Dead Druid: Claire-Agon Ranger Book 2 (Ranger Series)

by Salvador Mercer

  Dead

  Druid

  SALVADOR

  MERCER

  Dead Druid

  Copyright © 2016 by Salvador Mercer.

  All Rights Reserved

  First Electronic Edition

  Published by Diamond Star Publishing

  For information contact; Salvador@salvadormercer.com

  www.salvadormercer.com

  Edited by: Courtney Umphress

  Book and Cover design by Christine Savoie aka ‘Cagnes’ c2016

  Interior Icons: Svetlana Shirokova | Dreamstime.com

  Printed in the United States of America. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles or reviews.

  This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, organizations, places, events and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

  ASIN: B01CCQBXA0

  First Edition: February 2016

  10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

  Other Books by Salvador Mercer

  Claire-Agon Ranger Series

  Ranger Rising: Claire-Agon Ranger Book 1

  Claire-Agon Dragon Series

  The Black Dragon: A Claire-Agon Dragon Book 1

  The Blue Dragon: A Claire-Agon Dragon Book 2

  Sci-Fi-Technothriller

  Lunar Discovery

  Book Description

  A thousand years ago, on the world of Claire-Agon, a war raged between men and dragons, destroying both the creatures and the land’s many civilizations.

  Targon Terrel accepts his fate as a Ranger, a servant of the Mother and Defender of the Arnen. Having protected his fellow countrymen, he continues his battle against the sinister Kesh wizards, but he does not fight alone. Aided by unlikely allies, he presses his attacks to liberate Ulatha and its people.

  The Kesh continue to dominate the realms of Agon, enslaving those of neighboring realms and seeking to obtain the one artifact that will ensure their perpetual domination of Agon forever.

  Meanwhile, ancient evils stir from their long slumbers, moving to ensnare all within their reach as Dor Akun, Father Death approaches.

  Evil prepares to cover the land and only one thing stands in its way, a simple Ulathan family that goes by the name of Terrel.

  For:

  Dorothy

  Chapter 1

  Ambush

  Chapter 2

  Trojan

  Chapter 3

  Counter Trap

  Chapter 4

  Fight

  Chapter 5

  Decisions

  Chapter 6

  Traitor

  Chapter 7

  Ulsthor

  Chapter 8

  Farewell

  Chapter 9

  Complications

  Chapter 10

  Slave Pit

  Chapter 11

  Ancient History

  Chapter 12

  Ruse

  Chapter 13

  Lies

  Chapter 14

  Lich

  Chapter 15

  Druid

  Chapter 16

  Dungeon

  Chapter 17

  Oath

  Chapter 18

  Decisions

  Chapter 19

  Children

  Chapter 20

  History

  Chapter 21

  Escape

  Chapter 22

  Convergence

  Chapter 23

  Sacrifice

  Chapter 24

  Culverts and Towers

  Chapter 25

  Epic

  Chapter 26

  Freedom

  Epilogue

  Madness

  Contact the Author

  About the Author

  Appendix A

  The “Science” of Claire Agon

  Appendix B

  Dead Druid Glossary

  The Black Dragon

  Chapter 1 Excerpt

  Chapter 1

  Ambush

  “Theres it be again,” the Kesh driver said, pulling back on the reins and bringing his ox-drawn cart to a stop again in the middle of the rutted road.

  “Not again, Planks,” his companion said with a shake of his head.

  The sun was starting to peek from a few clouds and illuminate the area better, as it had been shaded for their entire trip that day. The Kesh brigands scanned the road off to their right while a horsed rider came from the front again to their cart.

  “What is it now, you two?” the man said, pulling his horse up short at the side of their wagon, which was laden with arms, rope, and other supplies. The rider had a metallic staff and a pointy, tasseled hat which kept his swarthy face shaded from what light there was at the moment.

  “Not me, Master,” the companion said, pointing directly at Planks. “This here idiot keeps seeing things just to the north, my master.”

  “Who’s you calling an idiot, Belts?” Planks said, looking at his cart companion with a scowl. “I told you whats I saw, and I am not mistakens.”

  “Speak normal, you reject,” Belts said, returning the glare, “and stop already with your hallucinations.”

  The screeching of a bird interrupted their argument for the moment, and all three men looked up into the overcast sky. There, flying so high overhead that it was hard to spot, was a great northern falcon circling lazily over their convoy of wagons.

  “I supposes I’m hallucunatin’ that as well, eh?” Planks said, scorn in his tone.

  “Nope, that there bird is an evil omen. Been present at each attack, it has,” Belts said, sounding as scholarly as he could considering the circumstance.

  “It matters not,” the mounted rider began, and then stopped to greet another rider approaching from the rear of the wagon train. “Saxon.”

  The other rider rode up quickly with a loud clapping of hooves against the dry ground, spraying dirt in every direction as the horse was pulled up close to the cart, causing the other horse and rider to startle. “Again?” the rider asked, looking at the two men in the wagon.

