Frostborn: The Broken Mage

by Jonathan Moeller

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  Mara held her short sword ready, standing guard over Morigna and Antenora as the sorceresses threw their magic into the battle. From time to time Antenora had a clear shot at the Mhorites or the Anathgrimm, and Morigna regularly threw spells of earth magic into their enemies. It hardly seemed to make a difference. Once again they were in the middle of a battle, caught between two battling armies.

  Mara knew she was not much use in a fight like this. She had been trained as an assassin, not as a warrior or a knight, and she preferred to kill enemies that were not fighting back. Additionally, the mighty wards ringing both the Traveler and Mournacht prevented her from using the power of her dark elven blood to travel.

  So she hung back with Jager, helping him to kill any Mhorites or Anathgrimm that tried to attack Morigna and Antenora. Not that many did. Ridmark and the others killed any Mhorites and Anathgrimm warriors that drew too close. Yet they were in an untenable position, and she knew it. There was no room left to flee, and neither Mournacht nor the Traveler could withdraw from their titanic battle. Her father was a coward, but his desire to claim the power of the Keeper had apparently overruled his fear. He could not walk away from the fight, and neither could Mournacht. The duel would continue until one of them was dead.

  And then the victor would turn his full attention to the Keeper’s companions.

  A Mhorite warrior sprinted at Antenora and Morigna, snarling. Jager leapt to the attack, his short sword flashing, and the Mhorite lunged at him. Jager jumped back, barely avoiding the tip of the Mhorite’s sword. Mara darted behind the Mhorite, gauged the angle of the attack, and calmly ripped her sword across the backs of the Mhorite’s legs. The orcish warrior fell to his knees with a screech of pain, and Jager stepped forward and stabbed twice.

  The warrior fell face-first to the floor with a thump, his blood joining the corpses and gold already on the ground. Blood and gold would cover the floor before this was done. The Red Family would have rejoiced at the sight…

  Mara forced her thoughts to remain on the battle, and a flare of blue light filled her eyes.

  “What the devil is that?” said Jager.

  The Traveler and Mournacht had moved to the center of the Vault, leaving a trail of corpses, fire, and smoking craters in their wake. Now they stood maybe twenty yards apart. The Traveler waited atop his snarling ursaar, his sword pointed at Mournacht. The orcish shaman gripped his axe’s haft with both hands, the weapon pointed at the dark elven lord. Blue fire snarled up and down the Traveler’s sword, while Mournacht’s axe blazed with crimson fire.

  Between them burned something like a small star, a writhing ball of crimson and blue flame. It pulsed and shuddered, wobbling between the Traveler and Mournacht, and seemed to be growing bigger. Mara’s Sight revealed the colossal flows of power surging into the star as Mournacht and the Traveler unleashed magical force at each other.

  “It is a spell,” said Antenora in answer to Jager’s question. “A contest of raw strength.”

  “So basically they’re…shoving at each other?” said Jager.

  “Precisely,” said Antenora.

  “Though shoving matches don’t usually result in explosions,” said Mara. The power in the competing spells was building out of control. It was like boiling water in a sealed pot. Sooner or later the steam would need a place to go…

  The star shuddered again, and the colors merged, becoming a ball of white-hot flame that expanded like a swelling balloon.

  “Oh,” said Mara. “That’s not good.”

  “We should take cover,” said Antenora. “Immediately.”

  A ripple of silence went over the battle as both Mhorite orcs and Anathgrimm orcs looked at the expanding sphere of fire.

  “Get down!” shouted Mara. Jager dove towards one of the stone tables, and Mara followed him. “Now! Go, go!”

  The others followed suit, taking cover behind the stone tables. Mara saw Morigna stumble, saw Ridmark grab her shoulders and pull her close…

  The competing spells exploded.

  ###

  Morigna threw herself behind the table next to Ridmark, and then the thunderous roar of the explosion filled her ears. The Vault heaved and shook like a drum, and the air jingled and clanged as thousands of coins bounced off the walls and floor. An expanding sphere of ghostly blue flame rushed past, filling the Vault. Morigna suspected it was the release of residual power from the spell, that it did not possess enough strength to hurt anyone.

