Son of the Keeper: Book 1: Principles of Magic

by R. S. Merritt

  “There’s thousands of them down there.” Omasa muttered. Then his lips moved silently as he counted the masses beneath them and tried to make sense of what he was seeing. “They’re getting ready to invade us. This here is an army your majesty.”

  “We need to get back and get reinforcements your majesty. We need to get out of here before they see us or someone notices the magic we’re using. There’s got to be a ton of magic users down there on top of more Corvellans than I thought existed.” Penny said. She was just as awestruck at the sight below them as the rest of them were. Wessel just shrugged and ran his finger over his hatchet.

  “Ok.” Chris was working to gather his thoughts. “The way back through the pyramid we came in from is blocked anyway so I say we get out through this place. They have a working portal up towards the front that they’re managing to get groups of troops through in spurts when the physics and the magic align. We need to at least destroy that before we leave. Otherwise, they may be able to drag in enough troops that we don’t stand a chance. Right now we can still take them if we bring together the nobility and attack.”

  “How do we get to the front without being captured or killed?” Omasa asked. “A disguise is all I can think of but we’ll give ourselves away if we try and use magic to do it.”

  “We have a couple of good disguises back in the room we just left. Let’s go strip the warlock and the shaman and then maybe some of the Corvellans gear would work on Omasa and Wessel since they’re pretty tall.”

  Chris nodded at Penny. “Good idea. Let’s do it. We need to move fast. Someone is going to figure out something was going on at the place we came in at and set off an alarm before too long.”

  They rushed back up the tunnel. Going for speed more than stealth this time. Omasa was leading the way when he bowled into a Corvellan who had been running down the tunnel the opposite way. A quick knife fight ensued and the Corvellan ended up being stripped by Wessel who pulled the bloodied and slightly tattered robes of the dead Corvellan on over his own clothes. With the hood up he could pass if no one looked too close.

  They made it the rest of the way back up the tunnel without any more incidents. Working quickly they changed into the clothes they could find laying around that looked like would cover them up the most. Chris ended up being the shaman and Penny took the outfit from the warlock. Omasa shrugged into a Corvellan robe and pulled the hood down over his face.

  “That Corvellan was probably running down the tunnel to warn everyone that something happened over here. We need to move fast your majesty.” Omasa had finished getting dressed and was helping Penny with her warlock outfit as he spoke. “Hopefully no one already warned them about the cave in. I’m thinking those big spiders aren’t too bright and we killed everyone else we saw so we may have a little breathing room. I wouldn’t expect a lot though your majesty.”

  With that in mind they all began rushing back down the tunnel again. They joined up with Wessel who confirmed he had not seen anything that seemed like the alarm had been sounded on them yet. As they were running down the tunnel something occurred to Chris and he asked Wessel without breaking stride.

  “How did they know I was the king?”

  “The dark wizards you mean? They’re normally pretty good at psychic and you practically scream half your thoughts your majesty. No offense but you may want to work on that some. Like, before we get to the end of this tunnel. If someone seems to focus on you or you feel a tickle in your head just try and shake the connection or scream so loud through the connection that you make their ears bleed.”

  Something else to worry about and try to focus on. Chris had thought he was good at guarding his thoughts. He had known of those dangers but he had never really tried to consciously block his thoughts. Oh no. Another really scary idea occurred to him that almost made him freeze in his tracks.

  “Wessel?”

  “Yes sire?”

  “Do you know if Nicole is good at reading thoughts?”

  Wessel laughed out loud at that one. Penny had evidently been listening in as well since she snorted with laughter behind them.

  “Alright your majesty. Time to get our game faces on.” Omasa spoke and then stepped out onto the ledge again. This time none of them were using magic to hide their identity. If someone paid too much attention to them then they may use illusion to make them think they were looking at what they thought they would see. They didn’t have that magic dialed up very high though and would turn it off if they saw a dark wizard checking them out.

  They were dressed as wizards so they could let some magic show. They just needed to drop the illusionary magic since it would look odd here in this fortress surrounded by the horde. This was going to be a delicate balancing act. As they started walking Chris felt a jolt and he whispered that the portal was being used again. It was all the way on the other side of this huge cavern so the fact that the magic was powerful enough to jolt him had Chris worried. They needed to get there and shut it down. Then they needed to get out of here and go round up an army to bring back here and take on these cavern dwellers before they decided to come out into the light and fight.

  They walked quickly but in a relaxed manner as befit their rank. Trying to look like they had somewhere to be but weren’t in a huge hurry to get there. Omasa led the way with the spear held in front of him to butt people out of the way since the warlock behind him would be considered a thousand times more important than the cannon fodder Corvellans. Penny and Chris both tried to walk imperiously. It didn’t help that if anyone looked close they’d notice their robes were sliced and bloody. That would be fun to try and explain in a language none of them spoke.