  “It seems our driver here is certain of what he saw,” the staff-wielding rider answered for the men who sat in the cart glaring at each other.

  “You know, Hermes, that the Ulathans haven’t attacked during the day?” the second rider said from his armored mount. Horses were rare in Agon, and this one was rarer still. Large and black it was, easily wearing its scaled armor across its body as well as carrying its rider who was also clad in black, long sword sheathed across the rear of the saddle but within reach. The scale mail that the rider wore was also different from the leather protection that the rest of the brigands were adorned with, and a hood concealed most of the man’s features in the dimmer light.

  “I know, Saxon,” the first rider said. “That is what worries me. There is a first time for everything, and something is always waiting for its first time.”

  “Uh, what was that, my master?” Belts said, releasing Planks from his glare and looking at Hermes.

  “Enough, driver,” Saxon said, giving the man a quick rebuke and turning his attention to Hermes. “I’ve not known one of our wizards to worry. Do you want us to search the brush?”

  “Apprentice wizard, actually, but no, I think it is not wise to leave the wagons,” Hermes said, scanning to the north into the deeper grasses and brush just off the road, and then turning his attention to the south where the forest started not far fr
om their road. “If there was to be an attack, it would come from the south, from the woods . . . not from the north.”

  “Agreed,” Saxon said, also looking at the forest and the many dead tree stumps that bordered it. “It is a powerful magic that those Ulathans wield to make the forest grow the way that it does.”

  “Nonsense,” Hermes said, his lips sliding downward into a frown. “Those fools do not use the arcane nor do they understand the powers of Akun. This is their corruption of nature, nothing more, and nothing to fear other than their arrows.”

  “You means their bolts, don’t you, my lord?” Planks said, his voice tinged with a slight reverence for their magic-user.

  Belts elbowed his companion before speaking. “Sorry, my master. Planks here is more than a fool. We do remember arrows with their bolts.”

  “Quiet, both of you,” Hermes ordered.

  “Do you want us to clear the forest again, Master?” Saxon asked, looking coolly at his leader from his mount, giving his horse a slight tug on its reins to point it toward the forest to their south.

  “It appears that chopping down the trees do not benefit us other than acquiring wood for the fire,” the wizard said, and the two brigands sighed audibly with relief at hearing that they would not have to spend time near the Blackthorn Forest. The last two crews who were tasked with clearing the forest from the road line were killed by the Ulathans. “Get the wagons moving and get us to the old keep before sundown.”

  “As you wish, Master,” Saxon said, spurring his horse to the front of the train and barking orders for the first wagons to continue. They began to move immediately, and the wizard rode to the rear, changing places with his commander.

  Once gone, Belts leaned toward Planks, his voice low. “You’re an idiot no matter what—”

  Planks watched as Belts, who was facing him but now looking past him, allowed his jaw to drop as his eyes grew wide and he suddenly tried to stand and shout at the same time.

  Planks looked to his right just in time to see a small leather-clad child hurl a palm-sized rock from near point blank range as she ran toward the wagon, startling the oxen and upsetting the cart. The rock hit Belts right in the forehead, and Planks yanked back on the reins to look at his companion whose eyes rolled back in his head as he toppled back and over the side of the cart, either unconscious or dead from the rock’s impact.

  “Whats in Agon—” was all Planks could get out before the young girl leaped at him from the side of the cart. Too late, the brigand noticed a wicked-looking dagger in her hand as she slid it past his throat, and he pushed her away, with her momentum taking her to the other side of the cart where his companion had fallen. Planks dropped the reins, never having a chance to draw his weapon, and held his hands against his neck, trying to stop the bleeding.

  The girl somersaulted on the dry road, never missing a beat, and ran due south toward the forest, weaving around a couple of short alder bushes that were near the road. Planks’ vision faded, and the last thing he saw in life was the girl standing on a large tree trunk that had been hacked down as she started to shout and yell taunts at him and his companions.

  “Kill the brat!” one of the brigands shouted, leaping from his cart and running south, pulling his short sword from its sheath.

  “Over here, you ugly Kesh scum!” the girl shouted, ducking as a crossbow bolt whizzed overhead, and then wheeling and running toward the forest tree line.

  “She’s mine,” one of the brigands yelled, running with several others as bolts flew overhead from the Kesh crossbows.

  Hermes galloped his horse up to the now driverless cart that was starting to be pulled off road by the startled oxen. “Stop this cart,” he commanded to no one in particular. Then, noticing that over half of his troops were running toward the girl, he started to issue new orders. “Back to the carts. Leave the urchin; return to your carts.”

  Despite being the most feared person in the convoy, the wizard’s shouts were barely heard over the yelling, screaming, and shouting of the brigands and the fainter taunts of the small girl who seemed entirely fearless despite the danger she was in. Hermes was having a very bad feeling about this.

  “Get back in line,” Saxon yelled, much louder than Hermes could, as he rode into the field between the forest and the road. “Get back . . . NOW!”

