The Sorcerer's Path Box Set: Book 1-4

by Brock Deskins

  ***

  Azerick and the refugees moved as quickly as they could, helping the wounded move as swiftly as they dared. He would treat their injuries more thoroughly when they stopped. He wished Delinda were here. She was a better herbalist and healer than he was, and she would know how to care for the wounded under these conditions. She had quickly mastered the few tricks he had shown her in regards to brewing healing potions. Given time and practice, she would have become a master herbalist and healer.

  His thoughts brought a wave of fresh grief crashing against his heart, threatening to rip it from its moorings and shatter it upon the rocks of his pain. Azerick suppressed his sorrow as best he could and focused on getting these people to safety. He did not have the luxury of time to mourn. He would do that later.

  Fear energized their steps, and they put a great deal of distance between them and the site of the ambush. No signs of pursuit were apparent, but Azerick and Toron both agreed it was very unlikely the cavern gnomes would simply let them go. They continued their exodus until fatigue and the pain of their wounds forced them to rest.

  Azerick treated the debilitating wounds with his scant supply of healing potions. For the others, he used raw, ground herbs to make a poultice to deaden the pain, prevent infection, and speed healing. They posted guards at the three tunnel entrances leading into this particular chamber. They could not afford to rest long, but continuing without it was impossible.

  Zeb sidled up next to the young sorcerer sitting with his back against the clammy cavern wall. “How long do you think they’re going to let us rest before they hit us again?”

  Azerick answered without opening his eyes. “To be honest, I’m surprised they have waited this long. If we get a full rotation of sleep it will be a miracle.”

  Azerick knew better than to believe in miracles and rightfully so. Barely more than three hours passed before the twang of crossbows and the shouts of men and gnomes woke him. He jumped to his feet with everyone else as the clanging of metal on metal resounded throughout the cavern.

  “Toron, take most of the men and defend the forward tunnel. I’ll handle the rear,” the sorcerer instructed.

  Azerick followed the sounds of battle to the tunnel they had traveled down a few hours before. One man was down with a quarrel through his chest while four others showed bloody wounds but were still battling furiously against twice their numbers in gnomes. Azerick sent missile after brilliant missile streaking into the ranks of cavern gnomes until his spells forced them back or killed them.

  “You men fall back and do not pursue them,” Azerick ordered.

  As the wounded humans slowly retreated, the tenacious cavern gnomes regrouped and renewed their assault. As the short, sinewy creatures charged forth with a cry of anger, Azerick wove another spell. Being in a world surrounded by stone had its advantages. He directed his stone spikes to sprout from not only the floor but the walls as well. Stone spears slammed into the forward ranks of the attacking gnomes, skewering several of them and completely blocking the passage for the ones behind.

  Azerick watched as a solitary gnome stepped forward and raised a fist-sized gem over his head. Balor came running up behind him as the gnome glared at the sorcerer and spoke an incomprehensible stream of words. The gem flared brightly, and the stone spikes Azerick raised crumbled to dust.

  “Azerick, the gnomes have retreated up front. One man is dead and another has a bolt in his gut. Zeb wants to know what you want to do now,” Balor reported hurriedly.

  “Get the bolt out of the man and have him drink this,” Azerick said and handed the sailor a small, metal vial. “Then get everyone moving as fast as you can. I do not like the looks of this.”

  Azerick expected the cavern gnomes to charge the instant the magic-wielding gnome cleared his spikes from the passage, but they stayed back as the strange gnome raised his gem once more. He uttered another stream of strange, but obviously magical words, and the ground began to tremble beneath Azerick’s feet.

  “Go! Tell them to run as fast as they can!”

  Balor and the others ran back to the rest of the group with one last look at the sorcerer and yelled for everyone to get moving. Balor reached the wounded man and saw a blood soaked wad of cloth had replaced the bolt in his stomach. He popped the cork and emptied the contents into the stricken man’s mouth. The potion stopped his bleeding almost immediately. His shipmates then helped him to his feet and carried him along.

