by Mike
Several minutes passed as he made his way from the village, when he caught a glimpse of a ruddy light up ahead. It wasn’t long before he cleared the forest and stepped into a small clearing. A small hillock sat near the back of the clearing which was the source of the red glow. Two orb-like holes dug into the side of the mound were to either side of a door shaped opening.
The door was covered by some sort of skin which had been slashed vertically in several places, allowing the reddish glow to seep out. The glow poured out of the orb-like openings, giving the impression of a demonic face staring at him. A sober foreshadowing of what he was most likely to face. Regardless, he moved to the skin covered opening; its color, entirely too human looking for his comfort.
Standing outside of the hovel, he was unsure of how to proceed. He was here uninvited, and it was near the middle of the night. Clearly the person he wished to speak to was awake and home, but he had no way to communicate to him he was here.
After a moment, he was about to turn away, when a raspy voice inside called out to him.
“You may enter, Captain.”
Johns almost fled. There was little he feared in life, but magic was one of those things. As children, they were told stories of the time when magic wrought havoc across the land by the bloody works of the Blood Mages, and the sheer power of the Essence Mages. It was enough to instill a fear of those who practiced magic into anybody, Johns included. Steel against steel was one thing. But steel against magic — well there was nothing he could do to fight that.
The fact this Mage knew who he was, unsettled him greatly. Remembering the cost of failure, he steeled himself before pushing the skin aside and entered.
What he ventured into would haunt him till the ends of his days. Dug into the hill was an open room, its dirt walls were rough, perforated with roots. Some hung a few inches from the ceiling, like desiccated chicken feet. Others exited in one spot on a wall entering somewhere else a short distance away, like tunneling worms, frozen in time. Several places in the walls, little niches were cut to hold various items. Pieces of skeletons, rotting flesh, and spiritual emblems dotted these alcoves.
Bottles of liquids filled other nooks and were placed sporadically around the dirt floor. Their various colors from dark red to almost black left no doubt in Johns mind what was in them.
The glow came from a bed of rocks emanating with an unnatural reddish radiance. It was apparent they gave off some level of heat, for the room was far warmer than the outside. There were two things inside the room he found hard to avoid staring at. His vision darted between them, his mind having difficulty knowing which was worse to focus on.
Beside the magical hearth was the body of a child, laid open. The child could have been no more than six years old by its size; which was the only way to guess its age. It was difficult for him to guess the sex, though he was pretty sure it was a boy. The skin had been sliced down the center from neck to groin, the cut split at the loins and continued down to each foot.
The sex organ had been either removed or had been obliterated by the fact the skin had been peeled back from the cuts to reveal the muscle, organs and bones underneath. The smell of burnt skin assaulted the Captain’s nose, the acrid smell caused Johns to sway, feeling a growing wave of nausea.
The source, he realized, was the edge of the flaps of the pulled back skin. They had been seared to prevent blood loss, the flesh blackened and cracked, like a pig roasted over a spit. The madness of the reason reached Johns ears when he heard soft moaning coming from the lips of what he had thought was a corpse.
Now, realizing the thing was still alive, he noticed other signs of life; the shallow rise and fall of its chest cavity, the redness of its arteries still carrying its life blood to areas of the body.
The face of the body was badly mutilated. The eyes had been removed. Dried blood caked around the sunken eyelids, which were sewn shut. The ears were cut off; the area of attachment seared as well. The child’s hair was burned, or shaved off entirely, including the eyebrows.
The shear level of brutality before Johns left him stunned. As Captain of the guard he had seen his share of death. He had seen all manner of corpses, from the young and the old. Body parts hacked off, entrails spilled out like some grey twisted, headless snakes trying to nest inside someone’s stomach. He had seen blood… so much blood. But this was different. Killing was usually so full of emotion, from the wife stabbing her husband a hundred times after finding him with a mistress, to the thief slitting the throat of his intended victim. They all share some level of emotion, but not this. It was mechanical, as if the child wasn’t human.
