Now that they were finally ready, they set off for the front gates of the school. The walls that surrounded the Mage School grounds were a monstrous 50 feet tall, black, and made of solid magically-reinforced rock. As they neared the gate, familiar voices called down to them.
“Hey!”
“Hoy! Halt!”
“Blast it,” Lenny grumbled. “I was hopin’ we’d slip by unseen.”
There was a loud sound of jangling armor and heavy feet on the stairs and three large forms loomed before them. The biggest one of them, just over seven feet tall walked right up to Fist. The hilt of a huge greatsword rose over one shoulder.
“Were you gonna leave without saying bye, papa?” she asked in a low alto voice.
“I already said goodbye to you earlier, Sweet One,” Fist said. “I didn’t think you would want me to do it again and embarrass you in front of the other students.”
“Bah, they’re too scared of me to poke fun,” she said and stepped up to give the ogre a huge hug. The pats they gave each other’s backs were loud in the night air.
“Hello, Golden,” said Edge. He stuck out his arms. “What about me? I haven’t seen you in months and I’m already having to leave.”
Golden stepped back from her father and allowed Fist to plant a wet kiss on her cheek before she approached Edge. “Missed you, Uncle Edge.”
Golden was one of only two ogre/gnome halfbreeds in existence, the other one being her younger brother. At 16 years old, her frame was somewhere halfway between her father’s monstrous musculature and her mother’s slender form. She had been given her name because of her lustrous golden locks. She had her father’s kind eyes, but the pointed nose and floppy ears of her mother’s gnomish heritage.
She had to bend a bit to embrace Sir Edge and he gave her a tight squeeze despite the bulky breastplate she wore. Golden was probably the closest thing Edge had to a child of his own and he doted on her whenever he could. He had been very proud of her when she had passed Training School at age fifteen. She was now well into her second year in the Academy and the only other students excelling as much as her were the other two guards with her.
“Ooh! Me too!” said Rufus and when he rushed up to hug her, she was engulfed in his huge arms.
“Well, you ain’t getting a hug from me,” grumbled Jacques Firegobbler, better known by his friends as Jack. Lenny’s oldest son, now seventeen, had the height of his half-orc mother and the width of his dwarven father. Even though at six-foot-six he was a foot shorter than Golden, he was a good half foot wider, making him a truly formidable figure. The slight greenish tone of his skin was barely noticeable in the torchlight
“Nobody was askin’ fer one, you corn-farmin’ layabout!” Lenny growled.
“If I hadn’t said something, you would’ve run over and grabbed me in front of everybody, you knee-high, forge-blackened, gap-toothed, blowhard!” Jack growled back.
Lenny laughed. “Keep practicin’ and you’ll curse like a Firegobbler yet.”
“We wanna come with you,” said the third member of the group. Sukie Woodblade was nearly as tall as Jack and with her own mixed heritage was just as wide at the shoulders. She was more soft spoken than the others and preferred a bow to the up-close fighting style of her friends, but she was every bit as talented.
The three of them were known among Academy circles as the Halfbreeds. What had started out as a derogatory term had evolved into a respected moniker as they out fought and out endured the rest. The three students were skilled beyond their years and it was expected that they would graduate early.
“No,” Edge said. “If you left, you’d be breaking the terms of your contract. They don’t let deserters back in. You are sticking with the Academy until you graduate.”
“That’s fer damn sure,” said Lenny.
“But this is about Aunt Jhonate,” Jack argued. “She’s the best dag-gum trainer in the school. She’s the only one who knows how to get the best out of us. We could help you.”
“The answer’s no and her name ain’t just Jhonate anymore,” Lenny reminded them.
“Oh, right,” said Jack, looking afraid as if she might have heard him. “What is her name now?”
“Sar Zahara,” said Deathclaw.
“Zahara,” said Jack with an awed smile.
“Ohh, melty!” said Golden in approval.
“Way melty,” said Sukie. “When I get named one day, I hope my name is as melty as that.”
Fist grimaced at the slang of this new generation. “Don’t you think you three could come up with better descriptive terms than that?”
