Noslen abruptly leaned away from me. “No, why do you ask?” He shifted uncomfortably. There’s definitely more. But if I push him, he won’t open up.
“Never mind. So, where are you sending us next?”
“Ghorza will give you those details. I have to step away. Until next time.” And he vanished.
Damn, that’s so annoying.
Ghorza laughed. “The look on your face. I’ve worn it many times.”
“Does he ever use a door?” I asked.
“Not that I can ever remember,” she said with a smile. “He likes you. He doesn’t like many people, to be honest. You should be nicer to him.”
“I’ve been plenty nice. If he wasn’t so cryptic, it wouldn’t be so frustrating. We’re risking our lives for him.”
“For all of us, youngling. You live in this world now as well. If the world is doomed, you too will be a slave to the necromancers.”
I frowned. “I guess you’re right. Sorry,” I said.
“It is forgiven. Now, the necromancers are heading toward the desert. There is a town there, full of cultists. They know the location of the abandoned monastery. It is where we hid one of the artifacts.”
“Which artifact?” I asked.
She smiled. “Agamor’s staff. It would be of benefit to your lightning mage.”
“I’m sure Garstil will be happy. He’s been slinging magic around without a staff since we met.”
Ghorza nodded. “There is another matter I wish to discuss with you. I am sure you’ve already figured out that Noslen is Morogan’s father.”
“Yeah, I did. Morogan doesn’t know. It didn’t feel like my place to tell him something so important. But it feels kind of messed up since we’re supposed to be friends. If he finds out I was keeping it from him, he might not forgive me. I wouldn’t.”
“I…understand. Tell him if you must. But if you do not need to, it would be best. He is not ready for that knowledge. And it will come with new challenges and responsibilities.”
“I see. I can’t promise anything, but I won’t bring it up. The crystal exploded, so he didn’t have a chance to see it.”
“That is fortunate. Once he is of age, he will discover it in due time. For now, he must be kept in the dark. As much as it pains me.”
“All right, for now. But if he asks, I won’t lie to him.”
“That is all that I ask. He looks up to you. I am glad that he has an honorable friend to travel with.”
“He’s a good kid,” I said, smiling.
“That he is. And he is waiting for us. As are your other friends. Shall we?”
We had dinner with the Orcs and dined like kings as their guests. The next morning, they made sure our supplies were fully stocked.
Ghomoku escorted us to the road in front of the village. “Aba, take care of cousin or answer to me,” he said. We traded grips.
“Count on it,” I said.
“Die well, my friend. Return soon, I want rematch.”
I smiled. “Die well,” I said. As much of a dick as he is, I like this guy.
It took us about a day to get to Chepstow, a quaint little town on the main road. We picked up some minor gathering quests in the nearby forest. They had a need for heal root and some meat. We made quick work of them and headed for the tavern. Now that they were restocked, we bought some steaks and potatoes and were enjoying a well-cooked meal before we spent the next few days on the road camping in the rain.
The tavern door was slammed open, and three scruffy-looking burly men walked in from the rain. They scanned the room looking for a table and laid eyes on us. The whole room grew eerily quiet.
“You’re sitting at my table, punk,” he said, leering. “Move, if you know what’s good for you.” He hesitated for half a heartbeat. “And leave your plates while you’re at it.” I—really—hate bullies. With a passion.
I looked at him deadpan serious. “I’m eating, asshole,” I said. Everyone in the room gasped. I turned back to my plate and put another piece of meat in my mouth and chewed, slowly. People nearest us picked up their plates and tried to move as far away as possible.
“What. Did. You. Say.” He sneered, enunciating each word. He had walked up to me and was towering over me now.
I cut another piece of steak, not looking at him. “I said fuck off. I’m eating. Now get out of here before you and your friends get hurt.”
14
Thasgrin, The Healing Hand
“I still think you overdid it just a bit,” said Garstil.
“It’s been three days, dude,” I said. “Let it go. I’m sorry I got us kicked out of the tavern. But I told you I have a thing about bullies. I won’t tolerate them pushing people around.”
