The Dread King: Book One of The Larken Chronicles

by R. L. Poston

  “Evidently not,” said Larken, shaking his head. “But, hopefully, at least Melona believed it.”

  “Do you really think that I’m that naïve?” asked Melona, who was leaning on a nearby post.

  “How?” asked Larken, dumbfounded that both Gahen and Melona could come that close to them without their sensing it.

  “Easy,” said Melona. “Remember the Healer shield that we developed? It works as well here as anywhere.”

  “Well, drat,” said Gahen. “Now I have to worry about Taz sneaking around invisibly. I could have gone all night without learning that.”

  “Sorry,” laughed Melona.

  “OK,” said Larken grumpily. “Now that everyone knows that I wanted to talk to King Frederick, can you all excuse us?”

  “Nope,” said Gahen. “Not sleepy. I’m more curious about what you guys are going to talk about. Once you’ve admitted the futility of escape and surrender, what’s the follow-up?”

  “Yeah,” added Melona. “I’m curious about that myself. What’s the plan?”

  “Don’t have one,” said Larken.

  “Then, let’s go back to bed,” said Melona. “Or do you think that being groggy from lack of sleep tomorrow is going to improve our chances?”

  Larken did not reply. Sighing, he shook hands with King Frederick and let Melona pull him away.

  “There goes a good man,” said King Frederick.

  “You’re right,” said Gahen. “But I doubt that he will ever believe that.”

  Now, in the morning’s light, with the sounds of carnage and almost certain defeat, Larken was fulfilling Gahen’s doubt more fully than even Gahen would have expected. Larken stood at the threshold of possibly being totally responsible, at least in his own mind, for the devastation of an entire army and the resulting enslavement of three kingdoms of innocent people. In the brief half-seconds of silence in the clamor of battle around him, he seemed to hear distant laughter, as if the Dark One were laughing at his impotence, his unwitting servitude, and his futile attempts to avoid his ultimate failure.

  It was in this frame of mind that he found himself lying to the Healers, suggesting that escape was possible. As he did so, he seemed to hear the laughter again—dark laughter at the further corruption of his soul. Yet, the task in front of him would not wait. His training as a Warder forced him to go forward. There was only one hope now. It was the hope for an unprecedented use of the Source to snatch victory from defeat.

  However, the attempt also carried another possibility that Larken feared more than defeat itself—the possibility that his direct use of the Source to kill his enemies would finish the corruption of his Talent. It was a Warder’s task to defend, even if that defense meant striking out to harm another. Warders, however, were not aggressive. Their training was to use no more force than was necessary. Even in armed conflict, Warders sought to defend first, to disable or drive away second, and to kill as a last resort.

  Larken’s first experience with using his Talent to kill at the Sarkan Pass had so shocked and appalled him that he had not been able to use his Talent afterwards. Now, Larken was going to attempt to use a more powerful weapon to kill thousands of Talented souls. He understood that it was unavoidable. He also knew that this was unforgivable. Something inside him feared that this had been the plan of the Dread King all along—to force him to kill with naked Talent. A plan that had brought him further and further away from his desire for peace and closer and closer to a darker state. A dark state that would make killing and destruction a part of his being. If he succeeded, he would be permanently changed. Killing and destruction would become part of him. This would not be the silencing or killing of hundreds of souls that they had accomplished two days ago. This would be the killing of thousands, scores of thousands, of minds and souls. This would forever darken his soul. It possibly might even forever darken the Source.

  Yet, there was no alternative. They had to try, even if the attempt might bring darkness to his world. There was no other possible path. But, as he prepared to follow that path, he seemed to hear the dark laughter that signaled that there was now no escape from the fulfillment of dark plans that had been made long ago.

  “OK,” said Larken. “Let’s do this.”

  “How do we begin?” asked Algar.

  “Like this,” said Larken, driving his Blade down into the earth and kneeling to place both hands over its hilt. “Place your hands over mine and link your minds to me.”

