‘My beautiful horsemen, knights of the shadow, who can travel beyond the grave and between dimensions. Astral hunters, dream stealers. They can step into this chamber should I command them.’
The head of the first horse took solid form. Its furless skin gleamed metallic black like Dread Dragon scales. It shook its head, its mane of spikes clattering against each other. The horseman’s hand solidified into a black iron gauntlet and its eyes within its tripartite helmet swallowed the light. These were eyes that drained the life of the living. They wore no amulets—they needed no Shadow Stone for Baelthrom to know where they were. He could find them in the Under Flow, the medium through which they travelled.
‘My knights can pass into the realm of the dead, a place I could never go. A place where Keteth and now the Raven Queen evade me. But no longer. These knights are already dead, already cursed. You were commanded to bring me the other knights, Cirosa.’
‘I lost them in the Murk, my lord. A place I could not reach,’ she said stepping forwards, wringing her hands. ‘From there, they never returned.’
‘Karhlusus, also, never returned,’ said Baelthrom. ‘But the demon wizard was an imbecile. He was useful for a time, but his greed, arrogance and insanity were a danger. No being possessed by a demon ever thinks logically or acts reasonably. It is better that he is gone. The demon worlds can wait for our coming. They will be easy to dominate.’
Baelthrom wasn’t bothered about the Murk and its inhabitants. Demons held barely half the light energy of humans and so were less sustaining. The Dark Rift was not interested in those who were half as bright.
‘Let us hope that four knights will be all I need,’ Baelthrom said as he walked towards the horseman which had partially materialised out of the ring. The horse lifted its head and the knight’s black eyes stared at Baelthrom.
‘My Shadow Knights of Maphrax. Hunt down the last of the Ancients and bring them to me. Only you can ride the places between dimensions. You will find them by their living light that burns brighter than any being on Maioria.
‘Then hunt for the Raven Queen. You cannot trap her in Maioria, her magic will be too powerful even for you. You must wait until she enters the realm of the dead, where you will now be the stronger. She won’t expect you to have power there and that is your chance. Bring her to me unharmed. Now go.’
‘As you command, Lord Baelthrom.’ The shadow knight’s voice was a long grating whisper.
They turned their steeds away, dematerialising and dissipating into the grey fog.
‘The last of the Ancients will be given to the Dark Rift. A great gift and the snuffing out of their kind on Maioria forever.’ He turned from the ring and walked to the pedestal where two orbs glowed dully.
‘With their death, the orbs can never be made whole again for they were the ones to split the magic. What happens then to the Orb of Life is an intriguing mystery.’ He passed his hand over the multi-coloured orb. It glowed brighter. ‘This orb is keyed to the Ancient’s race. When they are gone, what happens to the energy of life? Kilkarn, bring to me the prisoners.’
‘Yes, my Lord,’ Kilkarn grinned.
The dark dwarf returned with two necromancers. Between them, they half-dragged a middle-aged man and woman, both scrawny and bent over in hunger and weakness. They wore rags for clothes and their unkempt hair had not been cut in a long time. Their arms and chests were covered in unhealed wounds where the necromancers had frequently syphoned their blood—living blood was essential to a necromancer’s work and sustenance.
There were many prisoners in the dungeons of Maphrax, mostly for the production of Sirin Derenax, but Baelthrom rarely saw them. They were managed and processed by his necromancers.
The necromancers held the humans before the iron ring where they shivered and hunched listlessly, not even attempting to fight their captors. Their pale skin was almost grey and their sunken eyes had long given up on life. They were already dead. Perhaps they were not such a great gift to the Dark Rift. Their pitiful state made him angry. Those who did not fight were worthless. He hated the way they cowered before him. Merely food for the immortals.
Raising his arms, the Under Flow surged, surrounding him in a glittering sea of dark. He directed the magic into the iron ring. It exploded into it then burst up through the hole in the ceiling. He felt it gushing into the sky and towards the Dark Rift, from where it came. A vortex of black opened in the iron ring. Howling wind filled the chamber, billowing his cape and Cirosa’s hair. Waves of power returned to him and he breathed in the essence of the Dark Rift; the ecstasy of it, the immensity of it, the purity of it. He closed his eyes and let it become him.
