The Weaving of Wells (Osric's Wand, Book Four)

by Jack D. Albrecht Jr.

  Now, he had all of the power he could possibly need from Archana in the Well of Strands. He also had complete control over the life strand that he was using. He wanted the caldereth people to have caldereth life coursing through their bodies, and he wanted to make sure there were no mistakes.

  Dredek began drawing strands up from the bottom of the stone bowl, gathering a greater concentration of strands for him to pull from. He would need the surge of power that was rushing toward the well to complete the spell for so many people at once, but he needed the connection established first. When he was sure there was enough, Dredek began channeling the strands into his body through the life strand segment. He had discovered that the life strand could function much like a wand through focused experimentation, but the effect it had on the channeled strands was completely unexpected. Once he had discovered it, he realized he could raise all of his people at once with enough power, rather than one at a time.

  As the strands coursed up through his body from the well, Dredek sent the power back out through the wand that held a connection to each of the caldereth bodies. His life strand not only channeled the strands; it altered them. Dredek didn’t understand it, really, but he didn’t question it either. Perhaps it was because both types of strands were so closely linked to Archana. Maybe it was because the life strand had to have come from the source of all strands, and so all strands from Archana sought to be like the life strand. It didn’t really matter, because Dredek was going to use the mysterious phenomena to resurrect his family, regardless of its explanation. He didn’t need to know how it worked.

  As the millions of individual strands passed through Dredek’s life strand, they took on characteristics of it. Moving through him and his wand, they coiled around the anchoring spell that connected Dredek to each of the bodies, the strands binding tightly to each other until they were as dense and vibrant as a life strand. Then, as they passed into each of the corpses, new life strands began to form where the original ones had been severed. Dredek stood perfectly still, inundated by the strength of the strands flowing through him, staring at Aeya’s body. His eyes were glued to hers, waiting to see the first spark of life enter her pale orbs.

  Though, even if the emotions coursing through him hadn’t rooted him in place, he could not have moved had he tried to. It felt as though every cell in his body was slowly burning, and he feared he may be torn apart by the magic he was struggling to control. His shoulders ached worse than he could ever remember experiencing. His eyes were dry and stinging, as if his body temperature were significantly higher than was safe. His skin was hot and dry, cracking in places so badly that blood began dripping from his fingers and soaking into his robes. He wasn’t sure how much longer he could maintain the spell, but the thought of Aeya once again breathing air kept him holding on, kept his hands held aloft and outstretched from his body, kept the strands flowing through him.

  Just when Dredek thought he was going to fail, when he was sure he could not continue for another breath, he sensed the oncoming surge of power nearing the access of the Well of Strands, and he knew he was almost done. Once that vast rush of strands passed through him and into his kin, their hearts would beat and their lungs would breathe and Dredek would hold Aeya again. He held on a little longer. The life strands were nearly whole, and Dredek could taste his impending success.

  It began with a flicker, the twitch of an eyelid, the hesitant and gentle rising of her chest, and Dredek watched every movement with hungry eyes. Aeya took a breath, then another, and she opened her eyes. The other caldereth around her also breathed, blinked, and began to stir. The life strands were whole within their bodies, powering their hearts and nerves. The caldereth could feel for the first time in hundreds of years, and Dredek found himself wondering if the process he was putting them through was painful. He could no longer feel his own body, but he hoped that Aeya felt no pain as the blood quickened through her veins.

  Dredek could not feel it, but he saw the wand tremble in his grasp as his numb fingers failed to sustain his grip. He could not drop the wand and sever the spell before the life strands of his people were able to form completely and establish a direct connection to Archana. As it was, they were too much like the deer. They were alive—more alive than the deer had been with so little power to form its life strand—but they were not yet like they once were. They would be left helpless, unable to protect themselves without access to Archana’s magic. He couldn’t fail them now that he was so close to saving them.

  Dredek dragged another breath into his lungs, the air feeling so hot that he was sure it was searing his body as it passed into him. The surge was close.