The level of detachment was apparent in the fact the child was still alive, kept alive, for some twisted, evil purpose. It was a tool to this Mage, nothing more — nothing less, and like all tools, it needed to be kept working, its gears needed to be moving to make use of it. The ability to remove yourself from humanity enough to do what had been done to this child was beyond comprehension. Despite how horrid the body was, the cause for its state was equally unsettling.
The man sitting cross-legged behind the glowing rocks was a sight out of nightmares. Slick, black hair hung in tangled dreads; some clung to each other like the moss hanging from swamp willows. Their interconnection caused by dried, caked and blackened blood, though not all of it was old; droplets of the red liquid made occasional drips upon the shoulders and arms of the Mage. The Mage was bare-chested and was covered in varying stages of coagulated blood. Scars and freshly cut skin crisscrossed his flesh. It was hard to know where one had healed, and the other had been cut.
Strong, muscular arms were equally scarred, but the scarring took on a more precise appearance. Cuts ran the length of his arms, from shoulder to wrist. It was difficult to tell, but it appeared, as if, strips of his arms had been sliced away, and then sewn back on.
If there had been any scarring on the man’s legs it was impossible to tell since they were covered by a leather jerkin at least, Johns prayed it was leather.
The body of the man was more sinister looking by the eerie red glow emanating from the rocks in front of him, bathing everything in its blood red luminance. The aspect capturing most of his attention though, was the eyes. The eyes were blood red. Not just the iris, but the pupil and the orb itself. Only thin, black circles marked the division between the three parts. They were impossible to read, or to really tell where his focus was, which made watching them disturbing.
Johns had heard stories of Blood Mages of course, and it was said only the ones who had truly given themselves over to the magic were gifted with the blood sight, or the ‘eyes of blood’ as it was also known. It was clear he was in the presence of a powerful and evil person, because to give themselves truly over to the magic, they must spill blood… lots of blood. Usually those who spill their blood for a Blood Mage, seldom survive the bloodletting. Hundreds, if not a thousand people have undoubtedly been drained completely of their lifeblood by this man like the child lying next to him would soon be.
“Sit, Captain.” The Mage spoke again in his raspy voice. It was then he got a glimpse into the mouth of the Mage. The top four teeth were sharpened to a point and blackened by dried blood and lack of hygiene. The man’s tongue had been sliced apart, like much of the Mage’s body, and sewn crudely back together. The result was a bloated, scarred mass. It was a wonder the man could speak.
As much as Johns wished to flee from this man’s presence, he needed information, important details only this man might know. So, despite his instinct to run, he sat, instead.
“You seek information on the destination of your quarry, do you not?”
“Yes… I do.” Johns managed to answer. Wishing to avert his eyes from the man, there were few places better to look, though.
“Do you know the price?”
This was the part Johns was unsure of. The price was blood, of course. But, how much?
The Mage’s eyebrows raised to show his question nee
ded an answer.
Removing a small knife from the sheath in his boot, Johns dragged it across his open palm, flinching at the pain.
“Good,” the Mage rasped. “That is a good start.”
A good start? Johns wondered what he meant.
“Now, allow the blood to drain unto the stones.” The mage indicated the glowing rocks before him.
Doing as he was bid, Johns held his hand over the stones. The first drops of blood sizzled when they landed upon the stones, throwing up pale white smoke. Little by little he could feel the blood escape his flesh, to gather near the center, till it’s weight caused it to fall. The process was strangely mesmerizing to him and he could focus on little else.
Suddenly, the Mage’s hand shot out and grabbed Johns’ wrist, forcing his hand over. Johns tried to snatch his hand back, but the man’s grip was too strong. The Mage produced a blade from beside his leg and moved it towards Johns’ hand. Struggling, he tried to remove his hand, but to no avail, he could only watch as the Mage made another cut crosswise to his, causing him to gasp at the pain.