Deep, long groans of pain or ecstasy came from the iron ring. They wound around the chamber, growing in crescendo then dropping; a soul-wrenching noise that carried upon the Under Flow. He felt the shadows come then, the eaters of the living light moving towards him in the vortex. When the prisoners whimpered, he opened his eyes.
Shadow beings emerged from the vortex and flowed rather than stepped into the room. They were tall, twice the height of Baelthrom, but thin, insubstantial and flowing. They had no proper form as yet, but one day they would. Every time they fed on the living they grew stronger and their presence on Maioria increased.
Four shadows descended upon the woman, smothering her. She closed her eyes and clawed the air. Baelthrom wondered if she could even see them. The man at her side stood stricken, his eyes wide with horror. The woman lifted her head, the veins on her neck and face bulging. Her chest heaved and she seemed to be trying to scream but no sound came out.
She blinked incessantly, her eyes becoming all black and then normal again. Her aura began to glow brightly; they were lifting her life force from her body. Her fear spread through the chamber, thick and cloying. The shadows fed upon that too, bending their insubstantial heads and feeding like animals upon it.
There came a ripping sound like fabric being torn. The woman howled as her soul was rent from her. Swiftly, her body sagged, turned black and became shadow. This, too, the Dark Rift beings consumed whilst still gripping her shimmering soul in their arms. The shadow beings stood and turned to Baelthrom.
The Under Flow pulsed strongly then surged into Baelthrom. Everything turned to energy around him; swirls of dark power were his to command, more than he had been able to hold before. There was nothing greater than this feeling of power, there was nothing he existed for more than to feel it. This was their return gift.
The shadow beings flowed back into the vortex, taking their captured soul with them. Four more beings flowed out to surround the shaking man. The fear of the second victim was always more potent, attracting more things to come out of the vortex and numerous smaller shadows followed.
The man didn’t even manage to scream before the Light Eaters ripped his soul from his body, but he did lose control of his bladder, much to Baelthrom’s disgust. Even this the shadows consumed. All the bodily parts and fluids of the living were a source of food for the beings in the Dark Rift. Nothing went to waste.
Shadow beings clustered in the ring, standing tall. They bowed silently to Baelthrom, then flowed away into the vortex. Baelthrom took in a great breath and let it go as the Under Flow receded. Soon we will be together.
‘That is our exchange,’ said Baelthrom.
The priestess’s eyes were wide and keen with hunger. In the exchange of energy, she too had been given a little more power from the Under Flow. It was akin to sipping the Elixir of Immortality only purer.
‘It is divine,’ she breathed, looking up at him in adoration and fear, the perfect combination.
Hameka, his second in command, had already witnessed everything she had seen today. Now he wanted his priestess to feel the power of the Dark Rift, to taste the purity of the Under Flow, to keep her keen and hungry and under control. There was no escaping this power.
‘In return for the power of the Under Flow, they receive sustenance from me and soon they will have form here.’
Baelthrom walked to a corner of the chamber and picked up the wizard’s staff he kept there. ‘It is amazing how the universe unfolds to my needs. When I found the wizard with the orb I desire most, he left behind this staff. Now it belongs to me linking us together, for a staff is tightly bound to its wizard.
‘Leave me, both of you. Priestess Cirosa, go with Vornus and prepare our northern forces to attack. Hameka has secured Wenderon and attacks the Uncharted Lands as we speak. They will soon fall. We must be relentless now. The glorious end is near.’
‘As you command, my Lord Baelthrom,’ Cirosa bowed and backed away. Kilkarn followed her.
Baelthrom held the staff towards the iron ring and pooled the Under Flow around him. While the power was still rich within him and the connection to the Dark Rift strong, he cast his mind to the one locked in his memory. Through the Dark Rift and beyond he would find her.
‘Lona,’ he said, slow and low and loud.