Sai laughed. “Garstil is correct. After you headbutted him and broke his nose, that should have been the end of it.”
I sighed. “His friends didn’t appreciate what I’d done. They pulled weapons. I could have just killed them, you know. I—”
Morogan pulled his shield and mace out, looking around for threats. “Morogan smell something. Not like.” He sniffed around, trying to identify the direction it was coming from.
I didn’t smell anything. “Maybe it’s some rotting animal?” I asked. Morogan wasn’t convinced.
Sai quickly pulled out both daggers. “No. I smell it too. The air tastes of fear, decay, rot. Many have died this day.”
Then the smell hit me. “Christ. Yeah, I smell it now. That is seriously foul.”
We continued on cautiously, wary of an ambush. The rancid smell of decaying flesh grew more overwhelming as we continued. When we thought it couldn’t get worse, a clearing opened up on the side of the road. From low branches hung many corpses. Orc, Human, and animal—all with very little regard to what had been strung up.
“They have been bled dry. All of them. Whoever did this is likely only a day or so ahead of us. I worry what they want the blood for.” Sai sheathed his daggers. “This does not bode well for us. I think we have found your necromancers, Abalonious.”
I nodded. “We can’t leave them like this. It isn’t right, they were living beings, they deserve a better death than this.” My companions agreed, and we spent the next few hours cutting down the dead and burying them. Garstil said a prayer, and we set out along the road once again.
We’d decided to skip lunch after burying the victims of the bloodletting and continued. About an hour or so later, we noticed a tall building off about half of a mile up the road.
“Are we lost?” I brought up my map and tried to make heads or tails of what I was looking at. “This shouldn’t even be here. The map says this is a graveyard.” Everyone checked the map.
“Maybe someone make?” He thought for a moment. “Why make on graveyard?”
“Let’s go check it out.” Garstil checked his canteen. “We could use some more water anyways.”
We arrived at the building and received a shock. It was a dilapidated tavern with an inn on the second story. The tavern was completely empty with the door torn from its hinges. When we looked inside, we saw the floor had been completely destroyed. It was as if corpses had unburied themselves.
Garstil examined the dirt. “They built the tavern on a gravesite. The necromancers must have resurrected them. Aba, I think they’re building an army of zombies.”
Sai called from out back, “Hey! You guys might want to look at this!”
We rushed out of the tavern’s back door and skidded to a halt. The entire area had been cleared of life. Nothing grew. A ritual circle of some sort, fifty feet wide, had been painted in blood. Inside the circle, a second ring, around two feet thick, bordered the outer. Runes were spaced evenly around the double border, also painted in blood. Bodies in their own small circles surrounded the outer ring. Four Human corpses in the cardinal directions, four Orc corpses in the semi-cardinals, and animals in between each. In the dead center was a large, fresh hole with deep gouges. Something massive had clawed its way out.
Morogan
examined the claw marks. “Nightmare. Like from city.”
“Great. As if the first one was easy. This one looks even bigger.”
Morogan looked up at the sky. “Dark soon. Not want camp here.” He looked all around him, edgy and alert. We began to push on, looking for a place to camp.
“This keeps getting better and better.” Garstil pointed up the road.
The rotting remains of a wagon lay toppled atop rusting armor. Bones could be seen through the helmet, fetid flesh hanging off of the skull in tatters. For almost a mile up the road, there was nothing but death. A tattered and unreadable banner hung at the front of the procession. Nothing of value had been left untouched.
“It is as if everything was consumed or aged dramatically. The wood rots, and the metal is rusted almost all the way through.” Sai examined the wagon wheel tracks. “But the ruts from the wheels are less than twelve hours old. What kind of evil magic is this?”
Garstil’s face soured. “I think the necromancers are trying to practice a very specific spell. The one used during the Battle of Unsung Heroes.”