  They made it down onto the cavern floor and began walking through the encampments of the Corvellans. Battery powered lanterns were scattered around to cast light on the place. They were mostly setup in bunks with training grounds roped off to practice their martial skills. There were centralized mess halls which Chris averted his eyes from as the meals were a few grades below what he would have felt ok feeding a stray dog. Whistles sounded and a few companies of the Corvellans were mobilized. One company ran past them and headed up the trail far behind them into the pyramid tunnel they had just left. Another couple of companies ran in the direction Chris could feel the portal calling to him from. On a whim Chris nudged Omasa to tag along behind them. It gave them an excuse to run and who was going to look too close at people running to go catch the intruders?

  By running behind the Corvellans they made it to the other side of the cavern fairly quickly. They broke off as the Corvellans started running up a tunnel that looked like it may lead outside. Instead of following them that way Chris led them towards a side tunnel that opened up into a smaller cavern. This cavern had a deep hole carved into the middle of it. A staircase descended around the sides of the hole and led down to a platform carved out of solid stone a few hundred feet below. On top of that platform is where the portal manifested when the physics were right and magic activated it.

  Standing around down below were multiple wizards with heads bowed and focus aimed at the portal. On the portal Corvellans were popping into existence out of nowhere. As they appeared on the platform they shrugged to shake off the nausea you get when you travel a portal and headed for the stairs. The casualness they did this with showed they’d done it many times before. That lent credence to the argument that this was an experienced invasion force they were going to be facing. It probably would not have been discovered until too late if Chris hadn’t insisted on doing his trials early. They were also fortunate Randall had uncovered the rumors of this place and been suspicious enough to get a team to check the place out.

  There were a lot of things that had to be just right for the portal to work. Chris and Brent still had not worked out every single detail of what was needed but they did know it had to be perfect. Looking up in the air Chris saw the ceiling looked like smooth limestone. He reached out and gave it some tentative prods with his mind and the limest
one gave but didn’t seem like it would pour down the way he would like it to. He needed something to mess up the alignment of the stone and metal below. Something to knock the runes out of kilter and preferably knock the people on the platform down for long enough for them to escape.

  The Corvellans who had already come through the portal were filing past them now. Their heads bowed in deference to the warlock standing at the top of the stairs who did not deem them worthy of her notice. Chris couldn’t think of anything so he started describing what he thought they needed to do to see if anyone else had any ideas.

  “I can stick some solid steel spear tips pretty deep into that platform. Might even split it. Do you think that would do it?” Omasa asked.

  “If it spilt it then yes. That would be ideal. Why don’t you do that and the rest of us will focus on bringing down the roof as much and taking out the wizards standing around the portal before they figure out what is going on and kill us.” Plan created Chris got ready to hurl parts of the roof at the dark wizards below. It should hopefully be like shooting fish in a barrel. They should be pretty weak from channeling all that force into the portal to expand it much wider than it naturally would have been.

  Omasa counted to ten after they’d all called out their targets and waited for the rocks to fall. Wizards would sense if they tried to attack straight away with magic. They’d feel the prickle of the force line settling on them. They’d have a chance to strike back. They all greatly preferred not giving the enemy a chance to fight back. Give them the enemy facing away from them with an unarmored back any day. A fair fight is for losers and duels where people are going to be watching.

  The best way to take these guys out would be to use magic to weaken the roof and let large rocks fall on their heads. They shouldn’t get any warning at all of that coming. They’d sense the battle magic once Omasa started throwing the spears into the platform so the goal was to send a wave of rocks towards them first. Penny, Wessel and Chris focused on portions of the ceiling above the hole that aligned with the wizards below. There were six wizards standing around below.

  The first wave of the rock attack took out two of the wizards. They started working on another rock fall attack as Omasa started hurling spears at the platform. With the full force of his battle magic behind them the spears penetrated deeply into the platform. They did not cause it to crack or anything though. The wizards below started getting shields up and the second rock fall did not do any damage. The wizards knew now that someone was attacking so they started casting their magic around. They wouldn’t be able to use the portal until they’d removed the spear heads from it but after they did that it would be repairable.

  It would be more difficult with a bunch of dead wizards though. The ones below were putting up weak shields and the forces they started cycling around were pretty weak as well. The portal had definitely sapped their strength. Chris and Penny focused on ripping the wizards shields off them while Wessel went in for the kill as soon as a shield dropped. Finally there was only one dark wizard still standing. He was strong. Chris could tell from here that the wizard was powerful since the shield around him wasn’t budging when they reached out for it. They assumed this was the wizard who was acting as the portal master.

  The wizard jumped. He flew out of the hole and landed on the platform directly on the other side of the hole from them. Magical force lines began to encircle them and Chris felt himself being tugged towards the edge of the hole. Instead of fighting it he ran forward and threw himself into the space above the hole. He fueled his leap with battle magic and led with his sword as he zeroed in on the powerful dark wizard on the other side. The dark wizard had not been expecting this kind of attack but reacted quickly by slamming Chris with a shield spell that made him lose his momentum and began falling into the hole.

