walked toward the prone sorcerer. For a moment, Azerick was sure he was going to receive a brutal beating in retribution for killing their comrade, but the creatures simply walked past without so much as a look down at him. He wondered where the hideous creature was that had so easily immobilized him and the entire crew. The silent appearance of the vile monster answered his unspoken question a moment later.
The monster was even more hideous close up. It’s bulbous head looked like a giant tick atop a pair of scrawny shoulders. Large, yellowed mandibles protruded from its lipless mouth and looked at the immobilized humans as a spider would a fly caught in its web. Azerick was about to learn how apt an analogy that was.
The long, gossamer-robed creature glided up to one of the humans. Without a single word being uttered, at least not one Azerick’s ears could detect, one of the hulking minotaurs lifted a sailor up to a standing position and held him firmly before the monstrous creature.
The creature lowered his head toward the rigid form of the sailor almost like a lover soliciting a kiss. With a sickening suddenness, the mandibles of the hideous monster clamped down and pierced the doomed sailor’s head at the temples. A stomach-turning sucking sound filled Azerick’s ears as the horrible thing made large gulping motions, sucking out the man’s brain.
After several minutes, the mandibles were withdrawn, and Azerick could see they had holes at the inside curve much like a viper’s fangs, but instead of injecting poison, these were used to suck out the brain of the victim. Azerick was near to vomiting as the minotaur carried the dead sailor to the rail of the ship and casually tossed his lifeless body overboard as if it were no more than common rubbish. He could only stare dumbly at the creature he would forever refer to as a brain sucker. Captain Zeb was not so easily shocked into silence.
“You sick bastard! Let me loose and I’ll cut that ugly glob of fish guts you call a head right off your skinny shoulders!”
Azerick was sure one of the minotaurs would thrash the furious captain for hurling such insults at the apparent leader of this ship and crew. However, his ignorance of the situation was made apparent once again when the brain sucker simply turned toward the cursing human. Captain Zeb let out a piercing shriek of agony for several long seconds before falling silent, twitching slightly with a thin rivulet of blood running from his nose and ears.
Azerick was shocked into motion at the sight of his captain being laid low and rolled over until he brought himself up next to Zed’s quivering form. Now one of the minotaurs moved and landed several solid blows from its large feet; bruising ribs and forcing Azerick away from the injured captain. Injured, not dead Azerick had time to see before he was batted away.
Fortunately, the brain sucker seemed to have satiated whatever hunger it had, or perhaps it simply wanted to put on a demonstration, because it did not return to the deck for several hours. The prisoners were not offered any food or water in that time, which was probably a good thing considering it did not appear they would be untied to relieve themselves anyhow.
For hours the hulking minotaurs rowed, propelling the boat at an impressive speed; a speed Azerick had to assume was magically assisted. Even given the obvious strength of the shaggy creatures, he did not think they could move a boat this fast without the help of some other unseen force. Were his head not still spinning he could probably sense if there was magic in use.
The deck rail was not a solid wall like the ones on the ships he was accustomed to seeing in Southport. It was more like the handrail of a flight of stairs or banister in which wooden columns spaced about a foot apart supported a solid rail. Azerick was able to see the ocean ahead and a few points off to one side. He spotted what first appeared to be several grey specks in the distance. Those quickly resolved themselves into a natural stone formation thrusting up out of the sea at least thirty feet above the rolling swells. The ship adjusted course slightly in order to pass between two of the granite pillars that could not have left more than a few feet of space to each side of the ship to thread its way through.
Azerick briefly wondered why they were maneuvering between the columns of stone instead of simply going around them. The brain sucker returned to the deck of the ship and glided up to the forward deck as they neared the structure. The grotesque creature lifted its hands over its bulbous head, and Azerick felt a sudden wave of magical energy wash over him as the air between the pillars erupted into a shimmering screen of glimmering light.
Azerick saw the runes carved deep into the stone pillars just as the ship passed through the soap bubble-like screen. He once again felt his stomach become queasy as the world twisted and distorted around him. For several seconds, he felt as if the world had dropped out from under him and he was falling in uncontrolled flight, his body plummeting into an eternal void.
The world snapped back into focus, but when he opened his eyes, it was not a world he had ever before seen or even imagined. The sky around him was gloomy like on overcast day early in the morning just before the sun has peaked over the rim of the world. He looked beyond the rail and tried to make sense of the environment around him. All he could see was a dark grey, but whether it was the grey of clouds or distant stone, he could not tell. The scene felt gloomy, lifeless, and colorless.