The name echoed around the chamber vibrating the Under Flow and rippling across the surface of the vortex. The staff pulled and twitched as if seeking to find and return to its master. The vortex twisted and turned, searching. Baelthrom held his breath as an alien female face formed, made huge by the size of the iron ring.
How he remembered that face! Through all the fog of the past millennia, it came to him clear and sharp across the eons. Her eyes appeared first, shining black onyxes over which impossibly long eyelashes fluttered. The Under Flow came in stronger waves out of the iron ring and more of her was revealed. Smooth alabaster skin shone with ethereal light. Her nose was thin and tiny, and lips small and red. High cheekbones pushed up her large, slanted eyes. The collar of her strange clothing rose to spikes around her bald head, like a crown that starkly accentuated her beauty.
Baelthrom stared at her, enthralled. Only the Raven Queen had captured his attention as much. She’d appeared when he’d first made direct contact with the Dark Rift—something he had been striving for, for decades.
‘Lona,’ his voice was a whisper and he stepped closer, the staff pulling strongly as if sensing something there. Could it really be her? Had he really reached her across the boundaries that separated Maioria and the Dark Rift?
Powerful, disturbing feelings ignited within him, emotions he had not felt before: hurt, desire, obsession. He dropped his gaze. Those eyes. Those lips…he remembered naked flesh, softness, awe and wonder.
Then terrible pain, darkness, cold…rage. Why didn’t he remember everything? Did she know? There was something wrong with this alien being before him, something in his memory he should remember but could not quite reach. This being was dangerous—but why? He clenched his fists. Such ignorance undermined his power. He forced the foreign feelings away and retained a commanding hold on the Under Flow.
‘My Baelthrom,’ the woman said in a voice that was deep, almost melodic. That voice! He remembered that voice! ‘I have watched you from afar and endlessly tried to reach you before…Never mind, our time is short. I can see you still understand our language but remember little of who and what you were. It is no matter, for look at how magnificent you are. Your body is stronger than ever it was, powerful, dominating. My race will respect you very much. Do you remember us, the Yurgharon? We are not as physically magnificent but we are incredible architectures of entire worlds. Our intellect has yet to be surpassed. We will make a formidable alliance.’
Baelthrom said nothing. He searched the being for some sign, some clue, as to what it was he should remember. Vague, fractured memories filled his mind of a life lived so long ago, he could barely reach it.
Golden and silver-skinned beings screamed and fled from something in the sky. They were tall and aquiline featured, like the Ancients. Immense, destructive energy shuddered through his body although it was only his mind remembering. A world breaking. Deep, earth-shaking booms, felt more than heard, and then a terrible shattering. Blue sand spraying everywhere… Blue sand. A world destroyed.
‘What is the blue sand I see in my mind. It is everywhere. An endless desert,’ Baelthrom said, hard and cold. He reminded himself that the past was of no consequence. Everything to be his lay ahead in the future.
Lona paused, the barest uncertainty passing across her face before it smoothed into a knowing, soothing smile. ‘The blue sand is from the cursed dark moon you see in your skies. It plagues you and distorts the energy of the Dark Rift. It must be destroyed. You cannot overcome the Raven Queen—Maioria cannot be yours to rule—without destroying that moon.’
‘How do you know these things? Have you been watching from afar? And what if I would have her rule beside me—one with power and dedication such as she? I will not be surrounded only by traitors,’ said Baelthrom, testing.
Lona’s face hardened, her black eyes gleamed. ‘I have the ability to see many things from afar. And then I found you…’ She paused and dropped that line of conversation, focusing on the other. ‘One such as she, one who is dedicated to and chosen by the goddess, cannot be turned to the power of the Dark Rift. It was the goddess who destroyed the blue planet you see in your mind. It was your beloved home, Ara—’
‘Aralansia,’ Baelthrom finished it for her. Many things he had suspected finally slotted into place in his mind.
‘Yes, you remember and that is good,’ Lona smiled indulgently. ‘Through her, the one you call the Raven Queen, the goddess will destroy the Dark Rift and everything within it, including me. It cannot be allowed to happen. That is why I reach for you now, and why you reach for me.’