  Penny and Wessel both reached out with force and caught Chris. Omasa launched himself into the air at the dark wizard. Wessel let Penny work on getting Chris back onto the platform while he covered Omasa with magic. Omasa banged into the same shield spell and Wessel had to work to get him back on a platform as well. Meanwhile Chris had been dropped on to the platform on the opposite side of where the dark wizard was attacking them from. Chris began moving towards the dark wizard with his sword out and magical lines dancing between the two of them. Penny hit the dark wizard from across the hole with a vicious frontal attack that crashed and crackled against the dark wizards shield.

  Omasa and Wessel moved in on the dark wizards back. Seeing he was fighting a losing battle the dark wizard jumped over the edge of the hole to try and escape. He was held up by shields cast under him by Wessel and Penny and then Chris and Omasa brought down shields on top of the dark wizard. Effectively pinning him in space. The wizard struggled but it was taking him time to break out of this trap. Omasa and Chris began pressing down hard with their shield spells to keep him pinned while Wessel and Penny let there spells relax. This had the effect of driving the dark wizard hard into the platform below.

  The force of their shield spells slamming into the platform was too much for the delicate balanced platform and the entire thing shifted and fell against the wall of the hole. They sent more rocks and steel cascading onto it until Chris pronounced the portal was all messed up. Then they ripped the metal poles from the stairs and used battle magic to launch them into the platform as well. With all the noise Corvellans started showing up so after killing a few of them Chris decided it was time for them to get out while they still could. The platform should be trashed and without the portal mage they were not going to be able to activate it anyway so Chris figured they had accomplished all they could for now.

  “Let’s get out of here!” He yelled so everyone could hear him and they began moving towards the tunnel they had seen that sloped upwards. Corvellans were showing up but they kept there disguises and waited until the last second to slay them. A dark wizard came around the bend and instantly raised his hands in challenge.

  All four of them reached out and hit his shields at the same time. Ripping aside his shields they pummeled the soft flesh beneath and left the body broke and lifeless within seconds as they continued on their mad dash to get out of the pit. Light rolled down the slopes towards them as they moved as quickly as they could while still being cautious of being attacked or running into large numbers of the Corvellans or groups of wizards. The tunnel opened up behind a large copse of trees. They went around the trees and saw a company of the Corvellans were headed back their way.

  Ignoring the Corvellans Chris led them deeper into the jungle then asked Omasa to get them back to the airport as fast as possible. Omasa got them moving and without needing to worry about being detected they made it through the jungle in next to no time. They had to knock a couple of young men unconscious who had found their van in the woods and were in the process of robbing it. They left the men on the side of the road and drove to the airport as fast as they could along the narrow roads. Chris checked and saw that Omasa was using magic to keep them from flying off the curves into the rain forest. He was so focused on the driving he may not even have noticed he was using magic like that.

  Back at the airport they rushed to get on their plane and get out of there before the Corvellans were able to use their influence to get them locked down at the airport. As soon as they were in the air Omasa was on the radio relaying the information about the Corvellan army to the high protectors and the council. All the noble families around the globe would be put on alert. They would also be told to be ready to send forces to wherever the king told them he needed forces at. The first priority was to make sure they had strengthened their defenses. Since they had just ruined the hordes portal they’d be looking for another one to use. The easiest portals on the planet were the ones guarded by the nobles estates.

  With the information relayed and nothing else they could do at the moment Chris shut his eyes and tried to get a few hours’ worth of sleep before they landed. He smiled when Penny reminded him he had passed his
trials and congratulated him. The trials seemed like such a trivial thing when they were working on things like protecting the earth from the forces of evil. He was glad to be done with them though. They should have been one of the last hurdles to all the nobles accepting him and giving his word the weight to bring them all together for what he was going to need them for.

  Chapter 30: Coronation Day

  Four days later Chris stood on a raised stage overlooking the bluffs on the highest point on the island. A huge crowd of people were gathered in front of the stage. All were decked out in their finest clothes. Servers wandered through the crowd with trays of ice water, champagne flutes and some outrageous appetizers. Chris watched as one waiter walked by with a tray of crackers that kept jumping up out of the tray and doing flips before settling back down to rest properly on the tray.

  Chris reflected on how much his life had changed since the day he and Chuck had gone out to inspect the damage from the storm. The fateful day when he had lost his father and seen his first Corvellan. He had gained a kingdom in the process but would have given that up in a second if it would have brought Chuck back. He smiled over at his mom, Glenda, who was dressed in a beautiful blue gown and whose hair must have been helped by someone’s magic as it was smooth as a pond in a sheltered glade at midnight. She looked radiant and his heart swelled with love for her. This was not her world but she had taken to the tasks of it when asked.