Ahead of the ship, he could see land of the same cold grayness growing closer as the ship rowed on toward an equally colorless city of tall towers and strangely shaped buildings. Minotaurs, brain suckers, humans, a few dwarves, and beings he had never seen before wandered the streets and worked the docks.
Several minotaurs threw ropes out to the awaiting beings as the ship pulled up parallel to a large dock and secured the mooring lines. Minions extended a gangplank, and the brain sucker lightly strode across, stepped onto
the dock, and was greeted by another of its kin. They seemed to confer even though Azerick did not hear a single word and could not see either of the creatures’ mouths moving.
More workers rolled several carts with large cages on them out onto the dock. Minotaurs carried Azerick and the other sailors across the gangplank and carelessly tossed them inside the cages. Azerick was glad to find he was sharing a cage with Captain Zeb and that his friend was conscious once again. Although he still looked pale and a little bewildered.
“You all right, son?” Zeb asked in a slightly slurred voice.
Azerick nodded, unable to speak due to the gag still in his mouth. The wagons lurched forward, pulled by humans wearing tattered clothes and blank, lifeless faces.
“Here, let me see if I can get that gag out of your gob,” Zeb offered and used his teeth to pull the tightly wound strip of rough cloth off Azerick’s mouth and down around his neck. Azerick spit out the filthy wad of cloth stuffed into his mouth then tried to work up some saliva to moisten his arid mouth and throat before trying to speak.
“Thanks,” he was finally able to gasp out. “Are you all right?”
“My head feels like it was used as a catapult stone and my stomach sent along for the ride, but I’ll live; for awhile at least,” the Captain replied darkly, looking around at his surroundings. “Think you can cast any spells to get us out of here?”
“Not with my hands tied. I can’t form the weave making up the spell.”
“I’ll take it that means no since I really don’t know what you’re talking about.”
Azerick was heartened to see that Zeb was able to make a small joke and knew he would be all right as long as no one decided to change their condition. A shudder coursed through Azerick’s body as the image of the desiccated sailor passed through his mind.
The carts rolled down the cobbled streets pulled by the human slaves and guided by the brain sucker from the ship. The workers, likely slaves from their appearance and bearing, pulled the captives through streets thronged with the glazed, lifeless-eyed denizens of this strange place. The prisoners were rolled into a large, squat building. Barred cells holding prisoners of various races lined the walls of the interior. The ship’s crew was unloaded and herded into the vacant cages.
They placed Azerick in a lone cell, separated from the rest of the crew with empty cells to each side, likely to prevent anyone from freeing his hands. A minotaur gestured for the sailors to turn around and put their hands between the bars. When the humans complied, the creature cut their bonds, freeing their hands. No one afforded the spell caster such freedom. His hands remained tightly secured behind his back.
“What do you think they are going to do with us?” Balor asked, nervously massaging his wrists.
“I don’t know. But I’m sure that whatever it is, it doesn’t bode well for us,” Zeb answered despondently. “It’s my guess we’ll be sold into slavery from the looks of it. It looks like this whole city is run by slaves.”
“Why don’t the slaves revolt? There must be a hundred times more of them than those ugly monsters from what I saw,” one of the sailors asked.
“They obviously have some way of controlling them. There are spells capable of controlling a person’s mind or compel their actions. It is possible they employ some such a method, although I know of none that would work on such a scale as this,” Azerick supplied. “Even if that’s not the case, look how easily one of these things overwhelmed our entire crew. The body count of an open revolt would be horrendous.”
Several human slaves walked in bearing trays with bowls of some sort of grey gruel. They passed them through the narrow bars to the prisoners, but they did not supply any utensils, so the sailors were forced to eat with their hands. Azerick could not even manage that small dignity with his hands secured. He was forced to kneel down and lap up the bland, odorless, tasteless porridge like a dog. He decided to suffer this ignominy to maintain his strength. So long as he drew breath, he had a chance to escape his captors and free his friends.
As the hours passed, Azerick tried to sleep, but there was no possible way to get comfortable enough to enjoy any decent rest. He sat with his back to the wall, and exhaustion eventually pulled him into a restless slumber. He woke several times during what he assumed was the night, his cramping muscles never allowing him to sleep for long. He woke once again to the sound of someone sliding a wooden bowl under his door. Again, he had to eat like an animal from the bowl. Spots of the gruel stuck to his face as he licked the bowl clean. He swore someone would pay for this insult one day.