“C’mon, Uncle Fist,” said Jack with a roll of his eyes. “You don’t need to get so dag-gum pickled over it.”
The ogre groaned.
“Papa?” said Golden hesitantly. “You don’t know anything more about when Mama and Grandma Sarine are coming back, do you?”
“I’m sorry, Sweet One,” said Fist. “The last message I received was two weeks ago, same as you.”
Fist’s wife, Maryanne was bonded to Edge’s great grandmother. Mistress Sarine was well over 200 years old. As the Mage School’s historian, she was currently on a mission to Alberri to study at the libraries in the Gnome Homeland. Maryanne had gone with her hoping to train with the gnome warriors and had taken their son along for the journey. They were set to return in a few months’ time.
Fist placed a hand on her shoulder. “Don’t worry. I’m sure we’ll hear something soon. She might even be back before me.”
“See!” said Lenny loudly. “This blasted slobberin’ cry fest is the reason I wanted to sneak on by! Are you three warriors or whanny babies?”
“Warriors!” the three students announced.
“Then get back to yer dag-blasted guard duties and let us by!”
“Yes, Sir!” said Sukie and the others repeated her. They turned to leave.
“Bye, Sweet One,” said Fist with a wave.
“Bye Papa,” Golden replied and the three of them ran back up the stairs.
Their heavy steps echoed through the darkness and as the party walked through the gate and began their journey, Lenny shook his head and grinned. “Dag-gum kids.”
Chapter Twelve
Sar Zahara – Pilgrimage
Jhonate sat still next to the fire. Her legs were crossed and her eyes closed, her mind in a meditative state. The backs of her hands rested on her knees and her Jharro staff lay across her palms. In her mind’s eye, she floated in soft white emptiness, focused on her senses of hearing, smell, and touch.
Though it was late at night, she was still dressed for battle. The runes on her hardened leather breastplate reflected the firelight and her hair was braided and pulled up in the traditional style of the Roo-Tan people. Two braids hung down at either side of her face, interwoven with green braids that matched the color of her eyes.
It was difficult to differentiate the sounds of the night so close to the rushing sounds of the Wide River. She almost didn’t hear the approaching creep of the attacker. If she hadn’t already known it would come, she might have mistimed her attack.
When the moment was right, the smooth tip of her staff narrowed to a spear-like point. In one smooth motion, Jhonate twisted and thrust the point into the eye of the gorc that was standing next to her, its dagger raised. She rose to her feet, her eyes opening and taking in the rest of the attackers. They were all goblinoids, that beastly triumvirate of goblins, gorcs, and orcs.
“Nod! Now!” she cried and pulled her staff out of the eye of the convulsing gorc as she rolled to avoid the slash of an axe that was aimed at her back. A crossbow twanged in the night and an iron bolt pierced the head of the orc whose ax she had dodged. Its eyes lost focus and looked in opposite directions as it let out a wheezing sigh as it fell over.
Once more, Nod had proved himself not to be entirely worthless. They had stuffed his bedroll with sticks and leaves to look like it was occupied, and the man had hidden in the bushes to await the attack. Despit
e his crippling deformity, the man had a surprising range of skills. It was too bad his personality wasn’t more pleasant to be around.
Three more beefy orcs charged into the firelight and stabbed their spears into Nod’s empty bedroll. Two more gorcs and three goblins encircled the camp, waiting for their own opportunity to attack. It was a minor raiding party. Their armor was of a bedraggled sort, cobbled together from the armor of people they had waylaid. Their weapons, chipped and rusty as they were, were still deadly enough.
Jhonate darted at the orcs and changed the tips of her staff, making them thick and dense. She spun as she approached and ended up behind one of them, a thick brute with a light green complexion and multiple facial piercings. She swung her staff into the back of his head with skull cracking force.
She didn’t stop, but continued her movement, spinning again. As she did so one tip of the staff changed again, becoming a blade. The second orc saw her blow fell the first one and was in the process of raising its spear in a motion that protected its throat and head.
