Rune Master (Dragon Speaker Series Book 3)

by Devin Hanson

  A nightjar whooped out its song from Andrew’s right and he turned his head to see a lantern bobbing through the forest, following some path behind the grain tower. A pair of men in cloaks became visible, one of them holding up the lantern. They were discussing something, intent on each other and interested only in getting back inside the outbuilding.

  The owl to Andrew’s left hooted again. A warden shifted behind a tree, drawing Andrew’s attention, longbow held at full draw with the yard of ash pointing toward the two men. Before Andrew could fully focus on the warden, the arrow was released.

  It was a fair shot, but as the arrow leapt from the bow, the man with the lantern turned to look toward where the owl had hooted from, ducking his head down and holding the lantern up higher. Instead of the arrow taking the man in the chest it slammed into his arm, pinning it to his side. At the same moment, a second arrow from another hidden warden released his arrow, killing the lantern-bearer’s companion instantly with a heart shot.

  The wounded man was knocked to his knees by the force of the impact and he shrieked in agony before a second arrow took him in the throat, silencing him. It was too late; the damage had been done.

  Moving as one, the two wardens nearest the outbuilding flung back the shutters and stepped up, shooting arrows into the interior.

  Andrew heard a voice cry out, the exact words lost in the rain, but the cadence was undeniably alchemy. Light bloomed from inside the outbuilding and one of the wardens was engulfed in a billow of flame.

  “Ban!” Jules cried, one hand outstretched. The second warden fired into the building, only to have his arrow shatter against a wall of invisible force. A blast of fire lashed against the shield at the same time and the warden jumped back unharmed.

  The surprise was lost.

  “Igda’lado,” Andrew cried, drawing vitae from the dragon scale in his pouch. The words of the dragon language gave structure to the visualization of the runes in Andrew’s mind and the vitae from the scale forced the transmutation into reality.

  The fitted rock foundation of the outbuilding exploded, individual rocks shattering with tremendous force, blasting mortar to fragments and ripping the wooden wall that rested upon it to pieces. Again, Andrew focused and cried out the Saying, blasting apart another section of wall.

  The explosion of shrapnel showered away from the outbuilding out into the grass. Some of the heavier fragments flew all the way to the woods, crashing through branches in a lethal rain. Inside the outbuilding, the shrapnel struck a solid shield, rebounding harmlessly away from the figures inside.

  Through the pouring rain and drifting clouds of pulverized rock, Andrew could make out the hulking figure of Bircham Lameda. At his side were several other people, two men and a woman. The warden’s surprise attack hadn’t been in vain. There were bodies on the ground, how many Andrew couldn’t tell from his position.

  It was a shame they hadn’t been able to kill Lameda before he woke, but the alchemists already eliminated from the fight would make things a lot easier.

  “Incantor!” Andrew shouted, his voice magnified with a quick Saying, “Your crimes against the people of Ardhal and against the dragons have only one punishment. This night you will join your victims in death.”

  Lameda leaned forward, peering out into the night. “That you, Condign?” he shouted back. “You might have scared off Trent with your tricks, but I’m no spoiled lordling who earned his rank through family and gold. I’m a master alchemist, you upstart little rat! Come out of hiding and face me and we’ll see who is the better alchemist!”

  “Don’t,” Jules cautioned, grabbing onto Andrew’s arm. “He isn’t lying.”

  “He’s terrified of you, though,” Andrew objected.

  “That was before. He came from a common background. If he had the vitae for it and enough friends, he could have been the guild master. I could have beaten him only because I had more vitae than he did.”

  “How do we kill him then? There’s no way I’m walking away from this. He dies tonight.”

  “I’m not saying we retreat. But to beat him, we’ll have to be good and smart. If he’s been consuming the vitae of his victims for weeks, you can’t hope to drain him. Like as not, he has more vitae at his command than we do combined.”

  “I’ll follow your lead, then,” Andrew said.

  “Better if he doesn’t know I’m here. If he thinks you to be the only alchemist he faces, he might make a mistake.”

  “Burn me. Okay.”

  Andrew stood and walked out from the trees. Distant thunder rumbled. “Here I am, Lameda,” he shouted.

