Sanctuary Tales (Book 1)

by Robert J. Crane

  “It doesn't always work that way.” She shrugged out of his arms. “Not everyone comes back; guilds lose people all the time. Sometimes even a whole guild gets wiped out on an adventure, and then there's no one to bring you back!” She wore the pouty expression, the one that came before an argument. “And even if they do bring you back, I've heard the stories; you're never quite the same after a resurrection spell. You lose memories, and you don't even know what they are.”

  He sighed. “I've heard that too,” he admitted. “But we don't need to worry about it,” he said, tugging at the hem of her dress, “because I'm not going to die.” He shot her his most endearing smile and pulled her back onto the bed. She let out a squeal of surprise as he rolled on top of her and brought his mouth to hers. She ran a hand through his long hair, her soft lips playing against his. When they broke away, he stared into her eyes. “I'm not going to die.”

  She chewed her lower lip and played with a strand of his hair. “Promise?”

  “I promise.” He smiled and kissed her again.

  He walked past a blacksmith's stand without even noticing or caring. I was such a fool, he thought. That wasn't a promise I could make. The argument, short as it was, became the first of many. An unrelenting sore spot, Cyrus thought, along with my lack of money. He shuddered as he came out of a shaded alleyway and entered Reikonos Square. The fountain was ahead of him, and he quickened his pace.

  Niamh was waiting, laughing and splashing water from the fountain's edge at some children nearby. She stood up when she saw him. He heard a voice behind him, calling his name, and turned. The flower girl was hurrying behind, her hand outstretched, gold lying on her now-bare palm. She wants to give me my money back. “Keep it,” he shouted over his shoulder. He increased the pace of his walk and reached the fountain as the flower girl entered the square.

  “Cyrus!” she called out to him again, and picked up the long length of her dress as she ran across the square toward him.

  Niamh turned to him, befuddlement written on her face. “She seems to want to speak with you; should I wait?”

  “No,” he replied. “Take us out of here. Now.”

  The winds of the druid's teleport spell kicked up around them, stirring the dust at his feet. The flower girl was running, but she stopped as she saw the magic begin to take hold. She stood ten feet away, her cheeks glittering, tears tracing down her lovely dark skin from those green eyes that sparkled. She held out her hand with the coins in it and for the first time he saw the ring on her finger. Emerald, magnificent, a piece of jewelry worthy of a princess, not a flower girl.

  Imina, he thought as the magics spun the winds around him, creating a wall of air between him and the crying flower girl that had seemed so familiar for some reason. I forgot your face. He stared at her, trying to burn it into his memory, but the teleport spell carried him away, back to Sanctuary, back to his guild and his life, and away from her once more.

  THE LAST MOMENTS OF THE GEZHVET

  Note: Takes place at the end of Chapter 12 of Defender: The Sanctuary Series, Volume One.

  “Your poor dwarven friend, left to die alone ... he was alive, you recall, when they took him ... how do you think he died? Do you think it was painful? Do you think he kept his courage to the end? Or do you think he screamed and begged for mercy that would never be shown?” A twinkle lit the eye of the Gatekeeper, coupled with a smile that could only be described as sadistic. “Because I know.”

  —The Gatekeeper to Cyrus Davidon

  Avenger: The Sanctuary Series, Volume Two

  He was bleeding as they carried him off, the monstrous horror of the massacre going on around him tempered by the agony of a thousand claws stabbing through the flaws in his armor. The points of them pierced the metal chainmail that was his last line of defense, cutting into him like knives ripping through his flesh. “Let me down, you grubby, sunlight-dwelling greenskin sons of whores!” A claw cut into his cheek and he tasted blood running down his tongue and through his mouth as he was carried over the cobbled stone of Enterra’s throne room on the shoulders of goblins beyond numbering.

  There were hundreds of them, half a thousand, perhaps, but it might as well have been a million. Narstron could feel his strength failing, the blood loss making his head swim as they carried him into a passage at the side of the throne room. As he passed over the threshold, he caught one last glimpse of Cyrus, his best friend. The warrior in black armor was fighting with his back to a stone wall, his sword cutting swaths of destruction through the goblin army.