Jhonate slashed the staff across his abdomen and the blade-like tip of her staff cut through the leather armor it was wearing. Fluids poured immediately from the wound and its belly bulged in an unpleasant way. She followed up that strike with the weighted end, bashing the side of his knee and causing it to buckle inward. The orc squealed in pain and surprise and nearly fell over, but it managed to use its spear like a staff to support its weight.
Jhonate dodged to avoid the thrust of the third orc’s spear. She knocked the spear aside with her staff and used that motion to follow through with another strike on the wounded second orc. It was clutching its belly and couldn’t defend its throat. The blade tip of her staff flashed in a gray blur and opened its jugular.
As it toppled to fall upon its unconscious companion, the remaining orc took a fearful step back and assumed a defensive stance. This orc had a darker skin color than the other two, but it was more brown than green. Its features were less bestial than the others as well.
Perhaps it wasn’t a full-blooded orc. One of its parents could have been a half-orc. This wasn’t too uncommon. Sometimes orcs kept half-orcs in their camps to use as bedslaves. Resulting offspring were raised for manual labor or as fodder in their armies.
She allowed herself a brief second to feel pity for the poor beast’s wretched existence before she attacked. The kindest thing she could do would be to kill it quickly. She came at the orc, swinging her staff in alternating strikes. The orc fended off the blows with expert parries, swinging its spear like it was a quarterstaff.
A grudging respect for the unfortunate creature’s skill grew in her mind. The orc must have been a veteran of many battles. She didn’t let this respect alter her intentions, though. Jhonate took a step back, then shifted her grip to the bottom half of the staff and caused the end to swell into a sphere and sprout spikes like a morning star.
Jhonate stepped forward again and swung the staff downwards in a two-handed overhead strike. The orc made the proper counter, raising its spear over its head with both hands to absorb the blow. In mid-swing, Jhonate commanded the wood in the center of her staff to go limp like a rope. The staff hit the upraised haft of the orc’s spear and bent. The hardened spiky ball swung into the top of its head.
The orc cried out and tried to back away, but the spikes had embedded themselves in its skull. Grimly, Jhonate caused the spikes to grow into the orc’s head, seeking out its brain. While the orc trembled and jittered, she glanced behind her and saw the incoming rush of a gorc with a curved sword.
Jhonate didn’t have the time to withdraw the wood from the orc. She let go of her staff with her right hand and grabbed the hilt of the jeweled white dagger sheathed at her waist. She drew the dagger just in time to parry the gorc’s clumsy thrust.
This gorc was of a similar height as Jhonate, though its build was slightly heavier. Its face was a pale yellow and its eyes were wide and panicked. Jhonate realized that it was quivering with fear even as it attacked. She noted this information as she stabbed out with her dagger, piercing its chest and heart.
The moment that the white metal of her blade entered its flesh, Jhonate’s mind caught a brief glimpse of a hungry mind. She grew certain that this gorc had been compelled by a mind other than its own. Then her blade flashed brightly with light and the connection ended. The gorc slid off of the dagger and fell with a dying gurgle.
She stared down at the dagger and watched as the gorc’s blood beaded and fell away as if repelled by the blade’s very nature. It was a cruelly shaped weapon, but there was a beautiful purity about the white metal. The rubies set in its hilt and pommel glittered even in the dimmest light. At the base of the blade, just above the hilt, was a square naming rune that shone in silver on the white blade.
The rune on the dagger matched the rune on the back of her right hand. The square was filled with tiny symbols, both elemental and spiritual. When looked at from a distance, the intricate symbols in the rune combined to form a swirled pinwheel-like pattern. Many of her travelling hours had been spent pondering the meaning of it. Why had the Bowl chosen the rune and the name that it had given her? Sar Zahara . . . She knew the name was correct, yet it still felt foreign in her mind.
When Jhonate had stood before the Bowl of Souls on the day she had received the seer’s letter, she had been filled with indecision. Was this truly the right thing to do? Like it had every time she had been in the Bowl’s presence, she could feel it calling out to her; beckoning. Yet, the Jharro staff that had filled her hands had resisted the idea. It was as if her tree was telling her no. She had pledged herself to the Grove.