  Algar first, then Melona, and then Gahen knelt and placed their hands over his. Each head bowed and every eye closed in concentration. One by one they joined the meld and surrendered control to Larken. When the meld was complete, Larken took control of the total breadth and depth of their varied Talents and stabbed downward with all their energies. Downward, not into the earth’s core, but, empowered by the range and magnitude of the Talents within the meld, downward as he had before, toward the Source. Almost immediately, they found it. It was alive and aware, and it welcomed them into joining it.

  However, this wasn’t just a meld with the Source. This was an immersion into its nature. Melona, Algar, and Gahen became almost totally lost in the vastness of the Source, but Larken remained separate. Separate because he was different. He was unique. His Talent partook of the Warding, Healing, and Elven Talents, but it wasn’t just a combination of these. It was something different. While these Talents were bright and shining and could be lost in the ocean of Talent and light that was the Source, his Talent shone with a darker light. His light was not evil, but it was darker. This difference gave him separateness from the Source. And he needed this difference, because it not only made him separate, it also kept him in control of his own mind and Talent.

  Larken was also separate because there was a part of him that he had not surrendered to the meld. It was that part of him which he kept tightly confined and protected by his vows of Bonding. Even now, he would not release it. Especially now, since he felt its renewed will to overcome him. Larken knew it could not be allowed to control him because it might then control the Source. But that might be unavoidable. If Larken used the Source to kill thousands, there would be little difference between what he would become and what he fought to restrain. Darkness might rule his mind, soul, body, and Talent. And, perhaps, the Source as well.

  Through the Source, Larken sensed another power. It balanced the Source. As the Source created and nourished, this other power burned and devoured. It then released its devoured energies back into the Source. It was like an all-consuming fire which fed the Source and empowered it. Larken sensed also that this fire hungered to devour whatever it could. If it were possible, it would have devoured him, but it could not. Larken was as separate from it as he was from the Source.

  Larken found that he could control the meld even as it included the Source’s power. Seizing that great power, and letting it flow through him, Larken used the Elven sight that Algar brought to the meld to locate the Dark Forces. They spread out before him as dark lights further than any mortal eye could see. Some were strong. Some were weak. Some were so weak that they believed that they held no Talent at all. Yet, now, Larken could sense the latent Talent in each living creature. Not only did humans and Elves share this gift, it was present in a multitude of forms in everything that had life, and it sought to bind all together into one purposeful whole.

  But there was a distinct difference between the Talent of those Bonded to the three kingdoms and those Bonded to the Dark One. The three kingdoms’ Talent shone with a bright light that illuminated and nurtured. The Dark Talent shone with a dark light that would corrupt and destroy. One Talent sought to Heal and protect; the other sought to conquer and enslave. One would give; the other would take.

  Larken found it easy now to strike the ones with dark Talent, and he did. He struck with a blinding, white-hot lance into thousands of Talented beings at once. He scythed through all the minds and souls and defenses that he could sense. His attack was too quick for any cries or rea
ctions. Those struck did not clasp their hands to their heads in agony. They did not cry out. They did not grimace in pain. They simply died and collapsed.

  Although Larken was not aware of it, a total silence fell upon the battlefield. Before, thousands of troops had been assaulting the walls, and hundreds of soldiers had won through the Alliance defenses to fight hand-to-hand with the defenders. Now, everyone that remained alive paused and watched as thousands simply fell. Great waves of falling bodies rippled up and down the valley, across the hills, and beyond. The defenders stood slowly and watched in silence as an army of thousands simply fell dead in silence.