  Bircham nodded to the two alchemists at his left and they jogged out of the building, moving across the open ground to flank Andrew. Rain drummed on shields held over their heads, and in a curve around their bodies. Both alchemists held shields in a partial arc in front of them. Even a shield just strong enough to repel rain was a terrific drain of vitae. Andrew thought back to what Eagen Ferny had said, how the Incantors had drunk all the dragongas. These two alchemists had to have fluxes supporting their alchemy.

  “Igan.” Andrew spat. It was the simplest runeword he knew, and the one he knew best. The Ig rune floated in his mind, perfectly remembered after countless hours of study on just the one rune. Fire boiled from his outstretched hand, enveloping the two alchemists in waves of dragon fire. The alchemists slammed to a halt, changing their partial shields to full spheres.

  The Igan runeword was no combat Saying, fine-tuned to delivery maximum punch for minimum expenditure. It was pure fire, plain and simple. The alchemists waited, concentrating on their shields. The fire billowed around them, scorching the grass and blackening the dirt beneath. One of the alchemists sneered at him, mocking him for the simplicity of his attack.

  But Andrew had chosen that runeword not for its potential, but for its very simplicity. Maintaining the fire took a bare trickle of vitae. If he only had a single vial of dragongas, he could maintain that flame for minutes on end. The alchemists, though, had to hold their shields against the flames or risk being consumed by them.

  Realization of their plight came slowly. Holding a shield is easy enough, but rarely were they held for more than a few seconds at a time, and usually only in as small an area as possible. A full surround shield, held at a strength to keep the heat at bay was tremendously draining. And they found themselves trapped within their own shields. The ground about them bubbled and spat as the heat of the Igan melted the sand to slag. They stood safe on islands of cool ground, but they could no longer retreat without suffering horrible burns to their feet.

  And still the flames licked hungrily at the shields, daring the alchemists to drop them to try and attack. The alchemists stared at Andrew in growing horror. Surely, he couldn’t maintain the flames forever, could he? Andrew gripped the scale in his pouch, feeling the razor-sharp ridges along the sides dig into his fingers through the leather. He might not be able to hold them forever, but he could hold the flames for a very long time. With the vitae in the scale, the fires surrounding the alchemists could burn for years before finally going out.

  One of the alchemists fumbled in his robes and drew out a dragon tooth that he held in trembling hands. He was shouting to Bircham for help, pleading with the Incantor to do something, anything, before his flux was drained of vitae.

  Lameda laughed harshly in reply and did nothing. To aid them, he would have to drop his own shield, and Andrew was waiting for him to do just that.

  The tooth in the alchemist’s hands collapsed into drifting dust and the shield failed. He screamed as the Igan flames rushed in. Even normal fire at those temperatures would burn through clothes, flesh and bone quickly, but this was dragon fire, the alchemical distillation of pure flame. The alchemist died before he had time to fall to his knees, his initial scream choked off after barely a second of being voiced.

  The surviving alchemist stared at his fallen companion. There was no question about receiving aid from Lameda. Desperate, the alchemi
st turned to Andrew. Andrew could see his mouth moving, but between the rain drumming down on him and the roar of the Igan flames, he couldn’t make out a word that was being said.

  In truth, he didn’t care to understand. The alchemist had forsaken his oaths and turned on the Guild. He had been complicit in the murder of over a hundred innocents and aided an Incantor in evading justice. Even if Andrew could hear him, there was nothing the alchemist could say that would make Andrew trust him. Death was the only possible outcome and the man’s crimes would be purged by fire.

  Knowledge of his defeat grew obvious on the alchemist’s face. With a final defiant scream, the alchemist dropped the shield, and as the Igan rushed in to consume him, he shouted out a Saying of his own, one last strike against Andrew before he succumbed to the flame.

  It was futile. To perform alchemy, you had to speak the syllables in the dragon tongue clearly and with intention to produce the effect. To the alchemist’s credit, he managed to form the Saying before his flesh blackened and cracked, but Andrew had expected it, had known it was coming, and was prepared.