That caught my attention. “The necromancer from the forest.” I looked at Garstil. “He was a noob! He’s trying to learn the spell on his own since he doesn’t have a teacher!” We walked on, trying to not think about the smell. “He’s using trial and error to find that specific curse to kill and raise the dead, but it’s not working yet. We need to get moving. Maybe we can still catch him before he figures it out.”
After traveling for another two miles, we came upon the next anomaly—an area of jungle where all the vegetation was decaying and dead beasts littered the ground. None of the carcasses had been scavenged, likely due to the residue of death magic surrounding them.
We ventured forth, the sun setting over the mountains, casting long shadows over the valley. We made camp a little ways off the road, using the below-ground fire again. None of us wanted to be seen out here. Sai sparred with Morogan and Garstil while I started dinner. When it was my turn, Garstil took over on the food.
“Are you ready, Abalonious?” I nodded. Sai entered into a stance, his right leg behind him supporting his weight while his left leg was out at an angle. “This is a rear fighting stance. It lets me attack or defend from any forward angle with arms or legs. It keeps your weight back so your opponent cannot trip you. You can also transition to a forward fighting stance easily by shifting your hips and moving the weight to the left leg.” He rotated his hips, bending his left leg to almost a ninety-degree angle and straightening his right leg. “This stance gives you more power and shifts defense to mostly the hands; however, you can be taken down easily. It’s best to transition between several stances depending on the circumstances. Does that make sense?”
I just stood there. “Uh…”
Sai switched gears. “All right. Try to trip me, then hit me with any kind of attack. I’ll defend and retaliate if able.” Sai switched back to a rear fighting stance and waited patiently.
I triggered Dash, using my speed to my advantage, and swept my leg out to take him down. He lifted his leg for a split second, and I sailed by. I lost my balance. Sai switched to a forward stance and stepped through with some kind of kick and nailed me in the chest. An eternity later, I landed in a slide next to Morogan.
“Aba fly like bird!” He burst out laughing, reaching out and helping me to my feet. “How Aba fly? Aba weigh more.”
“Good question,” I said, brushing the ninja-toe footprint off my leather armor. I wasn’t quite sure how such a small guy sent my ass flying. “Sai, how does that work?”
Sai smiled, ever the patient teacher. “I countered when you were off balance. When the weight shifts, you weigh almost nothing for an instant as if you were floating in water. It is only a matter of redirecting your weight with my own, using my body weight as added momentum. I believe your off-hand sword uses this as a bonus, does it not?”
“I hadn’t considered that. Can we try again?”
“Of course. It is wise to master many different fighting styles. Eventually, we should spar swords versus daggers if you would like experience against someone like this Flint you’ve referred to. He sounds like a worthy adversary.”
We sparred until Garstil called us over to eat. I actually managed to learn the step through side kick as Sai had referred to it. Apparently, it was a powerful move in some martial arts called Tae Kwon Do, which I was growing more and more interested in learning. I’d sent Sai flying a good ten feet or so, and we’d both agreed that using Dash with it would likely kill someone with a chest or face hit. Something I’d have to keep in mind in the future.
Sore and exhausted, we turned in for the night, sleeping in shifts. The night passed uneventfully and we ate a bland breakfast, assuming we’d be seeing more death, decay, and other depravities during the course of the day.
We came across the wreckage of a wagon along the side of the road. The wheel was completely broken off and lying about twenty feet from the wreckage. Large clawed footprints marked the passing of the undead creature they’d brought out of the crater.
“Over here!” Garstil called from behind the wagon. “There’s someone here!”
We rushed over to help, but Garstil’s head hung low, shaking back and forth. “He passed just now. Begging for help.” He looked grief-stricken, “There was nothing we could do.”
“Friend, I beg for help for my family, not for myself. I was dead hours ago.” We jumped, startled. Before us stood the same man but slightly translucent. “They took my wife, son, and daughter. They mean to sacrifice them to appease some ancient god of undeath. Please, if you could find it in your hearts, save them.” Screams came from farther down the road. “Please. Hurry!” He faded from view.
