Hunt of the Bandham (The Bowl of Souls: Book Three)

by Cooley, Trevor H.

  “Well . . . no.” Zambon said. “I-.”

  “I recognize you now,” Faldon said with a grin. “Zambon, I haven’t seen you since you graduated. You know my son?”

  “Where is he?” Vannya asked.

  Zambon looked at the two of them flustered as if not sure whom to speak to. “Well, uh yes, I know him. No, he is not here. I last saw him a few months ago at Ewzad Vriil’s castle.”

  This response sparked another series of questions and Zambon was forced to start from the time they left the MageSchool. He told them of their journey and of Justan’s capture and imprisonment and subsequent bonding with the ogre, Fist.

  Jhonate was stunned by Zambon’s tale. Her memories of Justan blurred a bit with each new detail. The young man that left her at the edge of Reneul seemed so different from the Sir Edge Zambon spoke of. She twisted the ring on her finger. Had he really changed so much in such a short time? If she saw him again, would she even recognize him?

  “With Ewzad Vriil dead, the rest of the soldiers gave up easily.” Zambon said. “Captain Demetrius took charge and Sir Edge went on to meet that master wizard he had been sent to find. My father and I brought Sneaky Pete’s body back here to Jack’s Rest. We fought goblinoids and gathered any men we met along the way. When we got here, the place was destroyed for the most part. A few goblinoid patrols were camped here but we took the place back and fortified it. Now we harass the army as best as we can, and new men stream in from all around every day.” He noticed the uncomfortable looks on a few faces and his brow furrowed in concern. “What? What’s wrong?”

  “Son, I hate to tell you this, but . . . Ewzad Vriil is not dead.” Faldon said.

  Zambon’s face went pale. “That’s not possible. I saw him disappear. I saw Elise stab him and I saw him melt away.”

  “Nevertheless, he is back and staying at the palace in Dremald. King Andre is dead and now Ewzad has Queen Elise’s ear. He is probably the most powerful man in the kingdom.”

  Zambon swayed on his feet for a moment. Then he glanced at his father and the look of despair quickly evaporated. His lip curled into a snarl and for a moment, his face looked much like Tamboor’s. “We’ll have to find a way to remedy that.”

  “I am afraid you are correct,” Locksher said. He had been silent during the telling of the story, just taking it in. Now his eyes were wide with horrible realization. “Dear gods, do you see, Faldon? This has all been about Ewzad Vriil! He always had a thirst for power. Remember the mission we undertook years ago to defeat that vampire? Remember what Ewzad Vriil had been up to then?”

  “He was coercing others into drinking elven blood just to see what would happen,” Faldon said.

  “I think he was trying to decide whether the powers gained would be worth it. Those others were just his test subjects. He was about to drink it himself when I caught him.” Locksher looked as if he had swallowed a bug. “We thought him harmless once the king had banished him. Now it seems he had been hiding powers from us. I should have seen it. I should have tested him back then while he was still in my hands.”

  “I had him at sword point!” Faldon said, his teeth gritted together.

  “Both of us had him,” Locksher agreed, pacing back and forth. “I let him go even though something didn’t feel right about the boy. I told myself to keep an eye on him but time passed and I forgot. Even when he popped back up in the kingdom at young King Andre’s side, I did nothing, too distracted with my studies to look into his movements.”

  “What are you saying?” Vannya asked.

  It was just dawning on Jhonate. The pieces fit together too well.

  “Zambon,” Locksher said. “When you were speaking of Ewzad’s disappearance in the throne room earlier, you said that Princess Elise accused him of killing her father just before she stabbed him. Well, think about it. It makes sense. King Muldroomon revoked Ewzad’s rights and titles, banished him. Then mere days after the king dies, Andre pardons Ewzad and makes him a duke. An army of beasts appears in the mountains and who leads them into Jack’s Rest? Our friend Ewzad. Zambon, would you be so kind as to tell us again? When Sir Edge led the prisoner revolt into Ewzad’s throne room, what did the duke call himself?”

  Zambon blinked. “The messenger of the Dark Prophet.”

  Vannya gasped. “The villagers have been reporting that the goblinoid army attacks to the cry of, ‘for the Barldag!’”

  “Yes! The Barldag.” Locksher said. “Exactly! That is what the goblinoids called the Dark Prophet two hundred years ago.”

  “Could it be?” Faldon’s voice was calm, but Jhonate saw the worry in his eyes. “No, the Dark Prophet is dead. My instructor took us to the palace of the Dark Prophet when I first entered the academy. I saw his twisted bones in the ruins of his throne room.”

  “It is impossible of course.” Locksher paced back and forth excitedly. “Yet somehow Ewzad Vriil has united all the mountain tribes of the goblinoids by convincing them that he speaks for the one they call Barldag. Now he sits in power at the palace in Dremald. Tell me, what would stop him from giving Queen Elise an heir and becoming king by default?”

  “The MageSchool would hunt him down and as soon as it was proven that he was practicing dark magic,” Vannya said. “The queen couldn’t stop them. Those laws are older than the kingdom. They take precedence over any laws a Dremaldrian ruler enacts.”