  Even as the alchemist was gasping out the last syllable to the Saying, Andrew spoke but a single word. “Ban.”

  Lightning flashed out and danced against Andrew’s raised shield for a moment then the lingering flames of the Igan seared the alchemist’s flesh to the bone. As the alchemist died, the lightning faded away to nothing and Andrew released his shield.

  “Oh, very well done!” Lameda shouted, clapping his hands and laughing. “Don’t think that trick will work on me, though. I’ve vitae to outlast you and to spare.”

  The surviving alchemist was staring at Bircham in horror, her hands pressed against her mouth. The hiss of falling rain flashing to steam as the drops landed on the molten ground around the charred corpses of the two alchemists, and the Incantor’s chuckles were all that could be heard.

  “Why didn’t you help them?” the alchemist screamed at Bircham. “You could have done anything to save them, even just dropped this shield and he would have had to stop!”

  Lameda waved a hand, dismissing her objection. “Don’t be a fool, Tarsis. That’s the Speaker you’re talking about. For all we know, he can call two separate Sayings at once.”

  “You’re a monster,” Tarsis cried.

  The Incantor turned away from Tarsis and focused again on Andrew. “So, Speaker. It is your move.”

  “You say you have enough vitae to withstand my Igan indefinitely,” Andrew said, “I have a mind to test that theory, but neither of us have years to find out. You can’t stay hiding behind your shield forever. Are you too much of a coward to face me? Or is ban your only Saying?”

  Bircham’s brow furrowed and anger darkened his face. “I’ve killed better alchemists than you, Condign. I need not prove anything to you.”

  “Words,” Andrew held up a hand and made his fingers flap like a mouth. “Tell me, Tarsis, does he always bluster with no action to back it up?”

  Tarsis shook her head, her face fearful, eyes pleading for Andrew not to draw her into the fight. Bircham growled and started to pace the length of his shield. The burly man clenched his fists over and over as he paced, working himself up into a frenzy.

  Sudden fire bloomed to Andrew’s right and he spun, eyes tracking the billowing flame. A man screamed and clipped Maari calls sounded in the night. There were still alchemists out there! He couldn’t tell what was going on through the trees, but the wardens were shifting to confront whatever it was.

  The distraction nearly cost Andrew his life. Out of the corner of his eye, Andrew saw the dance of raindrops hitting the top of Bircham’s shield vanish. Reflexes drilled into him through hours of weapons practice had him moving before his mind fully registered the change. Andrew dove and a lance of fire ripped through the space where he had been standing a moment earlier.

  Andrew came to his feet and spoke a fragment of the Song he was holding in his mind. Vitae brought to life a white-hot spear of fire that stabbed toward Lameda. Fire bloomed on a shield hastily erected to protect the Incantor and Andrew sent a burst of flame toward the outbuilding. The Igan wasn’t intended to break through Lameda’s shield, but it did give Andrew time to catch his breath and climb to his feet. He shucked off the tangled cloak.

  A hail of ice shards erupted from a window of the outbuilding and Andrew threw up a shield to protect himself. Tarsis must have split off from Lameda and was now somewhere in the outbuilding using its walls as cover.

  Jules had told him what to do when fighting two alchemists at once: run.

  In a one-on-one fight, the other alchemist had to drop his shield to attack you, so the give and take of Sayings was more dependent on trickery and skill than volume of vitae. When fighting two alchemists at once, any time you dropped your shield to attack one alchemist, you left your flank open to the other. It was a losing proposition.

  Andrew didn’t have a choice, though. He couldn’t run. If Lameda got away, he would vanish without a trace and the whole hunt would have to start over again. The lives lost today would have been for nothing. Not to mention the likelihood of finding Bircham without another Incantor nearby was diminishingly small.

  With his shield up, Andrew’s Igan faded away, but the dragon fire had set the wooden sections of the outbuilding aflame. Through the licking tongues of fire, Andrew saw Lameda occupied with getting out of the burning building. That meant Tarsis was without backup for at least a few seconds.

