Nature's Master (The Nature Mage Series Book 4)

by Duncan Pile

  “What are yeh doin’ here man?” Baard said, helping him up. “Yeh could’ve bin killed.”

  “Looking for you,” Rimulth said, staring at his trembling hands.

  “Well yeh found me. What made yeh take such a mad risk?”

  Rimulth met Bard’s gaze. “Helioport’s about to be attacked. We need your help.”

  “No!” Baard said. “Sestin’s makin’ his move already?”

  “Yes and no. Sestin hasn’t showed his face yet, but tomorrow evening Ferast will arrive at Helioport’s gates with an army in tow.”

  “Ferast!” Baard spat. “That dirty, betraying…”

  “We think that Sestin will attack with a secondary force, probably made up of vaergs and demons. We need you Baard, but Hephistole says you’re too far away to help. Is he right?”

  Determination stole over Baard’s expression. “Get yerself back to Helioport an’ tell Hephistole we’re comin’. These boys can cover ground like yeh’ve never seen.”

  “Seriously? You think you can get there in time?”

  “If we don’t, it won’t be because we didn’t try,” Baard said. “Yeh should go. People need ter know help’s on the way.”

  Rimulth clasped Baard’s hand. “Move quickly.”

  “You can bet yer life on it,” Baard said.

  Rimulth sent a mental summons to the air spirit, which spiralled down from above and landed on his outstretched arm. He grasped the amulet, ready to transport. Even as he opened his mouth to speak the word of command, Baard was barking orders, rousing the ogre army from its sleep.

  …

  The ogres were hard to rouse at first, but then news spread that they ran to war and all reluctance disappeared like a leaf in a squall. All except the most necessary supplies were abandoned, and soon ogres were pouring down the hillside, crashing through terrain that would have slowed the toughest human army to a crawl. They leapt across gullies, cast aside great boulders and ripped up trees in their haste, leaving Baard feeling singularly vulnerable, running along in their midst. One slip and he would be crushed! Growling at his own fear, the red-bearded warrior ran on, trying to match the pace of his larger, stronger troops, but despite his best efforts, it wasn’t long before he was huffing and puffing and began to fall off the pace.

  He pushed himself on, refusing to show weakness in front of his men, but within minutes his breath was ragged and his throat raw. His legs were weak beneath him, wobbling from the exertion, and then finally he stumbled. A boulder of a knee slammed into his side and he spun away, falling heavily to the ground. A dozen pounding feet kicked and jostled him. Something heavy hit him in the head and stars exploded before his eyes, but just when he thought he was about to be trampled, an arm as thick as a tree trunk grabbed him around the waist and hoisted him into the air.

  “Hold on,” his rescuer said, and even in his dazed state, Baard recognised Khul, a particularly large Kaas who had served in his guard since the battle with the Gunthaak in Pell. “Climb onto my back,” Khul said, and Baard did as he was told, grabbing the ogre around the neck and swinging himself around till he was riding piggyback like a child. Some of the other ogres began to laugh.

  “Shut it,” Baard barked, but as usual, they ignored him. No-one was spared the Ogres’ rough form of mockery, including the Gunthaak-bane himself. Grumbling to himself, he shifted his grip to get a better hold. Khul moved at a loping gait much of the time, which was just about bearable, but from time to time he had to leap over gullies or fallen trees, and on each occasion Baard’s arms were almost yanked from their sockets. Minutes turned to hours, and still Baard clung on. It was all he could do to endure, knowing that the long, gruelling march was only just beginning.

  Twenty-nine

  The curved glass of the scryer was cool beneath Gaspi’s fingertips, the floorboards firm beneath his feet, but his head was spinning and he felt like throwing up. Hephistole had asked him to join him that morning, using the scryer’s magical sight to scour the countryside for sign of their enemy. The chancellor was in control, zipping about the landscape and changing direction without a word of warning, which wasn’t helping Gaspi’s stomach in the slightest.

  Resisting the temptation to open his eyes, Gaspi dry-swallowed and kept his inner gaze on the landscape below. Ferast’s army hadn’t moved at all that day, hunkered down beyond the Argent Hills. Gaspi felt safe in the assumption that Ferast was waiting for his Master, but where was the renegade, and what kind of force had he brought with him? With that in mind, he and Hephistole had taken to the scryer, determined to find Shirukai Sestin.