Seer Rahan’s letter had been specific, though. She needed to be named and even though she had refused time after time in the past, Edge’s arguments that she should do it suddenly seemed more valid. After all, the Bowl of Souls and the Jharro Grove both served the Creator. And she already did the Bowl’s bidding every time she went out on missions with her husband.
Despite her self-assurances, her hands had tightened on her Jharro staff and she knew it wasn’t right to use it. Reluctantly, she had put the staff aside and withdrew the white dagger that the Prophet had left in her care. This was a holy artifact like the seer had specified, but was it right for her to use it as her naming weapon?
Jhonate stood before the Bowl as a warrior, yet she had never killed a creature with the dagger before. The only time she had wielded it before was when she had used it to sever the Moonrat Mother’s connection to this world. But as she had held the dagger before her, the Bowl had called out to her again, more insistent than ever and this time she had stepped forward.
As she did so, a chant had built within her mind. The words were foreign to her, yet without knowing it, her lips had moved along with the chant. Soon the words had poured from her lips. Jhonate had raised her dagger into the air and as the chant reached a crescendo, she had plunged it into the water, her new name bursting from her mouth in a shout.
“Well, that didn’t go so bad now did it?” said Nod in his odd lilting accent.
Jhonate started and shook her head, realizing that she had become entranced in the middle of battle. She whipped her head around and saw that there were no foes standing. Those that she hadn’t killed herself were sprawled on the ground, either pierced by a crossbow bolt or lying in a pool of blood from Nod’s short sword.
“You alright, Sar?” asked the pilgrim.
He picked up his small crossbow off of the ground and collapsed it. It was an ingenious device, designed to be folded up and worn on a warrior’s belt, but putting it away seemed a laborious task. It looked all the more complicated because of the man’s disfigurement.
His left forearm was permanently drawn up, the fingers of his gloved hand twisted into a rigid claw. He managed well despite the disfigurement and told her that it was because he’d had it for years. It was the result of a curse put on him by a dark wizard. Evidently, in addition to the state of his arm, the curse had r
endered him infertile.
His previous life as a minor Khalpan noble had been ruined. His house had taken away his birthright since he could never produce an heir and his wife had left him. Nod had become a pilgrim, traveling to holy sites and searching for a cure to his curse.
The man clipped the collapsed crossbow to his belt and drew his sword. It was a fine weapon and she could believe that it had belonged to a nobleman. The hilt was golden and smattered with tiny runes. It glowed blue and black to her mage sight, a sign that it was enhanced with earth and water magic. This was the second time they had been attacked on their journey and each time he had acquitted himself admirably.
Jhonate put the dagger away in its sheath. “There was something wrong about this attack.”
“Is that so, Sar?” Nod said, and he walked around to each body, stabbing it with his sword to make sure the goblinoid was dead.
“They came after us as if compelled to do so,” she explained. “When I killed this gorc with my naming weapon it felt like there was another presence in its mind forcing it to fight.” She looked around the campsite and shook her head. “Their order of attack was strange as well. Normally, orcs force their smaller brethren to attack first as fodder.” She pointed. “These three orcs ran in at our decoy and let the goblins prowl the perimeter.”
Nod crouched down next to the orcs and grunted, then plunged his sword through the neck of the first orc she had downed. Evidently it had only been knocked unconscious because blood gushed from the wound.
“I noticed the same ’fing,” he said. “Not that I saw any vision about it or nofin’.” He pulled something that looked like a crooked thorn from the orc’s neck and tossed it aside. He then sheathed his sword and began rummaging through the orc’s armor. “But one ’fing I’ve found in me years of pilgrimin’ is whenever you’re on the trail of a new holy site, ’fings tend to come at you.”
“What kinds of things?” she asked doubtfully.
He pulled a couple of rusty throwing knives out of the orc’s beltloops and tossed them aside, then opened a pouch and shook it to discover it was empty. “Oh, brigands, goblinoids, monsters. You name it, anyfing with a dark side gets drawn towards you when you’re on the path of goodness.”
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