  “And the BattleAcademy would back them,” Jhonate said.

  “Yes, the academy is a threat. But now, with Ewzad at her side, our new Queen has recalled all troops from the border. Meanwhile his army gathers its strength. I have been worried that we have not run into any goblinoid forces on our journey.”

  “And we haven’t been attacked for over two weeks,” Zambon said. “Ben the Fletch took fifty men out two days ago to find out what the beasts are up to.”

  “I fear that the army is on the move,” Locksher said. “The academy’s defenses are stretched thinner than they have been since the War of the Dark Prophet, especially in the east, where there are few attacks,” Faldon said. “Now would be a perfect opportunity for Ewzad to assault the academy. If he took the army around the eastern edge of the mountains, he would have a distinct advantage.”

  Qenzic swore. “If the academy was defeated, he could roll right on to the MageSchool and if he succeeded there, nothing could stop him. All the known lands would be next.”

  Locksher nodded, massaging his temples. “We need to warn them both. But when will he strike?”

  “I know how to find out,” Jhonate said. All eyes turned on her. “We need a moonrat eye.”

  Locksher’s eyes met hers and she could see that the wizard understood. “She’s right. It would be the fastest way.”

  “We burn all the eyes, remember?” said Rickon the Bug.

  “Not all,” Zambon said. He walked over and rummaged through a well stuffed pack near the site where his father trained.

  Jhonate glanced at Tamboor. The man was still hard at work on his forms, oblivious to his visitors or their revelations. How did he continue with so much focus when such commotion was around? “He ain’t right in the head,” Rickon the bug had said. She fought back a shiver.

  Zambon returned with a leather pouch in hand. “Father slew one of the army’s leaders the day we retook Jack’s Rest. It was a huge fat giant. This eye spilled out of its belly. We think the giant had swallowed it. We went to dispose of it, but the witch soon had five of our own men trying to keep us from tossing it into the fire. She went after me too. The witch almost had me ready to attack my own father until he tucked the eye into this pouch.” His face twisted with distaste. “I don’t like being even this close to it. I’ve wanted to destroy this for a long time, but father won’t let me. He likes to take it out from time to time and wrestle with the witch. From the look of satisfaction on his face, I think he wins.”

  Zambon loosened the strings and started to open the pouch. Everyone leaned in to take a look. He jerked it away. “Careful! Remembe
r what I said? There is something different about this eye. Its power isn’t as great as it was when we found it, but the witch is still protective of it. Sometimes she attacks even if you just look at it.”

  Zambon opened the pouch fully and this time only Locksher and Jhonate leaned in. The eye was a dull orange color. It was shriveled and veiny and did not glow, yet it had a presence almost as if there were still life inside.

  “Orange,” Locksher said with a pensive look. “I’ve never seen that in a Moonrat. I have seen a few with green eyes, but the majority of them are yellow.”

  “All of the moonrats we’ve found up here have green eyes,” Zambon said. “Except this one.”

  “It must be special in some way,” Locksher said.

  “The moonrat we killed in the mountains last year had orange eyes just like this one,” Jhonate said. She reached for the orb.

  “Wait!” said Locksher. “What are you doing, daughter of Xedrion? It is best that I handle this.”

  “What are you planning to do?” Faldon asked

  “I am scouting ahead,” Jhonate replied. She gave Locksher her most stern stare. “Have you trained for mental attacks?”

  “Professor Locker has a perfectly well trained mind, thank you,” said Vannya.

  Jhonate ignored her and raised one eyebrow at the wizard, her arms folded.

  The Wizard of Mysteries shuffled his feet a little before admitting, “Well, I haven’t specifically trained for it, no. But I am no stranger to mental battle. I have been through a scrape or two.”

  Jhonate snorted. “Wizard Locksher, my people have long been plagued by witches that control the mind. They lure children away in the night. They seduce warriors into murdering friends and loved ones. Since I was but a small child, my father assigned tutors to teach me how to guard against mental intrusion. I have also been trained to strike back. Since my first encounter with the mother of the moonrats last year, I have intensified that training. I am the only one here qualified for this mission.”

  “Well then,” Locksher said with a slight bow. He gestured to the bag. “The eye is yours.”

  “Hold on. I am the one that gives out missions,” Faldon said. He placed a hand on Jhonate’s shoulder. “Are you sure about this?”

  “I am prepared, sir,” she said firmly.

  Faldon stared into her eyes for a moment, then nodded.

  Jhonate sat right there in the dirt, crossed her legs and held out her hand expectantly. Zambon stared at her hand but after she gave a few impatient gestures, he understood and handed the pouch down to her. The weight of it was a bit ominous. It seemed heavier than it should be. She closed her eyes and slowed her breathing, then shut out the sounds and sensations around her and cleared her mind of all distractions. Soon all was gone but a white emptiness. Slowly, Jhonate built up in her mind a representation of herself, staff in hand, armored, and ready for battle. Once ready, she reached her hand into the pouch and grasped the eye.