  They’d been searching for hours, checking every last gully and fold within miles of the city, but Hephistole was not in the mood to give up. He’d moved on to the isolated patches of woodland dotting the plain – remnants of a once-great forest, preserved by the city for the harvesting of wood – each of which would make an ideal place to hide.

  The first thicket guarded its secrets well. They were forced to move slowly through the dense stands of trees, which gave Gaspi’s stomach time to settle, but after a thorough search they concluded that the renegade was not there. The second thicket was larger than the first, but the woodland was less dense and they covered the ground quickly, deducing that it too, was empty. The third copse was much more promising. Something had ravaged the woodland, tearing strips from the trees and leaving them blackened, as if scorched. Great gouges scarred the ground, and there wasn’t a bird or a squirrel in sight.

  “This has to be it,” Hephistole whispered, an instinctive but unnecessary measure. Their voices didn’t carry through the magic of the scryer.

  “Let’s go further in,” Gaspi said, and realised that he was whispering too.

  They drifted fifty yards or so, passing another stand of ruined trees, before Hephistole brought them to a sudden stop. Gaspi had heard it too – a kind of snorting noise, breathy and obscenely wet. “Up ahead,” he said.

  They rounded an obscuring tangle of shrubbery and stopped, arrested by the sight of a long dead horse, shifting from hoof to hoof only yards away. The rotting flesh of its belly had been lacerated, hanging in long, ropey strands. The skin around its knees was ragged and torn, revealing yellowed knobs of bone.

  “Snatcher!” Hephistole said. Gaspi shuddered, grateful for the distance the scryer imposed. The last time he’d come across a Snatcher, its putrefying stench had almost unmanned him. They slipped past and moved further into the trees.

  “Over there on the left, behind that fallen trunk,” Gaspi said.

  They moved past the rotting length of timber and looked down on a mound of huge, bristling bodies, all muscle, claws and teeth. Black tongues lolled from their panting, drooling mouths. One of them vomited even as they watched, greenish liquid spattering the flank of another beast, which snarled in response and took a feeble snap at the air.

  “Something’s made them sick,” Hephistole said.

  “Transportation,” Gaspi said. “They’ll get over it.”

  “Of course. He must be sending them through as we speak.”

  “So let’s find him.”

  Hephistole hesitated. Gaspi suspected he knew what was on the chancellor’s mind. Sestin used to be Hephistole’s mentor – a close tie that in some ways could never be severed. So far, they’d yet to come face to face with the renegade, but if they sought him out now, Hephistole would lay eyes on his old mentor once again.

  “This way,” the chancellor said, sounding freshly determined.

  They passed a second mound of sickly vaergs, and then a third. Before long, the ground was littered with them, numbering in their hundreds. Demons of various kinds moved in their midst. There were Snatchers, occupying the rotting bodies of ordinary creatures – a large hound, a wildcat, several cows and goats, and even a hawk that flapped past on decaying wings. Gaspi counted half-a-dozen Bale-beasts, their leaden bulk gliding heavily through the throng of vaergs, ravenous eyes swivelling left and right, as if searching for a victim. There wer
e others that Gaspi didn’t recognise: an eyeless creature that must have stood fifteen feet tall, all legs and pincers, with a gaping, razor sharp beak; a pair of slug-like beasts, each the length of a coach and horses, which left boiling scars in the ground behind them; and a swarm of simian-like demons, with long, sinewy arms, wicked-looking teeth and claws, and eyes that glowed with a feral light.

  “Imps,” Hephistole said. “They’re lesser demons, much like dJin, but look at the damage they can do!” They were everywhere, scampering through the trees. A flock of birds erupted from the canopy, disturbed by one of the scuttling demons. A pack of them converged on the tree at once, ripping at it wildly as they sought to slaughter their escaping prey. Within moments the tree had been torn to shreds and the beasts fell back, leaving a stump of lacerated white flesh.

  “Not good,” Gaspi said. Fighting in packs, they could tear through a detachment of guards in moments.