  The gnome’s gem flared, the rock trembled, and three mounds of earth started rising in front of Azerick. The mounds quickly began to take shape. The tops of the mounds formed a rough approximation of a human-like head, thick arms sprouted from the sides, and legs formed beneath them. The creatures were so large they had to stoop to fit into the passageway, but Azerick doubted that would hinder their ability to crush him to a pulp one bit.

  He released a powerful bolt of lightning into the earth elementals. Chips of sharp stone flew off the creatures, and black scorch marks seared across their wide chests. The stone juggernauts ignored the trifling damage and rumbled toward him, causing the ground to vibrate under his feet with each step. The sorcerer sent a flight of arcane missiles into the lead elemental followed by a jet of intense flame. More stone flecks sprayed off the granite titan and blackened its surface, but his assault failed to slow it down in the slightest.

  Azerick made one last desperate attempt to slow the creatures’ advance. He erected another barrier of stone spikes extending directly in front of him and several yards down the halls. The sharp, monolithic shards scored tracks along the elementals’ stone bodies, but they caused negligible damage. With single-minded determination, they swung their huge fists and feet, snapping and battering their way through the granite spears as if they were no more than dry corn stalks.

  Azerick ducked when the lead elemental swung its maul-like fist at his head. Sharp stone flecks peppered the side of Azerick’s face and neck when the elemental’s massive fist crashed into the cavern wall. He heard the whistling and caught a glimpse of steel as it whisked past the top of his head. With a roar of defiance, Toron cleaved a huge gouge of stone out of the elemental where its shoulder and neck joined.

  If the massive attack bothered the extra-planer creature in the least, it did not show. It silently swung its other huge fist at the big minotaur who had dared to interrupt its assigned task. Toron brought his axe back around in another powerful blow in the opposite direction. Metal met stone in a colossal impact setting Azerick’s ears to ringing. Finely honed steel won out against the unnatural stone and severed the arm of the elemental just below the elbow.

  Azerick was forced to roll out of the way to avoid being pummeled by the hundred-pound chunk of arm that narrowly missed crushing his head. “Toron, let’s go! We need to catch the others.”

  The big, stubborn minotaur was loathe to flee combat, but he knew there was discretion in valor and followed the sorcerer’s instructions. He leapt back as the elemental swung its remaining arm at him, intent on killing these weak creatures of flesh. Azerick and Toron ran back in the direction in which the rest of their band had fled.

  “How far ahead are they?” Azerick asked the minotaur who puffed in deep breaths behind him.

  “A few hundred yards at best given the speed they were moving. They have some wounded who will force them to a slower pace.”

  Within minutes, Azerick and Toron spotted the light of the group’s rear element just ahead of them. Azerick shouted out a greeting before the guards filled them with crossbow bolts in a case of mistaken identity.

  “Where is Zeb?” Azerick asked one of the rear guardsmen.

  “He’s leading the column up front,” one of them answered with a jerk of his thumb.

  “Go find him,” Toron rumbled. “I will stay back here and help guard our rear.”

  Azerick had a hard time reading the expression set in Toron’s non-human face, but the glint in his eyes spoke volumes. “Don’t do anything foolish, Toron. We still
have need of you.”

  The old minotaur’s grey muzzle curled into a grin revealing a row of sharp teeth. “It is only foolishness when a brave act fails.”

  Azerick could not order him to do anything, but he hoped the Toron would not sacrifice himself needlessly. He had grown somewhat fond of the big creature in the short amount of time he had known him. Azerick raced up to the front of the column of fleeing humans and found Zeb breathing heavily but pressing steadily onward.

  “Glad to see you made it back, lad. What the boys told me they saw before you ordered them off had me a bit worried.”

  “What I saw before I left still has me worried,” Azerick replied with all seriousness.

  Zeb grimaced. “So what’s our situation look like now?”

  “Not good. The gnomes brought in some kind of spellcaster who has some rather potent earth magic. He summoned three earth elementals, which is a feat I could not hope to achieve. Worse yet, I have nothing in my spell inventory I can think of that will cause them any serious harm.”