  Just as Dredek allowed himself to feel a small measure of relief that the blinding pain would soon be over and he would be reunited with his love, a bright light erupted beneath his feet. His eyes locked with Aeya’s, and recognition lit her face as the blast of light and strands surged upward and engulfed him. He felt his link with Archana severed, and the stone around him trembled and began to crumble. His wands fell dark and lifeless from his hands.

  Dredek crumpled to the ground.

  * * *

  Machai and Elidin headed deeper into the passages with sixty troops behind them, while Juri took the rest down the side tunnel to bring the attack in from behind Dredek’s men. Machai wanted to run down the tunnel, rushing forward to defeat the enemy and come through for Osric, but Elidin held them back at a more reserved pace to allow Juri time to position the others.

  Just as Elidin had said, the tunnel soon terminated and they paused to scout the intersecting passage. To the left, a small chamber opened up off of the tunnel and Machai saw large crates with unfamiliar markings on the sides. Noticing the curious look on Machai’s face, Elidin explained, “It’s iat, one of the few things the irua import in large quantities. With the proper additives and spells it makes a lightweight building material that won’t crack in the dry air, and when cooked it becomes nearly edible. The longer it cooks, the more it expands and the worse it tastes, but it is filling and it’s inexpensive.”

  “What’s it made of?” Machai asked.

  “It’s a plant, grown on an island out east, I believe. If we live through this, I’ll boil some up for you myself and you can try it.”

  Machai grinned and turned his attention to the tunnel where it led away from their position to the right. “How far be it before we be encountering Dredek’s men?”

  “They’ll be just around that bend, up ahead. The tunnel to the armory isn’t far from here, and we won’t have much time to maintain a surprise attack once we get close to that curve in the tunnel. We will need to move fast. Juri should be nearly there now, so we should be getting to it,” Elidin replied.

  Machai gave the signal and led the group forward, indicating that they should be swift but silent. He felt more at ease with his axe and wand in hand within the tight stone tunnels than he had up in the exposed stretches of gritty sand thanks to a life in the dwarven tunnels. He was still glad he had such well-trained men at his back when he rounded the corner. A steady stream of well-armed men was pouring out of a tunnel up ahead, and the passage was thick with the Turgent’s colors.

  They heard no sounds of battle from the other end of the tunnel, and Machai hoped that Juri hadn’t run into trouble along the way. Hopefully, they wouldn’t have to wait long before the other army was forced to face them on two fronts.

  The passageway was fairly broad, as it served as a main thoroughfare to the armory and other important regions of the underground city. Machai called out commands in the guttural code they had been taught by Pendres, and his men tightened their organized ranks. They moved forward five wide. Machai was in the front row, centered between four other dwarves. Dredek’s men responded quickly to the surprise attack and formed up into rows with weapons held ready.

  Machai sent a wave of flames across the stone floor. The flames licked at the walls and washed toward the soldiers quickly. Someone with the same gift was able to
still the fire, and it burned out before reaching any of Dredek’s men, but it served as an excellent distraction as Machai and his men closed the distance down the tunnel to the soldiers. The two dwarves immediately beside Machai were tasked with maintaining shielding spells, providing the first layer of protection for the entire unit. As Machai and the dwarves on his far left and right in the first row hurled balls of fire and blasts of air toward the enemy forces, the row just behind them cast spells over Machai’s head. Deeper in their ranks, several men armed with bows shot arrows into the midst of the clustered men. Machai continued pressing forward, keeping the Aranthians on the offensive and limiting the chance that his men would be forced back into a corner. Soon, they were in striking distance of the soldiers.