Something snapped in my soul, and I screamed in pain and rage. There were innocent people who needed help, and now, at this stage of my life, I had the power to do something about it. Before I knew what was happening, red and white lightning exploded out from me, obliterating the wagon. The shockwave tossed my party in every direction, stunned. Dash, Temporal Shift, and Burning Rage all triggered simultaneously. The world blurred. My party disappeared, replaced in an instant by the sight of zombies dragging a woman and two children toward an altar. In slow motion, my fist connected with the first zombie. I wasn’t sure how fast I was moving at that point, but his head was chest level to me right before it exploded in a shower of ichor. I took out eight more with my fists before I remembered that I had swords. Fifteen more zombies charged me, still in slow motion. I pulled both swords and slashed in an “X” before time resumed its normal flow. Six zombies in front of me flew to pieces, just from the compression and rarefaction of the air, drenching me in decaying blood and flesh. I made quick work of the last nine, Dashing between them, cutting them down with no mercy. The lead ritualist tried to cast something at me; however, I threw my off-hand sword at him and cleaved him in two vertically. Movement behind me. I jumped and Dashed once again coming down at a forty-five, lightning arcing out of the blade. Two daggers came up crossed, intercepting the blow, ending my momentum. Burning Rage expired; I returned to normal size. Sai, on one knee, had caught the blow between his daggers.
“Shit, man, I’m sorry! I thought you were one of them.” I dropped the sword, every atom in my body shaking in pain and from adrenal withdrawal, severe side effects of Burning Rage. “I thought you were—” I collapsed.
I came to with the family I had saved as well as my party, my family, all around me. “What happened?” I sat up, pain throbbing throughout my body. I looked around. A scene of complete utter carnage surrounded me. Zombie body parts littered the area. The memories from the fight returned. “Shit! Sai!”
“Here, I am quite all right. Although you did almost destroy my daggers. Another level or two and you might have.”
“Dude, I’m sorry, everything happened at once.” I noticed the mother, holding her children and looking at me. “Are you all right, miss?”
She smiled a li
ttle, tears still staining her cheeks. “We are now, thank you. We were headed to Wallowdale. These monsters attacked Sheffield. There’s nothing left. We were the last of the survivors who made it out. They have an army of monsters.”
Garstil put his hand on my shoulder. “Let’s get your family to Wallowdale; we’re heading there ourselves”
Sai helped me to my feet. Damn, I smelled like shit. “I need a damned shower.”
Morogan laughed. “Aba smell worse than toilet!” We all chuckled. As we departed the grisly scene, I turned around one last time and saw the man’s ghost mouthing “thank you” and fading away for the last time. I’d granted him his vengeance and saved his family. His unfinished business had been fulfilled, allowing him to rest.
We arrived at the outskirts of Wallowdale at sundown. The wind had been picking up for the last couple of hours, and dark storm clouds were moving in fast. It would be a night of heavy rain. Off in the distance, we could already see the rain falling.
“Gonna be a cold night tonight once that rain makes it here. There’s likely not going to be much room at the inn. We should likely bunk together tonight.”
We entered the town walls, and wagons took up every bit of space inside. Sai looked back at us. “Likely, there will not be any free rooms tonight. These are the survivors. Let us get ours some help as well.”
On our way to the inn, we noticed an old tree in the town center with dozens of ancient runes, glyphs, sigils, and carvings burned, etched, and carved into its wooden surface. Occasionally, one of the runes glowed a gentle blue, fading out again after a few seconds. I wasn’t sure what that was all about, but it looked like many magical practitioners had worked on this tree over the years. As we walked up to the courtyard of the inn, we saw cots everywhere. The family we had saved thanked us and went in search of their neighbors and friends. We entered the inn and noticed that the more critically wounded survivors were inside. Some people had superficial wounds, and others had blankets draped over them. Weary men loaded them onto gurneys to take out the back door. From the other side of the room, one of the aides screamed, “Cleric! We need a cleric.”
Legend of the Sword Bearer: Tempest Chronicles Book 1 Page 14