  Quickly, Andrew focused on the rock foundation of the outbuilding and cried out a new Saying. As the words left his mouth, he extended them through the Song, building on their meaning and setting a chain reaction in motion. Stone in the foundation exploded, shattering the wooden walls all over the outbuilding at random. Then Andrew saw the chimney and direction the Song toward it. Shrapnel shrieked through the air as thousands of pounds of rock pulverized with explosive force.

  The outbuilding sagged to one side. Part of it was on fire, other sections were collapsed, the roof supports gone or compromised. The loss of the chimney brought that side of the roof crashing down, clay shingles cascading into the ruined building.

  As the walls came down, Tarsis came into view. The alchemist was crouched into a ball, a tight shield surrounding her. Lameda was nowhere to be seen, lost behind clouds of debris or in some section of the outbuilding that had yet to be destroyed.

  Andrew couldn’t let Lameda escape. He dashed into the ruin of the outbuilding, intent on finding the Incantor. If he let Tarsis distract him, the Incantor could sneak out the back. Wardens were waiting for him there, but they would be no match against him. As he ran, Andrew directed gouts of flame at Tarsis, keeping her shield up until he got inside and got a wall between himself and the alchemist.

  From the inside, the outbuilding was a lot larger than it looked. The destruction of the foundation had ruined the outer wall, but the high, vaulted ceiling still had plenty of standing supports left. Fire burned out of control in only a small section of the building, though it was spreading with hungry rapidity. Every instinct Andrew had was screaming at him to just run away. Charging through a burning building with murderous alchemists hunting him was a terrible idea.

  As if to punctuate his thoughts, a spike of ice ripped through the wall next to him. Andrew flinched so hard he fell over, and threw up a shield as another pair of spikes tore through the wood. One caught his shield and sent him tumbling.

  He didn’t have time for this! “Tiny gods, Tarsis. What do you owe Lameda?” he shouted as he picked himself to his feet. “We aren’t interested in you. Run now and maybe you’ll have a few years left to live before the Guild finds you.”

  “You call that an incentive?” Tarsis laughed bitterly. “Death now or death in a few years? At least with Trent, we have a chance of resisting the power of the Guild!”

  “You tell that to the two alchemists who died out there because Lameda wouldn’t lift a hand?”

  “Burn you, Condign!”

  Anothe
r spike of ice drove through the wall, tearing a swath of wood paneling with it. Through the hole, Andrew saw Tarsis stalking toward him, one hand raised, the other clutching a scale in white-knuckled fury.

  Andrew held onto the shield as ice hammered at him, spalling off as it impacted the shield and filling the room with glittery shrapnel. He scrambled back and flung himself behind the enormous stone wheels of the grain mill.

  The bulk of the stone gave him a moment’s respite and he flung fire back in Tarsis’ direction blindly. From his position, he could see the ruins of the fireplace, with its scattering of ironmongery: pokers, tongs, shovels and the like used to tend the fire.

  He heard Tarsis start a fresh Saying. Using her voice to pinpoint her location, he cried out, “Doco’lani!” The iron fire implements launched through the air toward where Tarsis was standing as if fired from a catapult and the alchemist’s Saying choked off with a wet thud.

  Cautiously, Andrew peeked over the lip of the mill and saw Tarsis standing, her eyes wide with shock. The front of her blouse was tented forward and her hands were exploring the displacement with fearful disbelief. Then she pitched forward and Andrew saw the shaft of a fire poker protruding from her back.

  The fire was spreading and Andrew kept a shield up, both to protect himself from the burning, unstable building and from Lameda springing a trap on him. Squinting through the smoke and dust, Andrew struggled to make sense out of the looming shapes. Movement caught his eye and he turned just in time for a heavy wooden beam on a pulley system to swing down and slam into his shield.

  Holding an alchemical shield didn’t magically eliminate inertia. The shield was anchored on him, the center of his chest, to be precise, and when the beam hit, all its forward momentum was transferred to Andrew.

  The wind was knocked from Andrew as he was flung headlong across the outbuilding. Pain lanced through his chest and he barely managed to hang onto the shield as he slammed through a wall and crashed into a section of stone foundation wall that was still intact. He struggled to his feet as Bircham climbed through the ragged circular hole in the wall left by his shield.