  In the meld, Larken’s killing spree accelerated. His Talent reached further and further and killed more and more. In his mind, within the darkness, he felt elation growing. At last, as Larken killed the last remaining enemy troops, it grew to a maniacal, uncontrolled glee. For it knew that it had won. Larken was now controlled by his killing rage, and his soul was almost completely without light, matching the darkness that had long sought to corrupt him. No longer was he interested in aiding the unfortunate, protecting the weak, or finding the truth. His rage was driving him to kill his enemies, and as he ran out of enemies, he found that his rage did not dissipate. Instead, it turned to his Bonds. The Bonds to the he had created to his vows of dedication no longer protected him. They no longer felt like a source of strength and purpose. They felt like shackles that prevented him from seizing what was rightfully his. He was the strong one. He was the one who should rule. He was the one who had conquered the Source, the Dark Forces, and his own pitifully weak nature. He did not belong to the three kingdoms; they belonged to him.

  With an inward shrug of power, he released the Bonds upon his inner self and became free. The dark sphere within expanded and filled him with power beyond even that of the Source. It freed him from his self-imposed limits. It sought to move him from his humanness to something beyond. Larken was ready for that leap. After a lifetime of feeling that he did not belong, that he was somehow flawed because he was different, the promise of power, the promise of freedom from doubt, was an exhilarating one. As he gathered himself to make the leap to a state of being that promised him dominion over the world, one small sound caused him to pause.

  “Larken?” came a hesitant voice. It wasn’t really a voice, since it came from within the meld. It was more of a whisper from the portion of the meld that was Melona. However, as part of the meld, it carried with it all the shared memories of the meld, all the emotions of the meld, and, most importantly, all the commitments that the meld members had made to each other. It was as if, in one moment, Larken had all of his memories with Melona run through his soul. At that moment, Larken was brought back from the brink of committing his soul to ultimate power to sanity. He shuddered as he saw the horror of what he had almost become.

  Now, in the sudden clarity of the combined memories of the meld, he saw himself again with clear perspective. He saw the young apprentice, not only from his point of view, but also from the point of view of one who had long loved him. He saw himself through the eyes of the Warder that he had first angered, then amused. He saw himself through the eyes of the Elf that beheld him as a young human, a great threat, and a possible savior. Now he could almost laugh at his folly of imagining that he could rule the world. Now the trap was crystal clear. If he had sought after the dark power, he would have made himself a minion of the Dread King. That had been the plan all along.

  The Dread King was powerful, but his power was limited only to that Talent that he could draw from the Source. The Source would only allow him the Talent that flowed through his channel to the Source. And, being of a dark nature that was incompatible with the Source, the Dread King had found that he could not contact the Source directly; he could only feed from the channel that he was permitted.

  The Dread King had long ago grown from a man of mixed emotions and drives into a dark being that sought all power, control, and Talent for himself. The Dread King was a bottomless pit of hunger. There was not enough power to satisfy its hunger. There was not enough heat in the world to warm its soul. There was not enough light in the world to lighten its darkness. The Dark One was a black pit of hunger, hate, and envy. The Source would not abide its presence, but the Source had allowed Larken to meld with it. If Larken became committed to the darkness while in contact with the Source, the Dread King would have an unlimited passage to the Source through Larken. This had been the trap laid down in intricate plans dating from before Larken’s conception and his mother’s planned escape. The Dread King had been subtly guiding both history and Larken to this inevitable end.

  Now in one lucid moment, Larken understood it all. He also understood that the moment would not last. He felt the seduction and pull of the darkness redouble within his own nature. He felt the temptation of the unlimited potential of the Source combined with the promised freedom from human emotions and inhibitions. As he began to slide down into the pit of seduction again, he knew that, this time, he would not be brought back to sanity.

  Straining against the darkness, Larken gathered all his power, all the remaining dedication created in his Bonding, and all his love for all of those who had touched his life and hurled it though the dark center within him. Driving all the power and Talent he had within him, he lanced through the dark center to the one that lay deep within the darkness. Far away, in a place unknown to him, his lance of power and light skewered a being that defiled him with promised freedom and power. The lance burned through the darkness and exploded the darkness into a million pieces. Larken felt the explosion of power. He felt the collapse of the connection within him. He felt, rather than heard, the screams of agony from the Dread King.