  “So are they indestructible or what?”

  “No, not quite. I think Toron could chip one into rubble with that axe of his, maybe two in his prime, but not all three.”

  “Can we outrun them?”

  “For a time. They do not seem that fast, but they are tireless. I think the gnomes will be content to let the elementals hound us until we exhaust ourselves, and then sweep in when we are at our weakest.”

  “Do you have a plan?”

  “Not at the moment. Just keep moving and hope something presents itself.”

  They increased their pace now that Azerick and Toron had caught back up to them for as long as they could, but fatigue and their own wounded men soon forced them to slow down. Azerick made his way to the rear of the column to check on the rearguard and to see if their enemies were catching up to them.

  “Where is Toron,” Azerick asked Balor when he failed to see the minotaur.

  “He keeps stopping whenever the tunnel gets narrower. Doesn’t say why, just tells us not to worry about him and to keep going.”

  Azerick started to head down the tunnel after Toron when he heard footsteps and heavy breathing coming at him. Azerick readied a spell but let the energy dissipate when he saw the dark shape of the asymmetrical horns on top the large, shadowy figure. Toron grinned brightly when he saw Azerick standing in the circle of light his enchanted stone threw off.

  “Toron, what are you doing back here?”

  The grey muzzle grinned even wider. “Slowing those giant dirt clods down a bit to buy you all more time. Whenever the tunnel narrows enough to allow only one of those creatures through and restrict its movement, I wait and chip off a few more chunks off it. I left one of them crawling on the ground after I took its leg off. Same one that lost its arm to my axe earlier. I think we can call that one out of the fight unless that gnome can put it back together.”

  Azerick saw Toron try to stifle a gasp of pain when he breathed in. “Are you injured?”

  “The downed creature’s friend wasn’t too happy and paid me back a bit is all. Caught me squarely in the ribs. I’ve lived through worse.”

  Azerick wondered how old he had been when he received those wounds, but he pushed the thought out of his head. “How much time do you think you have bought us?”

  “We were gaining ground on them for a while, and I managed to increase our lead with my harrying, but we’ve been slowing down for a while now. I would say we are only slightly farther ahead of them than we were when we first fought them. I give us an hour at best if we do not slow down any further.”

  Azerick doubted the group’s ability to maintain even this somewhat sedate pace for much longer. If something did not present itself soon to give them some sort of relief, they were in serious trouble.

  “Save your energy for a last stand. Your axe will serve us a lot better in a concerted fight than your slowing actions are likely to bring us at this point.”

  “Yes, you’re probably right,” Toron sighed as he ran a thumb over the notched and blunted edge of his axe.

  “If we get out of this, we all owe you our lives, Toron. I’m glad you came with us.”

  “It is I who owe you for giving me the chance to live and die like a true warrior. I thought I was going to die a feeble old man.”

  “You may yet still get the chance,” Azerick replied.

  Toron glared down at the sorcerer. “That’s a hell of a thing to say!”

  Azerick threw the old minotaur a wink, clapped him on his broad, hairy shoulder, and ran back to the front of the group.

  “Any changes up here, Zeb?”

  “It looks like we’re coming up to another large chamber. Just pray nobody is waiting for us inside.”

  Azerick and the men looked around intently as they entered the large chamber, but they saw no sign of ambush. Several tunnels branched off from the large, domed chamber. Their magical lights were just able to illuminate the tips of the stalactites clinging to the ceiling lost in inky blackness farther above. Stalagmites jutted up from floor in a parody of Azerick’s stone spike spell. Some were over ten feet tall with a base that would take three men linking arms to surround it. The humans quickly scouted the room and found four new tunnels presenting them with a decision to make.

  “Which way do you think, lad?” Zeb asked him.

  “I don’t know, Zeb. I just don’t know. Damn it all!” Azerick swore in frustration and knuckled his forehead, thumping it rhythmically trying to induce it to produce an answer.