  Machai did not hesitate to swing his axe, thereby initiating the close-quarters combat. Dredek’s men were larger, and they wore heavy and restrictive armor, so they stood only three wide in the stone tunnel. The Aranthians’ tight ranks served them well, providing them with a denser face and giving them the extra hands to establish and reinforce shields by spell. The armor also made it harder to find an opening in the fight, however, and it took Machai a moment to fell his first enemy. He kept his strokes conservative and controlled, seeking only to incapacitate the men rather than kill them. They were the Turgent’s men, after all, and Dredek was no Turgent of the Human Realm. Once the usurper was taken down, Machai did not want any more blood on his hands than was necessary. These men were loyal to Dredek only because they could not see that he was an imposter to the title. Once Dredek was gone, these soldiers would serve the new Turgent just as diligently as they now served the caldereth wizard.

  Machai’s axe slipped through the first man’s defenses, severing a tendon at the shoulder and leaving the man’s sword-wielding arm useless. The second man he easily knocked unconscious with the flat of the blade. The soldier’s helmet was still reverberating from the impact like a deeply toned bell when Machai had to block a stroke from a long sword. Unfortunately, the battle plan of the Turgent’s men was well organized and ruthless. Machai found himself up against highly skilled foes, and it was nearly impossible to navigate through the battle without inflicting fatal wounds. When he realized he could not fight them and protect them at the same time, Machai shifted his goal to killing them swiftly rather than leaving them to bleed out slowly on the stone floor of the corridor.

  Machai swung his axe with deadly efficiency while his wand was busy sending small but effective spells into the soldiers’ ranks. Dredek’s men seemed innumerable, but they were slow in their heavy armor. Machai’s men, on the other hand, were densely packed across the passageway and well shielded with magic. So, they were armored lightly and much more mobile. The Aranthians and dwarves moved together as a cohesive unit, blocking and casting spells for each other. They formed an unstoppable wedge in the corridor, pushing Dredek’s men back, though it took everything they had to keep the enemy from picking them off and destroying their advantage.

  Luckily, it wasn’t long into the battle before Machai and his men heard familiar battle cries echoing toward them down the tunnel. Dredek’s men were distracted by the addition of another threat from the other end of the corridor, and their lack of focus turned the fight further in Machai’s favor. The Turgent’s troops fell before the dwarven blades, and with each moment, the Aranthians moved closer to the entrance of the Well of Strands.

  Machai heard a low rumbling growl, like the distant echo of thunder through the mountains around FireFalls. The sound was terrifying even in its familiarity, for Machai knew the devastation that could come from a force capable of producing such sound, but he had no idea what would be the source under the deep tunnels of Angmar. Small pieces of stone rained down onto the floor in front of his feet, and Machai scrambled backward from instinct. He glanced up at the ceiling of the tunnel just as the rock split open and a large chunk of stone landed where he had just been standing. Troops from both sides of the battle scattered, the current fight forgotten for the moment as Aranthians and Dredek’s men retreated side by side from the new threat.

  A terrifying creature squeezed its bulk through the hole in the ceiling and dropped down to the stone floor. It was the size of a bull, but it squatted on short hind legs and braced its weight on long, thick arms more like a gorilla. The arms ended in huge claws, and the small head held eyes set wide above an elongated snout. Machai glared in surprise at the brown, wrinkled skin encasing rigid muscles and the row of sharp teeth snarling at him from only a few strides away. He had never seen a creature like it, but he had heard legends of beasts that burrow through stone with sharp claws. Some tales said the things were attracted to the sounds of battle, but the older stories—the stories whispered by ancient wizards when the fires were dying low and the ice was settling over the mountains—claimed they were drawn by vast outpourings of magic. Machai suspected the latter was the truth, and therefore he feared the beast that blocked the passage before him. If those legends were the true ones, then these creatures would be far more dangerous than the best soldiers that the Human Realm could pit against his dwarves. If this was a stone slayer of legend, then there were more of the ravenous creatures on the way to Angmar; legend said they traveled in packs.

  “Do not be using magic!” Machai called out to his troops, but it was too late. A fireball was hurtling through the air past Machai’s head as he yelled, and the beast leaned back on its hind legs and took the blast fully in the chest. Most creatures would have crumpled and blistered into a mass of charred flesh from such an onslaught of magical fire, but the stone-tunneling monster merely shook its snout rapidly and snarled. The fire dripped harmlessly to the stone floor, sloughing off of the creature’s hide and fading away without a trace of smoke.