Baelthrom’s eyes blazed from blue to green and then red as he sifted through a hundred thousand things at once, paradigms explored and outcomes decided. He cast them all away. This Lona possessed power that he desired. She, like them all, was not to be trusted, not until he could remember her fully. He would play along, for now.
Baelthrom spoke simply. ‘I say she can be turned when she sees what I offer, or the alternative; the destruction of Maioria. Perhaps you are jealous of the power this woman holds? Afraid, maybe.’
Lona pursed her tiny lips. ‘The risk is too great. There is something you must know. Through the orb of the wizard whose staff you hold, I first found you. That wizard has come to us from your time to try and stop what you will become. Within his orb of power, I have seen many things and our future, both yours and mine, is dire. If this Raven Queen lives, the Dark Rift will be utterly destroyed and all those within it. This cannot happen, which is why I come to you now, across time and dimensions, to ensure our very survival. I will stop this wizard and you will destroy the Raven Queen so that the Dark Rift can continue.’
Baelthrom considered her dedication and decided it was true. Her words of doom did not stir him. Nothing could halt what he had set in motion, not even the Raven Queen. It was only a matter of catching her and channelling her powerful magic to his means. Maioria and her people were too weak to resist his might.
Lona drew closer. A shimmering boot stepped out of the vortex and clapped onto the hard floor of his chamber. With another step, she fully materialised before him. Those eyes, those lips…utterly unchanged. He forced the disturbing feelings back, letting them anger him rather than entice. She paused a few feet away and looked up at him from beneath her long eyelashes. He was half again as tall as she, and could crush her with his fist but she was fearless and that unsettled him deeply.
‘You turned your back on your goddess when she destroyed your planet,’ Lona said.
She began to pace slowly around him, her black robes shimmering and clinging to her lithe body. He wondered what the material was, considered taking it and getting the necromancers to design one for himself. Other feelings and desires were also aroused; desires he had only used for domination and destruction of other beings. He could destroy her now and forget about her.
‘Your goddess obliterated you and your people because you dared to be greater than the gods.’ She almost shouted the last, her face becoming hard and her voice venomous. ‘When you t
ried to fight her, your people turned against you. That is why you persecuted them across the dimensions.’
Baelthrom laid his wings flatter against his back. Distrust; that is what he felt. He should remember these things, they were important. Lona was concealing things from him.
‘What occurred in the past has no meaning for me now,’ he said, swishing his tail and forcing her to take a wider path as she circled around him. ‘Old planets and their gods mean nothing to me. Only Maioria.’
‘You set your sights too low,’ Lona crooned. She paused to raise a hand, and the Under Flow moved. A universe of stars appeared in the iron ring instead of the vortex. No other being had been able, or ever dared, to affect the contents of his iron ring. He glowered at her dangerously, hand lifting the blade at his hip.
Her lips curved into a slight smile as if she enjoyed the danger. She lifted a hand and indicated to the universe. ‘Every one of these stars and planets can be yours, can be ours. The Dark Rift has no bounds, like the great One Source has no bounds. This is the only place which exists for us alone without the rules of the One Source. Now, we get to be the gods of this place.’
Baelthrom’s eyes glowed darkly. Did she want to rule beside him? He would not share his rule once in the rift. ‘You come to me now to help you stop your own destruction? You hold something back and that is very dangerous. Who are your enemies?’
‘It is complicated,’ Lona snapped and whirled away. ‘Either our future lies in the Dark Rift, or it does not exist at all.’ Her face twisted into a scowl of pure hatred. ‘Yes, we have enemies! The Anukon and the Rorsken. You knew this once. We must destroy them before they destroy us. If they are not stopped, they will become the rulers of the magnificent Dark Rift.
‘We have many problems but all can be overcome if we act now. I come here now to help you stop the destruction of the Dark Rift at the hands of the Raven Queen. That is why we cannot afford not to help each other. Either we are rulers or we are nothing at all. I will not be a slave for my enemies’ enjoyment.’
Dragons of the Dawn Bringer: The Goddess Prophecies Fantasy Series Book 5 Page 34