  The Kesh commander finally received the attention he deserved, and most of the Kesh slowed their pursuit, turning to look back at their mounted leader as he rode and shouted for them to stop. Several bowmen, standing on their carts, lowered their crossbows in silence.

  The girl reached an unnatural mound that looked like one of the large granite boulders that had been deposited there by ancient glaciers centuries earlier, with dirt piled all around it, and turned to face the Kesh, all of which had now stopped and were deathly silent. She then held something up in the air for them to see. It was a wooden baton that the Kesh revered as a symbol of leadership. The wielder of the baton was a commander of a Kesh brigade, and it was a rare symbol representing power and authority amongst Kesh society. What happened next horrified them.

  The girl bent over slightly at her waist and turned, her small behind pointing at them, and then she patted the baton against the underside of her rear in the most disrespectful manner that could be done to a Kesh. The reaction was immediate.

  “Kill her!” came the cry from several brigands in unison, and the calming influence that their commander had over them dissipated faster than a fog in high wind. Bowmen recharged their crossbows and aimed at the girl less than three hundred feet away.

  Several bolts came close, and it appeared that one hit her as she clutched at her chest and fell behind the rock mound. Several brigands cheered, and the ones in front ran faster, some tripping over the rocky ground, trying to reach her first. She reappeared, blood covering her face as she clutched the side of her chest, a Kesh crossbow clearly protruding from her body. She grimaced in pain and made one last vulgar hand gesture at the leading brigands before falling back and out of sight.

  Hermes spurred his horse forward, crossing half the ground before the first of his troops crested the hill, and disappearing behind it. Within seconds, there were shouts and screams of pain and death. Then, without warning, a tall woodsman dressed in fur and leather crested the rocky mound. Blood covered his body as he held a large axe in one hand and a Kesh sword in the other. The blood was not his own.

  Two brigands tried to climb the mound and attack the ferocious woodsman, and with consecutive swings they were killed, one nearly cut in half. A third received a vicious boot in his chest and was repulsed at least a dozen feet, landing unconscious. Several bolts flew toward the man, and he swatted them away with ease. His eyes narrowed as he spotted Saxon and pointed the axe directly at the Kesh commander in an obvious challenge.

  Saxon accepted, pulling his own great sword from behind his saddle and spurring his horse forward at a high run. The black steed started to breathe heavily as it carried its rider past the Kesh troops on foot and approached the evil woodsman. Hermes noticed that the bolts stopped flying toward the man, and he assumed his troops ceased firing for fear of hitting their commander. At least his theory seemed sound until he heard a muffled shout, a loud thump, and then screams of death behind him.

  Turning to look back at the wagon train, he noticed that most of his crossbowmen were dead, wicked-looking Kesh bolts sticking from their bodies. This confused the Kesh wizard apprentice, as he had a sick thought that perhaps there was some sort of coup going on amongst the wizards of his order, until he spotted the Ulathan women setting fire to his carts, having first removed several key bags of provisions for themselves as they started to flee northeast.

  “Master, they are destroying our carts,” the chief quartermaster said to him as he ran up to Hermes’ mount, breathing heavily from his run.

  Indeed, Hermes came to the realization that they had rode into a perfectly executed ambush by these Ulathan guerillas fighting their clandestine and
covert battle against him and his countrymen, and, while not winning outright, they were causing more than just grief. They were starting to seriously impact the Kesh ability to wage war and maintain their hold on Ulatha.

  Not only that, they seemed to understand the limitations and sphere of influence and power of the wizards of his order, always striking either when there was no wizard present or when the wizard was out of range so to speak. This day they had managed to taunt his troops into attacking near the dreaded forest and leaving the wagon train vulnerable to attack as well as getting the Kesh wizard, HIM, in the middle of the two, unable to counter either attack. Hermes was both angry and impressed.

  “Rally what men you can and put those fires out. Track those women and kill them,” the apprentice wizard ordered, turning his mount and his attention back to the impending battle between his commander and the woodsman. He didn’t want to mess this match up as Saxon had been hired specifically to take out the Ulathan rebel leader.

  A bolt shot from the forest tree line directly at Saxon, hitting his horse and ricocheting away, leaving both horse and rider unharmed. Hermes smiled, a wicked look crossing his face as he anxiously awaited the meeting of rider and rebel. The distance was covered quickly, and Hermes could see no way how the woodsman could evade the large mount. The wizard inhaled sharply in anticipation as Saxon raised his long sword overhead for the killing blow to be done at speed.

  The large brown blur that shot over the rocky mound and past the woodsman was about the only creature that the Kesh wizard could think of that would be large enough to arrest the momentum of an armored steed that weighed well over a ton. The large bear was thrown back and to the side of the mound, while the armored stallion stumbled, falling to the ground and crashing into the base of the rocky outcropping with a sickening cracking of bones that could be heard over the screams and shouts of pain and death.