  The beast raked its claws across the floor, leaving four long indentations on either side of its body in the otherwise smooth, well-worn stone of the passage. It snarled again and then hurled its mass toward the crowd of mingled troops.

  “No magic! Brawn and sharp blades, me brothers!” Machai hefted his axe and shouted as he shifted his weight. His blade caught the hind leg of the beast as it rushed past him, rending its flesh and spilling thick blood across the stone. The creature never twitched from the wound, as if it hadn’t even noticed the bite of the blade in its leg, but Machai was reassured to see that his weapon could inflict an injury in the stone-like skin of the beast.

  His optimism faded in the blink of an eye as he watched a dwarf and two human soldiers get ripped apart by the creature’s fierce claws as it encountered the bulk of the crowd. Soldiers screamed and scattered on the edge of the crowd, and Machai muttered insults about cowardice as he rushed toward the monster with his axe gripped firmly in both hands. Three Aranthians were holding the thing at bay with their swords, and Machai launched himself up onto its back while its focus was on the other men. He landed on its spine in a crouch, but the beast twisted its torso viciously in response to the threat. Machai nearly tumbled to the ground, but he swung his blade down and caught the monster’s neck with his axe. Keeping a firm grip on the handle, Machai was able to pull himself up onto its back as he pulled the weapon free. With another solid swing of the axe, Machai took its head off, and his men yelled out a mix of cheer and battle cry.

  As Machai slid off the heap of muscle and bone, he grimaced to see two more of the creatures drop out of the tunnel’s ceiling. He adjusted his grip on his axe and called out encouragement to his men.

  “Our blades be more vicious than be their bite. Be sinking in yer teeth, brothers.”

  His troops had gathered themselves into a tight unit, forming a solid wall of steel across the tunnel. The Aranthian archers took their places behind the dwarves, arrows nocked and ready to launch. Dredek’s men had separated themselves from the Aranthians, reforming further up the tunnel and eyeing both the rock monsters and Machai’s men with violent intent. Machai called out an articulate grunt, ordering a few men to watch the soldiers and prevent an ambush. It
seemed the cowards were content to let Machai and his men battle the sharp-clawed beasts, but Machai worried they would be fighting on two fronts if the soldiers decided to take advantage of the situation. He kept his attention on the monsters, counting on his men to give adequate warning from behind if necessary.

  “Fire!”

  The archers let loose the arrows, but the majority of the projectiles glanced off the thick, wrinkled hides like toys. A few found their mark, and the enraged creatures sprinted toward them with shafts bristling from their faces and torsos. Machai resisted the temptation to launch fireballs, knowing they would only absorb the magic and feed their rage. He fell into line with his comrades and readied himself for the battle.

  The creatures came on fast, claws slashing and teeth gnashing, tearing into the frontline. His men held out well, those in front defending themselves and each other with shields while the row behind stabbed and slashed with blades. It wasn’t a perfect fight, and several of his men took wounds that would require rapid, intricate healing to save their lives, but the beasts fell with agonizing roars.

  Just as the animals cried out in death, Machai heard the warning cries of his men indicating an attack from Dredek’s soldiers. The unit responded quickly, resuming the fight with the elite human troops. Wands were drawn, and Machai allowed the magic to rush to his fingertips. He launched three fireballs in quick succession, clearing the heads of the dwarves and slipping past the other Aranthians. Fire blasted the frontline of the soldiers, enveloping half a dozen men in flames.

  Machai ordered the charge, and he rushed headlong with his men into the fray. He swung his axe methodically, no longer concerned for the lives he had to take to reach his destination. While the troops were loyal to the Human Realm, which Machai still saw as an ally, Dredek had established the Aranthians as enemies, and his soldiers wouldn’t stop fighting to keep Machai from the Well of Strands. He cut through the troops swiftly, pushing toward the end of the tunnel and the promise of fulfilling his mission.