  The musty smell of the caves was heavy in the air as Narston lost sight of his friend. The natural wonder of being this deep in Rotan’s holy ground was tempered not only by his fear but by the artificial construct of stones being placed into square halls and tunnels. He had always hoped to die deep below the earth but not here, where Rotan’s holy ground had been desecrated by the cold, unnatural goblin architecture. Narston was aware of the cold air, but he barely felt it amidst the wounds, the cuts, the thousand searing hurts that enveloped him.

  Narstron slammed his left hand down with all his remaining strength and saw it land hard on one of the goblins who was carrying him. The goblin, a scaled, green-skinned, snaggle-toothed beast, fell out of his line of sight, below the procession. But the rest of the goblins, however many of them there were, still had him up on their shoulders. They formed a crowd that was too large for him to resist, to fight back against. His right hand was numb from where their claws were still buried in it, immobilizing it. He felt his sword jarred from his fingers. He tried to roll, to fall off the shoulders of those who carried him, but he couldn’t work free of the hands that gripped him, of the claws that bit into the flesh of his back and sides.

  Narstron slapped out at another goblin, and this time he knew he broke something, perhaps a nose. The goblin staggered and fell below the tide of green-skinned foes that carried him on. I hope he was trampled to death, crushed underfoot by this horde, this reckless mob. The chanting was the worst, the voices of the goblins echoing through the cave as they went. “Gezhvet! Gezhvet!” they called as though trying to shout it into the depths of the earth so that Rotan himself could hear it. Narstron whipped a hand around again, this time missing anything, and he felt a sharp stab in his side for his troubles. He didn’t scream, though, and he wouldn’t; he refused to give this lot the satisfaction.

  The block and mortar hallway widened ahead just before they burst out into a massive chamber, a room that looked like a theater he had once seen in Reikonos. It had room for standing parted by an aisle down the middle, leading up to a stage for the performance. Except I doubt I’ll enjoy the final act of this one. It was dark, like home—like Fertiss, the dwarven capital—but his eyes had long since adjusted to that, the small torches burning in the corners of the room shedding enough light for him to see by. Not nearly so much as I’ve been accustomed to living among the humans, though.

  He was carried down toward the stage, making one last attempt at resistance against the mob with his good hand. His blow landed home on a goblin’s face and he snagged his gauntlet on a pointed green ear as he pulled it back. He heard the howl of pain and ripped as hard as he could, the lobstered metal joint still caught on the fragile ear. He heard a screech as it tore loose, taking the ear with it. His grin of satisfaction lasted all of five seconds before he was dumped unceremoniously against the surface of an upended surface. He hit hard enough that the wind was knocked out of him, but his legs caught him and kept him standing. Goblin claws seized hold of his left hand and yanked his gauntlet, ripping it free while others tugged free the right. He saw a green ear spiral to the floor where it was trod over, lost in a shuffle of green flesh.

  Narstron felt himself gasp as a goblin, taller than the rest of them yet shorter than himself, reached out with a dagger and stabbed him through his left hand, driving it into the surface of the table behind him. Over the pain he could feel the grain of the wood against his hand, an odd sensation that was marred
by the blistering pain in his palm. It took a moment for his shock-addled mind to realize it was the Emperor of Enterra himself, Y’rakh, who had done it to him. Damn, that was the good hand. I can still kick them, at least—

  But he couldn’t. The wave of goblins receded, save for Y’rakh, leering at him with yellow eyes as he moved to Narstron’s other side. The dwarf felt himself slumping, using the hard wood surface he was butted up against for strength as he tried to remain standing. It was a fight against his legs, strength fading. He had his numb right hand at the ready to throw up if the Emperor came at him, but the agony from the knife thrust through his left hand on top of all his other injuries had left him exhausted. He could feel his legs crying out for permission to buckle. He looked down to see his armor red with blood. His own or that of his foes, he couldn’t be sure. Only going to get one shot at this ...