  The Talent-fed screams from the Dark One filled the world, but then were cut off abruptly. The screams from within the meld continued longer, as the meld felt both the white-hot lance burning through their minds and the resulting explosion of the dark power. Larken felt the screams just long enough to despair at the damage that he was causing. Then the darkness of unconsciousness took him, and it was over.

  Chapter 24: Homecoming

  Larken woke to the creaking and gentle swaying of the wagon in which he lay. As he opened his eyes, he found himself gazing into the concerned and watchful eyes of Melona.

  “Where?” he asked, finding his throat dry and scratchy.

  “On the way home,” answered Melona. “Here, drink this.”

  Melona raised his head and placed a flask at his lips. Larken first sipped and then drank thirstily of the fruit drink that she offered him. Lowering his head back to his pillow, Melona smiled.

  “Don’t talk yet,” she said. “You’re OK, but it may take a few more hours for you to gain all your strength back.” Seeing him about to question that fact, she placed a gentle finger on his lips and said, “Just wait, I’ll explain.”

  Seeing that he would obey, she shifted to a more comfortable position. “The Dark Forces were totally destroyed. The few that were left alive, were either unconscious or so dazed that could hardly stand. We’re on our way back to Shropanshire. You’ve been unconscious for two whole days, but you’re OK. I know, because I’ve Healed you. My Talent has increased way beyond what it was before the meld. Melding with the Source increased Gahen’s Talent as well. I can Heal things now that I couldn’t before. Gahen is now stronger than Jaris ever was, and, if I’m right about you, you now have more Talent than anyone else in history.”

  “What of Algar?” Larken asked.

  Melona lowered her eyes to the floor of the wagon. “He didn’t survive,” she said. “He died when the power exploded in the meld. I’m sorry.”

  “A good friend,” said Larken. “You’re pregnant.”

  Melona’s shocked look surprised him.

  “You didn’t know?” asked Larken.

  “Yes, I knew, but how do you know?”

  “You’re right about my Talent. It’s stronger than before. Remember the Elven sight, the ability to sense life, a
nd”—he paused, squinting at her—“it’s twins.”

  “A girl and a boy,” Melona said. Then she laughed. “I can tell there aren’t going to be any secrets with you.”

  “No,” said Larken sadly. “No secrets.”

  “Larken,” asked Melona anxiously, “what’s wrong?”

  “I’m not really sure,” said Larken. “Everything used to be so simple. My world was only the smithy, Ox Run, and you. It was simple, but it was good. Now, everything seems complex and somehow darker. Maybe it’s just me. I feel darker inside.”

  “Larken, it’s just your imagination. The Dread King is dead. We’re sure of that. We all felt him die. The Dark Forces are gone. The war is over, and we’re on our way back home.”

  “OK,” said Larken. “Maybe you’re right.” And, as he lay back down, Larken knew better. The darkness wasn’t completely gone. Some of it had spread through his soul and was still within him. He had destroyed the center of the darkness, but some of it had stayed with him. He no longer was a simple apprentice. He now knew about evil and the necessity of sacrificing good to obtain the greater good. He no longer believed in the pure goodness of life. His life and his thoughts were tinged with darkness—not completely dark, but tinged.

  Melona and Larken rode along in silence for a while. It took only a few hours until Larken was back to full strength. True to Melona’s predication, Larken found that he had Talent at unprecedented levels. He could now even move small objects with a simple exertion of will.

  He met that evening with several of the leaders who had served with him. Estron was present, but Thaddeus and Soran had remained in Strollie to oversee the care of the wounded and the rebuilding of the defenses.

  Larken had learned that the war was truly over and that the Alliance was being disbanded. He had just learned of the full extent of their losses when they heard shouting and the thunder of galloping horses. A large party of Warders raced up on their mounts. They jumped off their mounts and ran into the camp. Larken didn’t recognize any of them, but Gahen quickly corralled them to one side of the camp. Larken couldn’t tell what was going on, and he had promised himself not to use Talent to pry into private conversations, so he and Melona waited, exchanging puzzled glances.