  Yet as it rolled past the table where she sheltered with Ridmark, the dark magic within her rose in answer, and suddenly the shadows mantled her from head to toe. The dark magic within her must have interpreted the blue fire as an attack, had risen in her defense as it had beneath the gaze of the basilisk.

  “Are you all right?” said Ridmark.

  Morigna coughed out a laugh, and forced the shadows to disperse. “I think so. But does it matter? We can worry about dark magic if we get out of here alive.”

  She made herself stand, leaning upon her staff, and Ridmark followed suit.

  The explosion had thrown the Vault into further chaos, tipping over stone tables, sending treasures flying in all directions, and killing hundreds of the battling orcs. The Traveler’s ursaar lay dead, its head and forepaws missing, smoke rising from its charred carcass. The Traveler himself stood a few paces away, his blue armor scorched, more ghostly fire snarling around the blade of his sword. Mournacht leaned upon his massive axe like a staff, the blood sigils upon his chest and arms sputtering, his rage-filled eyes locked upon the Traveler.

  The shaman roared and sprang at the Traveler, his massive axe raised for a killing blow, and the Traveler snapped his sword up to meet the attack. Around them the surviving Mhorites and Anathgrimm resumed their battle, rushing into the melee anew.

  “The damned fools,” muttered Ridmark. “They’ll keep fighting until they’re all dead, and they’ll take us with them in the process.”

  “If we could engineer the first and prevent the second,” said Morigna, “that would be the optimal outcome.”

  She looked around as the others gained their feet. None of them had been hurt in the explosion. They had already taken wounds fighting the Anathgrimm and the Mhorites, but they were far enough from the duel between the Traveler and Mournacht that the blast had lost much of its force by the time the shock wave reached them.

  Mara stared at Morigna, her green eyes narrowed in thought.

  “Perhaps we should fall back to the doors of Dragonfall,” said Arandar, wiping sweat from his forehead. “Our foes seem preoccupied with each other.”

  “That won’t last,” said Ridmark. Already more orcs, Anathgrimm and Mhorite both, rushed into the Vault from the throne room. “Very soon at least some of them will turn their attention to us. Be ready for another round.” Arandar nodded and began using Heartwarden to heal wounds, and Gavin followed suit. “We ought to…”

  “The shadows,” said Mara. “You used the shadows.”

  Morigna scowled, a mixture of embarrassed anger and guilt going through her. “Not deliberately. They came in response to…whatever it was that Mournacht and the Traveler did to each other. The way they did when the basilisk first looked at me. I did not call them deliberately.”

  Mara nodded, once, and then her green eyes got wide.

  “What is it?” said Ridmark.

  “I think,” said Mara, “I think I know we can kill both the Traveler and Mournacht.”

  Chapter 18: Remember

  The gray mist swirled around her, and again Calliande saw a stone plinth rising from the gleaming white floor, yet another crystalline sphere waiting atop it.

  A jolt of fear shot through her, and her hands clenched into fists.

  Piece by piece, the crystalline spheres restored her memories…and old pains surged through her with every new recollection. The spheres had showed her training as a Magistria in Tarlion, how driven she had become, how focused and determined. Marius and the others had taugh
t her, and her skills grew rapidly. There had been no shortage of opportunity to practice her spells, either. The war with the Frostborn worsened with every passing year. They had overrun the Northerland, and pushed further south into Caerdracon with every passing year.

  By the age of fifteen, Calliande was in the camps of the High King’s armies with Marius, attending to the wounded. By the age of sixteen, she had become a full Magistria, so great was her skill at healing and so dire was the High Kingdom’s need. She had seen every possible injury a weapon could inflict, swords and maces and arrows. The pincers of the locusari left long, ragged wounds, and the insect-like creatures favored disemboweling their foes, the men screaming as their viscera hung wet and limp against their legs.

  Calliande healed their wounds, absorbing their pain.

  She had fallen in love with an older Magistrius, a man named Julian Taborius, one of the Magistri skilled in wards and defensive spells. He treated her kindly, as a younger sister, until one day he explained that she was common-born and he was noble, and therefore any relationship between them was impossible.