  Whether it was luck, divine intervention, or just thumping his head to jar his brain into action, he had an inspiration. He held out his hand and produced a small flame. It hovered just above his palm, flickering like a tiny willow wisp.

  Zeb hushed and held back his men as Azerick paced around the chamber near the wall, pausing in front of each tunnel. After he had made nearly a complete circuit, he returned to the second tunnel on the left from the one they had entered.

  The tiny flame flickered and danced upon the sorcerer’s outstretched hand. “This one, Zeb. There is a breeze coming from this passageway. Get everyone moving, quickly.”

  “You heard him, folks! let’s get a move on,” Zeb called back to the people trying to catch their breath.

  Azerick paused by the tunnel entrance and made sure no one was left behind, particularly Toron. The old minotaur flashed him a grin as he brought up the rear guard. Satisfied all were accounted for, he jogged back up to the front of the troop column. The tunnel twisted and turned its way through the solid rock. In less than an hour, the group found the source of the breeze wafting through the tunnel and came to a halt. It was not a surface exit as Azerick had hoped, but a massive chasm, its depth and width lost in darkness.

  “This doesn’t look good, son,” Zeb remarked with concern.

  “Hand me a crossbow bolt,” Azerick commanded.

  One of the sailors plucked a quarrel from a short quiver at his hip and handed it over. Azerick chanted a word of magic, and the bolt lit up with the same bright light as the stones he had made.

  “Fire it across the gulch. Try to hit the far wall near the same level we are at,” he told the sailor as he returned the bolt.

  “If there is a far wall,” the sailor muttered.

  The man made a guess as to the distance and fired his crossbow. The magical, makeshift flare sped across the dark expanse before clattering against the stone side about fifteen feet up from their position on the far side. The illuminating bolt looked little more than a bright star surrounded by an expanse of darkness when it finally came to a rest at the bottom of the chasm.

  “Did you all see the tunnel on the other side?” Azerick asked the men standing around him. Several of them affirmed they had. “All of you give me a bolt, but do not take your eyes off where you saw the tunnel.”

  Azerick repeated his spell over the half dozen quarrels and returned them to the men holding the crossbows. “Try to get your bolts to land inside
the cave on the other side. One of you shoot first to get a second look, then the rest of you aim for the cave.”

  They all raised their crossbows and waited for the lead man to loose his shot. The bolt sped away across the dark expanse like a shooting star. It struck surprisingly near the entrance, just a few feet above it. The twang of the crossbows hurling their projectiles echoed through the cavern the moment the first one revealed the cave entrance. Three of them struck just on the outside of the distant cave and joined the previous two at the bottom of the deep gulch, but two made it inside and illuminated the passage.

  “Good shot, men.”

  “Shoot, weren’t nothin’. Try it from the top of a rocking ship’s mast at sea,” one of the grizzled sailors replied.

  “Stand back, everyone,” Azerick instructed and began another enchantment.

  Azerick deftly wove a spell, and the air began to shimmer before him. Light appeared in a thin line as if someone had just taken a knife and made a long cut in the air revealing the sunlit surface. The thread of light widened until it was six feet wide and eight feet tall. Through the magical doorway, the men could see the cave with the illuminated crossbow bolts lying on the ground, but it now looked only a few feet away.

  “Zeb, get everyone through quickly. I don’t think we have very much time.”

  Azerick slapped his head in rebuke as the rest of the party ran through the portal. “I am such an idiot!” Azerick pulled a scroll tube out of his pack and began shuffling through the pages.

  “What’s the matter, boy? Why are smacking yourself about?” Zeb asked.

  “I have a veritable treasure trove of magical spells at my fingertips, and I completely forgot about them!” he snarled as he set a couple of the scrolls aside before rolling up the rest and dropping them into the leather tube.

  “Everyone else is through, little wizard. Time to go,” Toron rumbled.

  “Not just yet. They may know a way past this. I want to convince them it is not worth their effort or lives.”