  “None of this is good,” Hephistole said. “Wait…I see something.” He guided them away from the marauding throng of demons and into a broad clearing. They stopped at its edge, taking in the horrifying tableau before them. Vaergs were pouring from a brilliant sphere of light at the heart of the clearing. It pulsed, throbbing with arcane energy as more beasts were vomited forth. They crawled away to join their den-mates, suffering from the after-effects of transportation. Gaspi wasn’t interested in the vaergs, however, or even the glowing gateway they were emerging from. His attention was fixed on the hooded figure at its side – robed in red, slender, with a hand extended towards the gateway. Sestin! Gaspi’s blood ran cold. This was the man who had brought them so much hardship. He was responsible for the first attack on Helioport and the death of the guardsmen who fought to defend it. He had sent the Darkman to kill Gaspi, but it had taken the twins instead, who had given their lives to save his. He had ordered Ferast to fight in the Measure, where Everand had been murdered in cold blood. Never had this man, this renegade, fought his own battles, but he was responsible for every life that had been lost.

  As if sensing Gaspi’s rage, Sestin turned in his direction. Gaspi held his breath, reminding himself that the magic of the scryer only worked one way. There was no way Sestin could have detected him.

  Sestin lifted slender hands and pulled back his hood, exposing a face that was somehow young and old at the same time. His skin was dry and shiny, stretched tightly over prominent cheekbones. His hair was black, combed closely to his skull. His mouth was cruel and eyes were black as night. He raised a hand, a dark globe of power forming at his fingertips. “I see you Hephistole.”

  Gaspi froze, terrified. Beside him, Hephistole gasped.

  “Let go of the scryer!” Gaspi hissed, but Hephistole was unresponsive.

  “So good of you to greet me this way,” Sestin said. “Soon enough, you shall partake of my hospitality.”

  “Let go!” Gaspi cried, but Hephistole held to the magic of the scryer, either unwilling or unable to act.

  “Be gone!” Sestin spat, launching the globe of darkness. Gaspi couldn’t wait any longer. Even as the strike loomed in his sight, he opened his eyes in the Observatory and threw himself at Hephistole, breaking the chancellor’s contact with the device and knocking him to the floor.

  A great crack rent the air and Gaspi was thrown from his feet. Disorientated, he rose to his knees and gasped. The scryer was blackened and smoking, a jagged fracture running from top to bottom. Even as he watched, a section of the heavy sphere toppled slowly to one side and crashed to the floor, where it shattered into a thousand pieces.

  Thirty

  Hephistole stood on the wall in the early dawn light, looking out across the plain. Trask was beside him, and all the sentries were on high alert, ready to call their sleeping comrades to arms when the word was given. A black line smudged the horizon, spreading the full width of the plain – Ferast’s army, on the march. In a few short hours they would be at the gate, ready to wage war.

  The Captain of the Watch joined Trask. “Sir, should I sound the alarm?”

  Trask shook his grizzled head. “Let them sleep,” he rumbled. “There’s nothing to do but watch for now.”

  “Yes Sir,” the captain said with a sharp nod of the head, and took his leave.

  Trask shared an apprehensive look with Hephistole. “Well, this is it,” the Drillmaster said.

  “This is it,” Hephistole echoed.

  “Do we have a chance?” Trask asked, speaking softly so that Hephistole alone could hear him.

  Hephistole looked again at the darkening smudge on the horizon, knowing they were outnumbered several times over. “There’s always a chance. We have these walls to protect us, a strategy to follow, and we have a Nature Mage. Never underestimate what Gaspi can do.”

  Trask grimaced. “I don’t doubt the boy, but I’d prefer another ten thousand men.”

  Hephistole grasped the Drillmaster’s shoulder. “Hold to hope, Tobias. When the sun sets on this day, we may well be victors.”

  …

  Gaspi looked out over the enemy army and wondered when Sestin would show himself. Trask had sounded the alarm an hour previously and Gaspi had rushed to take his place on the wall to find that Ferast’s army was only a short march away. The army had approached the city and come to a halt beyond bow range.

  Beside him, Taurnil shifted his grip on his staff, his gaze fixed on Ferast’s troops. Lydia was there too, as was the fire spirit, which had found a perch on the battlements, its tail weaving sinuously behind it. Rimulth stood nearby with the air spirit on his shoulder.