  Y’rakh came at him again, producing another knife from his belt. Narstron feinted as best he could, acting like he was going to block the knife with a bracer, but instead he changed direction at the last moment, jutting a finger at the goblin’s eye as he came close. The Cyrus Davidon strategy. Narstron thought of his friend, surely dead now, with a trace of sorrow. He rammed his finger hard ahead, and it struck the bony skull of the goblin as Y’rakh turned to the side abruptly.

  Narstron heard rather than felt his finger break through the numbness. His hand weakened and Y’rakh grasped it, ramming it back against the wood surface behind Narstron. He felt the long, thin blade of the dagger cut into his open palm. He could feel the resistance for a fraction of a second as the tip of the knife ripped through the flesh and encountered tendon and bone, but that lasted only a moment and it was through, the numbness gone and his hand blazing with fire as it, too, was pinned to the table.

  Narstron kicked out with his right leg with everything he had—pain, rage, more than a little fear—and he caught the Emperor of the goblins squarely in his tapered midsection, just below his bony ribs. The breath rushed out of the goblin’s mouth, filling the air in front of Narstron with a squalid stink of bad meat.

  They killed Cyrus and Andren. Killed them both. “I’ll make you pay!” Narstron’s shout echoed as he lanced out again, catching the Emperor of Enterra with a metal boot in the head that caused him to fall backward, nearly off the slightly raised stage upon which they both stood.

  The click of a thousand claws touching the stone floors beneath the dais was an eerie sound. All the goblins were quiet and tense, looking as though they wanted to move forward in a mass and eat him alive to avenge their Emperor’s injury. Let them come. I’ll kick until I can’t kick anymore, rip my damned hands off if need be, slam my shoulders, pauldron-first, into their slimy mouths, break their teeth—

  “My friends,” came a calm voice from the back of the chamber. Amusement wafted from a black-cloaked figure who had his hood pulled back, revealing a dark elf’s features, gaunt to the point of looking almost like the bones of a skull, only a thin layer of skin stretched over them. “There is no need to be so harsh; his fight is over.”

  Heavy, guttural growls came from Emperor Y’rakh as he spoke in his own language, in what sounded to Narstron’s ears like bitter cursing. “This dwarf is as fearsome as our legends say,” he spoke, now back in the human language, not averting his eyes from Narstron but raising his voice so it carried over the chamber. “It is as you told us: he is surely the Gezhvet.”

  “Would I have lied to you?” The dark elf’s smile was as thin as the rest of him and more than a little overly satisfied.

  “The price you demanded was high.” Emperor Y’rakh said looking over his shoulder at Narstron. I’d carve him open if I had my sword. If I could bite him, I would sink my teeth into his throat. For Cyrus. For Andren.

  “The price is always high when the reward is so very rich,” the dark elf said, making his way through the neat rows of goblins lining the room. “Is saving your life and your empire not worth a trifling sacrifice?” The dark elf brandished a hammer, a metal object with intricate detail. It had an obsidian oblong head that looked more impressive than anything he’d seen from the blacksmiths of Fertiss. The dark elf paused just past the throng, at the base of the stage, staring up at Narstron with an innocent, almost curious expression. “So ... what will you do now? Now that you have your Gezhvet in hand?”

  Y’rakh looked back at him, and Narstron felt the creep of something dark in the goblin’s vacant expression as it turned colder. He felt the hatred seep into it. He hates me. Truly hates me. This is no simple invasion being turned back. There’s something else at play here, something I’m not getting. “Now,” the goblin said in a quiet, hissing voice, “we tear him to pieces and render his prophecy moot.”

  “Moot is such a lovely word,” the dark elf said smoothly, holding the hammer daintily in one hand as though it were weightless, while running his thin fingers over his black robe with the other. “If I may suggest, though, something you might not have considered, with these adventurers—humans, dwarves and such—death is hardly certain. I could ... ensure that he never rose again, if you’d like.” The dark elf grinned. “I can solve this problem for you more surely and definitely than simply tearing him to pieces.”

  Narstron watched, the pain in his hands from the blades jutting out of them keeping him from saying more. Are they really arguing about how best to kill me? Who did I so grievously offend? I bet it was that elven witch, Vara.