The Mage dropped the knife and with both hands twisted Johns’ wrist again, to turn his hand, palm down. With his fingers, he peeled the edges of the cuts back. Johns let out a howl of pain. A shower of blood poured upon the rocks, to sizzle and pop, filling the air with great gouts of white smoke. When the room was full of smoke, Johns could feel the man’s fingers let go of his skin and the flaps pressed back to their original position. When it appeared the Mage was satisfied with the location of the skin, he slammed Johns’ hand unto the rocks below. The scream of pain which Johns emitted was one he would wake to for nights to come.
The smell of burning flesh assailed his nostrils and Johns realized, the burning flesh was his own. He almost passed out. When the Mage released his hand, Johns snatched it back, cradling it in his lap. Reaching for his sword at his hip, he found he could not move to grab it.
“Your blood is now mine, Captain.” The smoke still hung heavy in the air and it was difficult to see the Mage. His eyes though, his blood red eyes, glowed through the haze.
“I apologize for the necessity of the blood and fire, Captain, but you would not have gotten your answers otherwise, and I doubt you would have agreed to the price in full.” his voice rasped out.
“You don’t know that! You should have asked!” Johns knew the Mage was right, though.
“I do know it, actually. I have seen it, as I saw you coming here tonight.”
Johns quieted down. He told himself before he came in, when it came to magic against steel, he had nothing. Besides, if the Mage had wanted him dead, he had no doubt he would be lying next to the child right now.
“Good, Captain. You are understanding now, I think. As I said, your blood is mine, and will be mine until I release it. That was the price for the information you seek.”
“What do you mean, ‘my blood is yours’?”
“Several things, actually. The most obvious to you should be you cannot do harm to me or intend to do harm to me. Your blood will not respond to those intentions.”
“And the other things?” Johns was afraid of the answer but asked nonetheless.
The smoke dissipated enough for Johns to see the Mage’s face greet him with a ghastly smile at the question. He gave no answer.
“Are these really the questions you came here for?” The Mage asked him, instead.
They weren’t, Johns conceded, but he hadn’t been expecting to be sliced and burned either.
“No, I wish to know where Quint Linksill intends to go, and why?”
The Mage stared at him for some time, then down at the rocks which had burned his skin and boiled his blood. When the Mage looked up, the red glow Johns had thought he saw earlier, was gone.
“He intends to travel to Covenhome. To the Isle of the Witches, to petition the Witch of Time to view his life line and confirm he didn’t kill the Minister’s daughter. He intends to return home to give this evidence to the Minister and prove his innocence. Since there is no denying the knowledge the Witch of Time possesses, the Minister will be left with no choice but to dismiss the charges against Quint.”
Johns head sunk. It was as he thought. If Quint were to succeed it would not only clear him, it would eventually lead to questions Johns did not want asked. The trick was to make sure he didn’t succeed.
This knowledge was both a curse and a blessing. Knowing now Quint was seeking to clear his name in the most definitive manner possible was bad news. Since there was only one logical place to make port on the Isle of Sleet, the island home of Covenhome, it should be easy enough to intercept him.
Johns felt more hopeful than he had in months of the chase. For too long Quint had been one step ahead of him, but now he knew where his quarry was going, and given Quint’s penchant for trying to throw off pursuit by going out of his way, it should be easy to get ahead of him.
He knew what he must do now. He would pursue Quint to the point where the man would eventually use one of his many tricks to elude capture, he would take some of his men and strike swiftly for the city of Stormland, book passage to the Isle of Sleet, where he would wait for the eventual arrival of his prey.
Eyeing the Mage, who waited patiently for something Johns couldn’t determine, he decided it was time to leave. He rose to stand, still holding his injured hand in front of him. Nodding once to the Mage, he turned to leave. The Mage’s gravelly voice drifting through the haze in the room stopped him at the exit.
“There is the matter of the sword.”
Johns glanced back at the Mage.
“Sword? What sword?”
“The ancient, magical sword, Linksill carries with him.”