  It made sense that the fire and air spirits, with their tremendous, destructive powers, should take part in the battle, but Gaspi had refused to allow either Loreill or Lilly anywhere near it. Loreill had objected, wanting to be there to protect him from dark magic but Gaspi had stood his ground. Loreill had no offensive powers to speak of and would be vulnerable once the fighting began. Lilly on the other hand was happy to remain with Emmy in the infirmary. When the final confrontation came, Gaspi would need all the elementals and their bond-mates at his side, but he was prepared for that eventuality. He would send a summons to Loreill, who in turn would call for Lilly. Lilly would alert Emmy, who wore an enchanted amulet and could transport straight to his side. The elementals could move quickly in spirit form, and would join them only moments later. That way, they stayed out of danger until the time came to confront Shirukai Sestin.

  Gaspi’s gaze fell on Jonn, armoured in his customary chain mail, short swords scabbarded at his waist. His guardian caught his eye and they exchanged a grave nod. Jaim stood beside him, cloak wrapped tightly around his short, stocky frame. Of all the sword and sorcery recruits, Jonn and Jaim had proved themselves the most formidable in practice. Gaspi could only hope their prowess would see them safely though the battle.

  Hephistole and Drillmaster Trask had positioned themselves above the gates, from where they would direct the defence. The chancellor wore robes of unrelieved black with his hair pulled back in a severe ponytail. His expression was stony, his eyes hard and his jawline tight. Unlike some of the other magicians he wasn’t wearing a stitch of armour, but only a fool would think him vulnerable. His usual genial manner had been banished, and instead he emanated an aura of grim determination. Gaspi thought he looked oddly like Voltan.

  Gaspi looked along the line of guardsmen, stretching for hundreds of yards along the wall. There they waited, as ready for battle as they’d ever be, but Ferast’s army didn’t show any sign of attacking and probably wouldn’t until Sestin showed himself. Unbidden, he glanced at the shadowy woodland in the distance, within which the renegade’s forces gathered. Just thinking of that boiling cauldron of demons and vaergs made him blanch. Any moment now, they’d emerge from the trees and teem towards the city; a monstrous tide, thirsting for blood and destruction. Gaspi shook his head. War was a headlong rush into madness.

  An icy blast of wind knifed through his cloak, making him shiver. The clouds were grey and heavy overhead,
scudding rapidly across the sky. An eerie silence hung in the air as men stood waiting, their fates unknown. When the sun set on this day, would they be among the living or would their blood redden the ground? Nearby, a guardsman cinched the straps of his armour. The creak of leather seemed unnaturally loud.

  A young guard’s shoulders begin to shake – just a boy, Gaspi realised, perhaps thirteen years old. The sound of repressed sobs found an echo in his heart. If he, who’d been through a siege before and battled demons head to head, felt the knife-edge of fear, how much worse would it be for an unblooded boy? Gaspi’s heart went out to him but he hadn’t a single word of comfort to offer. The boy was right to be afraid. Within the hour they would be fighting for their lives.

  Everyone is afraid, Gaspi thought to himself, but that was before he laid eyes on Sabu. The blade-master stood tall, looking out at the opposing army with terrible resolve in his eyes. His cloak caught a gust of wind and billowed behind him, revealing a pair of gleaming scimitars, sheathed at the waist. The blades emitted a steady opaline glow – evidence of the powerful enchantment they carried. Gaspi had seen the fabled weapons in action, slicing through flesh, bone and even armour in a single stroke. Silently, he corrected his earlier assertion. Not everyone was afraid, but Sabu’s enemies ought to be.

  A bone-shattering shriek rent the air – a sound born of boundless, unnatural hate that shook Gaspi to his very core. Was this it? Was battle finally upon them?

  Frantically, he scanned the plain, looking for any sign of movement. “Hephistole,” he cried, pointing at the wooded dell, within which Sestin hid his demonic minions. Something huge was moving within, shaking the canopy as it shouldered its way to the edge of the trees. Giant grasping claws thrust between two trunks and pushed them aside. The treetops swayed alarmingly, one to the left and the other to the right, and with a great groaning crack, both trunks gave way and toppled to the ground. Out of the gloom emerged a creature from nightmare. Thrice the height of a man, its appendages were formed from hundreds of splintered bone fragments, plundered from a host of the slain. Its head was huge – the horned skull of some colossal creature, with protruding up-turned tusks, black with the detritus of previous kills. Its empty eye sockets glowed with a ruddy light, emanating from deep within its skull. It strode free of the shattered trunks, lifted its head and unleashed another fearsome shriek.