  Nothing happened immediately. She had expected to be attacked by the voice at once. After a few short moments without result, she focused on the eye in her palm. The world outside her body faded and a low hum began to fill the whiteness. The small version of Jhonate in her mind sprouted large feathered wings and began to soar towards the hum. Then she saw it, a black square in the distance. She picked up speed. The square grew larger and larger as she approached.

  Jhonate burst into empty space, a black nothingness. She glanced behind and saw a small window of light behind her in the darkness. It was the way she had come, the way back to her own world, and it would be her escape route when it came time to leave. A silvery wire trailed from the window, connected to her somewhere along her spine. With a mental nudge, Jhonate lengthened her staff and hardened her armor before gliding further into the darkness.

  She soon saw other tiny points of light in the blackness around her and knew them to be portals to other eyes, other minds open to the call of the mother of the moonrats. Jhonate became aware of movements in the darkness, hundreds of tendrils somehow darker than the nothingness around her. They moved quickly, darting through the ether, piercing through the tiny points of light in rapid succession. The mother of the moonrats was busy communicating with her army. This distraction was why she had gotten this far.

  Jhonate soared towards the source of these tendrils, an amorphous black mass in the center of the darkness. The tendrils shot by faster and closer together the nearer she came to her goal. She darted and dodged nimbly around them knowing that if one of the tendrils even touched her, she would be found out.

  Soon the tendrils were so thick in the air that it became difficult to proceed. She searched until she found a calmer area in the center mass. Once close, she extended her grey staff. The tip narrowed itself to a fine point and she thrust it inside the black.

  A barrage of thoughts and images filled her mind. The mother of the moonrats was old, very old, ancient. Her mind was full of memories and it took Jhonate a moment to focus her search. A blur of thought processes flew past her, individual conversations, no, orders. The shape of the army emerged in her mind, she saw their numbers and formations. It was bad. Very bad.

  Quickly she sifted through thoughts digging deep into the mother of the moonrat’s mind looking for something, anything that might be of help. Finally she saw it, a secret so well protected so well guarded, that the moment she touched upon it, all other movement stopped.

  “YOU!”

  Jhonate withdrew her staff and darted back the way she had come, following the thin silver wire. A swarm of tentacles pursued her, reaching, grasping. She soared and banked and slashed about with her staff, now sharp as any sword. Each tentacle she cut hissed in the ether.

  “HOW DARE YOU COME HERE?”

  The roar was thunderous and Jhonate realized how precarious her situation was. She was within the mind of a creature so old, so experienced that if she was captured, her soul would be overwhelmed and torn asunder. Jhonate would be gone, her mind an empty shell, her thoughts replaced by the commands of the mother of the moonrats.

  “YOU WILL NOT ESCAPE!”

  If she had true ears in this place they would have been bleeding from the intensity of the roar. She whirled her staff around, severing hundreds of tendrils, but some of them made it through her defenses and touched her. Each time there was a searing pain as if a bit of flesh had been ripped from her body. Bit by bit, her armor melted away, pulled into the darkness. She battled for what felt like hours, flitting around, always following that silvery trail. Her wings were in tatters. Her skin throbbed. Finally she saw the window she was searching for. Jhonate flew towards it with every bit of her strength. Tendrils grabbed her staff, pulling it away from her. More tendrils wrapped around her legs, tugging, yanking, melting her flesh. They pulled at her and she surged ahead, throwing all her strength into one last lunge. There was a tearing sensation and she shot forward.

  Jhonate burst through the window and into the comforting light of her own mind. She shouted for joy, but her triumph was short lived. The window to the moonrat mother’s mind was still open. Tendrils poured in, gripping the light around them. More and more tendrils came through the portal. They swarmed and rippled and twisted together.

  A shape emerged from the tangled mass, black and shining and feminine and beautiful and horrible all at once. A face formed, full lips, a dainty nose. The eyes that opened in the center of that perfect face glowed red, the red of living blood.

  Jhonate tried to stand, but she could not. Her small form was naked and bloodied, her legs ended in ragged stumps where the tendrils had torn her feet from her. She told herself that this was not real. It was a mental representation of her body. She was in her own mind. She was in charge.

  “I think not,” the black figure said. Jhonate gasped in surprise.

  “Oh, so you think you accomplished something with your little trip inside me, do you, dear? Now that I am here, your mind is no longer yours.”

  “You are wrong,�
� Jhonate said. Her feet had grown back as instructed. She stood and faced the creature. Clothes reappeared on her body. “I am not so weak as you think.”

  “So you grew a couple feet? You think that a few years of training make you equal to me?” She snarled and thrust out an arm. Long black fingers shot from her hand and wrapped tightly around Jhonate, holding her in place. “Shall we see what you found out on your little trip?”

  The moonrat mother reached her other arm into the whiteness. Jhonate could feel the creature rooting through her memories. As she had been trained, Jhonate moved the important thoughts out of the reach of the grasping arm. The small success increased her confidence. She spat onto the fingers binding her. Her spittle sizzled, melting through one of them. The moonrat mother’s eyes narrowed and another black finger grew out to replace the damaged one.