Johns thought back to when Quint was at court. He could picture him still, the clothes he wore and the way he acted. He remembered a sword, but it was nothing special. In fact, he was pretty sure it was a similar sword most carried at court, as was issued by the Minister.
“I’m afraid you must be mistaken. The sword he carries is naught but an ordinary weapon.”
Johns once again turned to go.
“The sword he carries now is not the sword he carried when at court. It is the sword he found in the ruins of Blintinstone.”
That name made Johns turn completely around. The vastness of this Mage’s knowledge left him breathless. The ruins of Blintinstone was the first place Johns had tracked Quint. It was also the first place the man had eluded him. Not only eluded him but had all but disappeared completely. There had been no trail of him leaving the site. Nothing for miles to indicate he had left. The trail had, without a doubt, showed him entering the ruins, but no indication as to where he had gone from there.
The ruins were from the ancient keep the first King of Born had resided in. Caltis Born, the first king of that Kingdom, though at the time, it’s power barely encompassed the old forest surrounding it.
Caltis Born, Lord Born at the time, had used the old forest to raid and pillage the surrounding countryside for years. He recruited and surrounded himself with ruthless, but intelligent people. After some years of attacking the surrounding cities and countryside, he eventually installed his own people in charge of the towns after running off or killing the other ones.
After this was done, he named himself King and asked for fealty from the surrounding towns, and since they were all run by those he had put in charge, they swiftly swore their fealty, and so the Kingdom of Born was created. It was history everyone knew.
Over the next few decades, Caltis continued his expansion to include most of what the Canton of Born now covers, and the kingdom prospered. When Caltis died and his oldest son Kael took over, he moved the ancient home away from Blintinstone, to the city of Yolik, which he renamed after himself, and proclaimed it as the capitol of Born.
With the center of the Kingdom of Born moved from Blintinstone, the city gradually depopulated as many of the citizens worked for the King or made their income fr
om the bureaucracy. Those who were left were mainly farmers, loggers and hunters who made their income from the forest and the surrounding land.
The castle at Blintinstone was abandoned and fell to disrepair. Even the stones themselves were taken to make boundary walls for area farms. Eventually, only the skeletal remains of the structure were left. Some full walls hadn’t yet been pillaged, including the central stair spiraling up to the non-existent second floor, and those dug down to the cellar, plus the keep’s former prison.
The cellar was a labyrinth, covering several miles under the keep’s grounds and what used to be the surrounding town. It was there he had lost Quint. His tracker insisted he had indeed entered the cellar, but from there they lost all trace of him.
He sent his men throughout the tunnels to locate every exit point and from there they tried to pick up the trail… but it was like he had disappeared. After several days of searching and eliminating all possibilities of Quint leaving through any of the known exits, he was forced to call off the search. It was sheer luck they picked back up his trail at the way station on the West Trading Road. Could he had found a hidden room where this sword lay abandoned for centuries?
“What does his sword have to do with anything?”
“Nothing,” the Mage shrugged, “and everything.”
Johns exhaled loudly, he detested riddles. He decided to wait the Mage out.
The Mage stared at him with those blood red eyes for a long time, and when Johns managed to stand his ground under that gaze, the Blood Mage nodded.
“The blade is named Wren-Kurth. It is an ancient, magical sword that has existed for centuries. It was buried beneath Blintinstone from a time before the name Born ever tilled the earth.” The Mage turned to the body next to him and grabbed a vial from the floor. It was a grubby, dirty thing, big enough to hold a pint of ale easily.
With deft fingers, the Mage grabbed an artery running the length of the inside of the child’s leg and lifted it slightly. A quiet moan escaped the lips of the child. As quickly as the Mage snagged the strand, he sliced it with the knife he had used to cut Johns’ hand. The two ends were gathered up dexterously and pinched as to not allow much blood to escape. The other hand brought around the vial and the Mage placed the end of the artery leading to the child’s foot inside the vial and the blood began to pour. Swiftly, the Mage took the other end coming from further up in the body and tied it off to keep it from leaking too much of the child’s life blood.