  “I don’t know about that, Malpravus,” the Emperor said. “Tearing a body to pieces tends to solve most of your problems with it.” There was a wary air about the goblin. “What price would you charge for this service you offer?”

  “You would think so ill of me as to assume I would come to you with this offer solely to enrich myself?” There was a hint of reproach in the dark elf’s voice, but Narstron could hear a lack of sincerity in his tone. I wonder if the goblins hear it as well? “Allow me to do this, then,” Malpravus said, “in the name of our continued friendship and goodwill. Allow me to end this threat that has hung over you for so long. Definitively.”

  The thinly slitted eyes of the goblin watched the dark elf, giving his words careful consideration. When the nod of assent came, Narstron almost missed it, it was so subtle. The Emperor stepped aside with measured movements, relegating himself to the front rank of the goblins as though ready to charge the dais should something go awry.

  Malpravus climbed to the place where Narstron was fixed, hands still struck through, anchoring him to the upturned table. “Dear boy, I expect you’ve had better days.” The dark elf looked him over with an appraising eye, as though about to sell him off in the slave markets of Gren. “Indeed, you look as though you put up a impressive fight before they brought you low. I trust all that defiance has run its natural course?”

  “Get on with it if you’re going to get on with it,” Narstron said, trying to keep from babbling. His hands were cold and aching now, the warmth of the blood that had been running down them long since faded. Now a chill was setting in, the frigid underground caves getting to him at last.

  “Oh, I shall,” the dark elf said with a grin, and there was a thunking noise as he set the hammer down on the floor next to his feet. “But first I’m simply trying to get the measure of you. I don’t recall seeing you with Sanctuary before.” He squinted his eyes. “You must be new.”

  “I’m feeling a bit old at the moment,” Narstron said, hearing his words slur. “A bit worn through.”

  “I suppose you would,” Malpravus said, steepling his fingers before stretching his knuckles. The fingers were long and slender, like the branches of a gnarled old tree made bare by winter’s edge. He manipulated them digit by digit, the cracking of his pronounced knuckles sounding like dry tinder being broken. “Your friends are dead, your guild is almost entirely wiped out—” Narstron caught a toothy grin from Malpravus on this point—“It’s been a hard day, to say the least, and I suppose it’s not about to get much easier for you.” One of his hands
disappeared into his sleeve and returned a moment later with a little flourish. A red gemstone was pinched between his thumb and forefinger, a ruby that hardly glistened at all, especially in the dull light of the cave.

  “If this is a marriage proposal, I’m afraid I’m going to have to beg off,” Narstron said, staring at the dark gem. “Not the least of which reason is that you’re not my type.” He tugged on his arms, felt the pain in his palms. “Also, I can’t feel my hands.”

  “You’ll feel nothing, soon enough,” Malpravus said, smile widening. “Tell me, though, before you go—was Alaric with you tonight?”

  “What?” Narstron watched the dark elf, the goblins behind him fading into the background as if they were being absorbed into the cave itself. He felt his legs grow weaker. Not sure I should answer that. “No.”

  “A pity,” Malpravus said, and his expression grew more clouded. “It would have wrapped things up a bit too neatly if he was, I suppose. There is some logical limit to the number of birds you can kill with one well-thrown stone, after all.”

  A little connection was bridged in Narstron’s mind, some dying light igniting like a lamp catching the flame. “You did this. All of this. Brought them down on us, when they shouldn’t have known we were coming?”

  “I did,” Malpravus said. “I must confess, it was one of my cleverer maneuvers, being able to hand these fine allies the Gezhvet,” he gestured at Narstron and there was a groundswell of goblin noise from the haze behind him, “and also procure something I wanted in the process.” He nudged the hammer with a foot, and Narstron’s eyes fell on it, his question of what a Gezhvet was forgotten for the moment.

  “Is that ...” Narstron let his head drift downward, “is that Terrenus?”

  Malpravus looked down. “The Hammer of Rotan? Indeed.” The skeletal smile was back.