  That same night the Frostborn attacked in force, smashing the army of the High Kingdom and sending them fleeing south towards Castra Carhaine. Calliande remembered the Frostborn in their grim gray armor, their swords coated in freezing mist, remembered the hordes of locusari swarming across the ground like a chitinous tide. She remembered the spells of ice and frost, remembering seeing villages burn, the villagers rounded up as slaves in the growing empire of the Frostborn.

  She remembered Julian screaming, his body pierced by a dozen icy spikes. Marius had pulled a weeping Calliande from the dead man, urging her to flee before it was too late.

  Calliande hadn’t been able to save Julian. There had been so many that she had been unable to save that terrible night.

  “Must I?” said Calliande in a raspy, raw voice as the mist swirled away from the stone plinth.

  “Yes,” said Marius, his voice full of regret. “I am afraid that you must.”

  Calliande closed her eyes, taking a shuddering breath. She realized that with the Devourer stalking her, closing her eyes was probably a terrible idea, and she opened them again. Yet she still saw no sign of the Devourer, and the dragon skulls in the walls stared down at her in silence.

  “No more,” whispered Calliande. “I don’t…I don’t want to see any more. I was happier not knowing.”

  “You must,” said Marius.

  “Why?” said Calliande, blinking the tears from her eyes. Her mind seethed and buzzed with the pain of the things she remembered. “Will you force me?”

  “No,” said Marius. “I have never forced you to do anything, Calliande. You drove yourself onward. Just as you have driven yourself onward now.”

  “All right,” said Calliande. She took a shuddering breath. “All right. Let’s…let’s just get this over with.”

  Before her courage could fail, she crossed the hall and gripped the next crystal sphere in her shaking hand.

  Again years of memory exploded through her skull in a single instant.

  After that battle, after the day Julian died, the war became more and more desperate. Town after town and castra after castra fell to the Frostborn. The High King, who had hitherto ignored the Keeper’s advice, at last began heeding her counsel, and summoned all his vassals and allies, and a great army of humans and dwarves and baptized orcs and manetaurs strove against the Frostborn. Calliande saw battle after battle, healing wounds and lending her powers to the wards against the terrible cold magic of the Frostborn. At last her skills caught the attention of the Keeper, and Calliande became the Keeper’s new apprentice.

  She grew to love that old woman with all her heart.

  In public, Ruth of Taliand put on the face of the Keeper, stern and commanding and aloof. In private, she was kindly and wise, and taught Calliande a great deal about magic, secrets known only to the Keepers. For the Keepers could use the magic of the Well at Tarlion’s heart, but they also commanded elemental magic, powers that only the wielder of the staff could employ. Just as Marius had become her second father, so too Ruth became her second mother.

  Ruth told Calliande the truth about the war, as she had told Marius and a few others she trusted. Most of Andomhaim thought that the Frostborn were simply another kindred of terrible power, like the urdmordar and the dark elven princes. In truth, the Frostborn came from another world. Most of the men of Andomhaim thought Shadowbearer a myth of the dark elves. Ruth knew better. Shadowbearer had opened a gate and summoned the Frostborn for mysterious reasons of his own. He was possessed by the shadow of Incariel, the great demon the dark elves and the dvargir worshipped, and had spent millennia working evil before turning his attention to Andomhaim at last.

  The only way to defeat the Frostborn and end the war was to close the gate between worlds on the slopes of the Black Mountain.

  Calliande’s fingers tightened further against the crystalline sphere, tears streaming down her cheeks.

  At last Ruth had been slain in battle, ambushed as the Frostborn continued their relentless advance from the Northerland to Castra Carhaine. Calliande had taken up the Keeper’s staff, and power and knowledge exploded through her, knowledge that exploded anew through her mind as she stood in the silent white chamber of Dragonfall. Secrets of spells and power, and the truth that the Keeper’s magic was of Old Earth, that there was no power on Andomhaim that could oppose the magic of Old Earth. That secret had allowed the Keeper to defend Andomhaim from dark magic for over five hundred years before Ardrhythain founded the Two Orders.