The bowls were taken away a short time later, and the prisoners were left alone with the exception of a single hulking minotaur wielding a stout cudgel sitting on a wooden stool near the door. He would occasionally get up to walk the corridor of cells, smacking the bars of the prisoners’ cages with the club when someone came too close to them. Other than the guard’s occasional rounds, they were left to themselves.
A few hours after their morning meal, the guard snapped to attention as the outside door opened. Several guards of human and minotaur races walked in ahead of two brain suckers. The spider-faced creatures seemed to be conversing in a language that sounded like someone trying to chisel stone with a dead fish.
“Master Xornan, I am sure you will be most pleased with my newest acquisitions. I have one in particular I know will please you immensely,” the slave master promised silkily, if the word could apply to such a liquid and grotesque language.
“We shall see, slave master Valinquar. You have disappointed me before,” the psyling lord reminded the subordinate.
“It was bad luck the ogre was slain in The Games, Lord Xornan. Surely your lordship cannot hold me responsible for simple ill fortune?”
“I hold you responsible for selling me a creature too stupid to move out of the way of a charging Aragonax. You managed to find a creature that even its own dull-witted kind would label as feeble-minded.”
“I assure you, this one is different. He is a human wizard, and very smart as humans go.”
“A wizard you say? It has been some time since I fielded a magic user in The Games.”
Azerick watched the exchange, feigning indifference as he sat in his cell with his back pressed against the back wall. He could make nothing of the squishy conversation of the two psylings, but the way they looked at him gave him the impression that he was the topic of their conversation.
Come stand before me, human, so I may look at you, a voice commanded.
Azerick heard the command but could not see from where it came. It took him a moment to realize he did not hear the order with his ears but inside his head.
Yes, human, I need not sully my mouthpieces with your crude language to communicate with your primitive mind. Now come closer. Do not force me to command you. Your cooperation is requested, not required.
Azerick decided that such trifling defiance at this point was futile and did as the monster bade him. He would play the part of the subjugated, obedient, and compliant slave. He would let these disgusting creatures think they dominated him until they let down their guard. Then he would make them pay.
You may play whatever games you like, human. They will avail you nothing. I know everything you think as you think it. Resistance is less than futile; it will no longer even be possible once I bond you. So, you are a sorcerer not a wizard. How delightful. I do not think Valinquar realizes what a catch he has. Yes, you will serve me well, human.
“He is not much to look at is he, Valinquar?” Xornan said to the slave master, looking at the dried gruel stuck to Azerick’s face.
“He is merely soiled from his captivity. Do not judge him so hastily. Had I not quickly subdued him, he would have wreaked great havoc on my hunters and ship. It was he who killed one of my minotaurs and seriously injured several others with a most powerful display of wizardry.”
“These other humans,” Xornan asked, gesturing to the sailors in the other cells, “they were with him? They are
his shipmates?”
“Yes, Lord Xornan, I was fortunate to capture most of the ship intact. A very fine haul; all quite healthy and strong.”
“Very well, I will take the lot if we can agree on the price.”
The slave merchant wrung his long-fingered hands together in anticipation of such a profitable deal. The two bulbous-headed psylings haggled for several minutes in their indecipherable language before striking a deal. Minotaur and human guards secured the sailors’ hands once again and marched them out, prodding them along with their weapons into wheeled cages similar to the ones used by the slave master.
Several of the newly acquired slaves were ordered to pull the carts under threat of force, encouraged by a minotaur wielding a scourge. The indentured sailors had no recourse except to grumble their displeasure and pull the carts. Even their grumbling was subdued lest they invoke the minotaur’s displeasure and feel the scourge upon their backs.
Xornan climbed into a silk-curtained palanquin hefted by four minotaurs as the humans were pulled through cobbled streets past various single and two-story buildings. Azerick spied a huge, circular stone structure dominating the center of the large bustling city; obviously an arena of some sort.
The plain, blocky buildings began to dwindle and, larger, mauve-colored structures of much more elaborate design began appearing. These fanciful buildings were unique, not just for the color of the stone but also for the fact they appeared to grow from the rock itself and were not constructed of cut blocks. The walls blended smoothly with the ground with no evident sign of seams or mortar. Eventually, these manor houses dwindled and even taller towers began appearing. These too were of the same hued stone as the manor houses and appeared to have sprouted from the very earth like the stalks of some massive amethyst plant or tree.
The carts halted inside the courtyard beneath a huge tower reaching over a hundred feet in height. The slaves were hustled out of their cages and made to stand before their new master.
The Sorcerer's Path Box Set: Book 1-4 Page 37