  And then, as Calliande had taken up the staff and become the new Keeper, she understood how to win the war. The high elves did not interfere in the affairs of other kindreds unless asked, and two hundred years earlier the Keeper of that time had journeyed to Cathair Solas to ask the high elves for aid, and in answer Ardrhythain had founded the Magistri and the Swordbearers. So Calliande had gathered the Keeper’s most trusted followers, Marius and the knight Kalomarus and a few others, and set off for Cathair Solas in the distant north, fighting her way through the lines of the Frostborn. At last they reached Cathair Solas, the last citadel of the high elves, beautiful and powerful beyond measure, and Ardrhythain and the mages who ruled the high elves heard her plea.

  The high elves gave Kalomarus the power of the Dragon Knight of old, the repository of the terrible power once wielded by the dragons. The power was a terrible burden, but Kalomarus was a seasoned knight, grim and sober yet with a kind heart, and he mastered the power.

  Together they won the war, driving the Frostborn back and closing their gate, and after fifty years Andomhaim had peace at last.

  Calliande released the crystal sphere and stepped back, breathing hard, her body covered in sweat. She looked at Marius and at the chamber around her, and realized that it looked different.

  For the Sight had returned to her.

  The Keepers had the Sight. How could she have forgotten it? She saw the power of the threshold flowing around her, the awesome power gathered in the dragon skulls. She saw the flows of power and understood them, the knowledge of generations of Keepers flashing through her mind. Calliande turned to Marius and saw the complex threads of the spell that bound him to the mortal plane, the oath that bound his spirit to her across the long centuries of sleep.

  “We won,” she said. “I remember…Kalomarus and the sword of fire. We swept the Frostborn from Caerdracon and the Northerland, and broke their gate upon the slopes of the Black Mountain.” The final battle, she remembered, had taken place where the Tower of Vigilance now stood.

  “We did,” said Marius. “After fifty years of bitter war, Andomhaim had peace at last.”

  “What went wrong?” said Calliande. “The war was over. We had defeated the Frostborn…wait.” Her new memories clicked together. “The Frostborn were never our true enemy, were they? They were just the tools of our ultimate foe.”

  “We defeated the Frostborn and closed their gat
e,” said Marius, “but Shadowbearer remained. For a hundred thousand years he pursued his goal, Calliande. For years beyond the capability of human minds to count. We had defeated one of his tools…and at last the full weight of his malice turned upon Andomhaim. Come. There is one final crystal, and then you shall have the fullness of your memory.”

  “Wait,” said Calliande, scrutinizing the mist with her Sight. She now possessed a mastery of the Sight beyond Antenora and Mara. In fact, if she lived through this, Calliande could instruct them in its use. Yet even with her skill, her Sight discerned no trace of the Devourer. The Keepers were ancient, and their knowledge had passed to Calliande. Keepers had stood guard over humanity in Britannia and the Empire of the Romans upon Old Earth, over kingdoms and nations and empires since the days when the men of Sumer had raised pyramids of mud brick and the Yellow Emperor brought civilization to his people in the lands of the Han.

  Yet the Devourer was older than that, older than human civilization, and her Sight could not find it.

  “Go,” said Calliande. “Take me to the final crystal.”

  Marius bowed. “As you command, Keeper.”

  Calliande flinched. Yet she was the Keeper, was she not? She knew it in her bones. It was her duty to protect the people of Andomhaim, and she could not turn away from it.

  “Yes,” she whispered. “Thank you, my friend.”

  The mist swallowed her again, and Calliande walked into it, her stride purposeful, the Sight guiding her. She noted the way the magic flowed around her, and saw the touch of Ardrhythain in the work, just as she had seen his touch in the soulblades he had forged, the disciplines and the spells he had taught the Magistri. He had done well to build Dragonfall, to hide the skulls of the ancient dragons away from those who might abuse their great power. The dragons’ skulls themselves powered the spells upon Dragonfall. It had been the perfect place to conceal her staff. Shadowbearer could not have come here, even if he had known the location.