Knights of the Wizard (of Knights and Wizards Book 2) (10 page)

GREY SKIES RELEASED A MODERATE RAIN and a crack of thunder made the crows fly away seeking shelter, one last glance at Berhtram who lay lifeless on the ground, both wings broken. The rain hit the bird hard, pelting its eyes and beak bringing it back to consciousness, being confused by its situation and then slowly remembering. Berhtram stood up and then hopped around awkwardly, trying hard to take to the air but it was no use, couldn’t stand the pain of flapping his wings. The raven was in so much pain that it didn’t know what to do with itself, toppling over it blinked several times. Berhtram thought that he would simply close his eyes and perish.

Ackley shot a rock out of his sling, hitting a crow and killing it, watching it hit the ground. He picked up the bird and stuffed it into his leather bag that was hung over his left shoulder, the third kill of the day. He was eleven and liked to put food on the table; his father was dead and it fell on him and his older brothers to provide for the family. He swung his rock over his head, launched and hit a white birch tree dead center and liked the sound it had made. Movement to his left caught his eye, observing the raven struggling on the ground. The bird looked like it was fatally injured. Ackley could stomp on it and put it out of its misery.

“What happened to you?” he said to the raven. Picking it up Ackley examined it, quite a handsome raven he thought even though most ravens looked basically the same, but this one had a single white feather. His mother taught him that it was good luck to heal an injured bird, luck was something that they could use, so even though the bird might not make the trek back with him he decided to give it a try nonetheless, placing it in with the other dead birds. Berhtram being in such a weakened condition went to sleep.

Ackley returned to his three room hut about a half mile from the castle in Kaday, where three chickens were pecking the ground in the coop. Inside his mother was drinking cider, his brothers nowhere to be seen. In one room were two goats eating grass off the floor near the far wall, one wandered out past the boy, being tethered to a rope around the oak tree in the front yard.

“Did you get anything?” his mother asked. She was worn down by life but tried hard not to show it, life just wasn’t the same since her husband Edward passed, keeping a positive attitude in front of her children but crying when they weren’t around. Some days she had hope for the future but those days were the exception. Her face was aged beyond her years.

“I got two crows and a pigeon and a badly injured raven.”

Millicent perked up at the thought of the injured bird. “Injured raven you say?”

“Don’t get your hopes up mother because I don’t think he’s going to make it. Two broken wings by the look of it.” Ackley took the bird and set the raven on the crooked table and they both stared down at the poor thing.

“Why don’t you bring it over to Juliana? They say that trying to help an injured bird can bring a little luck even if it doesn’t make it.” Millicent had a faraway look in her eyes. “You’re not the one that hurt it are you, because if you are the luck won’t take.”

Ackley gently touched the bird. “No mother I found it on the ground.”

She took Ackley’s face in her hands and gazed into his green eyes. “Because if you’re the one that hurt it then it will bring bad luck not good, certain things are not to be fooled with. Do you understand?”

“I promise you mother I only found it.” He definitely didn’t want to bring bad luck down upon them.

Millicent nodded. “Bring it over to Juliana then. With the king giving your brothers permission to hunt for deer for two days maybe they’ll get one. We haven’t had deer in ages, making me hungry just thinking about it.”

“Making my stomach growl,” said Ackley. “I was eating deer this morning but then I woke up.”

The boy found Juliana feeding her chickens in the backyard, an elderly woman that was stooped over; she was dressed in black with a hump on her back. He showed her the raven and told her what his mother had said and she took it inside, the boy followed her in to watch her work. She placed both hands over Berhtram, judging the amount of life energy that remained.

“Can you heal him?”

“The poor thing,” said Juliana in her raspy voice. “Not much life left in it. Usually for a bird to survive it must have more life in it than death, this one is almost ready to give up the ghost.”

The boy nodded. “Mother says that we can get a little luck just by trying to save it.”

“That’s true,” said Juliana. They went inside and the old woman had more than a dozen baskets against the wall, picking up one that appeared to contain a small block of wet mud. She took a chunk out of it, sprinkling what looked to be a yellow spice with black specks into the mud, when she was sure it was completely mixed she commenced to apply it to Bertram’s wings. “I’m not sure if the poor thing will survive this, must be awful painful. Pain can hurry one’s journey to the other side. The raven will likely decide that it’s not worth the fight.”

Ackley watched as she coated both wings with the mud, placing the raven in a basket and giving it back to him.

“Thank you Juliana.”

“You tell your mother if he won’t eat then it’s best to do away with him rather than let him suffer.” Juliana tapped the boy on the head. “One thing is for sure the bird will never fly again.”

He thought about a bird not being able to fly. “He’s not gonna be happy about that.”

KING KAI WALKED AMONGST HIS MEN as more than seventeen thousand warriors had gathered, more than a half a dozen generals nodded as he past them. His almond eyes were quite attractive, his long beard down to his chest, each soldier anxious to prove their worth to the king. The second in command was ill and many were sure that his prized position would soon be available, because when the king died his second in command would become king, which brought instant respect for whoever was chosen to be second in rank.

The Dwagord were out to kill and conquer. They knew that life was short and their creed was to pillage and spread their seed throughout the world, so that their spirits could overrun the afterlife and take over there as well. The Dwagord always looked for signs; a dead bird could be enough to postpone a battle for weeks, but ultimately it was whatever the king commanded. Yet they had known about the kingdoms on the other side of the mountain range, having flown over it on the back of a dragon. The only path through the mountains was too high to climb because of the lack of oxygen. Even on the back of a dragon with a breathing spell it had been risky with so little oxygen, the adventurer that had flown over, telling the king what he had seen, had perished several days later. The enchantment had also succumbed to the lack of oxygen.

A warrior ran up to the king. “The mirror your majesty.”

The king took the small mirror and looked through it; it could see almost a hundred miles in any direction, however being away from its source of power, the crimson boulder, the image flickered and went black; he did manage to see at least seven kingdoms before it went dark. Disappointed Kai handed it back to his servant and told him to give it to Daijulan to see if he could do anything with it.

Kai took in a deep breath and thought that even the air smelled different here, some sort of flowery scent. He looked up and pointed, two black dragons were mating. Perhaps this was a land of dragons? Back in Caoma dragons were rare, with one or two sightings a year but in this new land they had already spotted more than a dozen. He didn’t like dragons as they were magical beasts that could ruin one’s day with a single burst of fire but at least they tended to keep to themselves.

The two black dragons broke off from mating, swooped down low over Kai and his men for a closer look and then flew east. Sometimes Kai had dreams that he was a mighty red dragon that the whole world feared but was always disappointed when he opened his eyes to discover the reality of being human.

The king hoped that this strange place was ripe for the picking.

ASH MANAGED TO CAST A HUGE SEE-THROUGH KITE SHIELD which appeared just outside the entrance to their lair, he had no idea if it would hold against Charox’s magical flame as they all braced for impact, knowing that this could indeed be the end, and for a few seconds all they could see was the fire heading towards them. But the shield held, the golden red flame deflected, spreading in both directions as it hit the rock face, burning small trees that were growing on the side of the mountain. The outcome angered the attacking dragon and as it approached the shield struck him in the face as if held by some giant unseen hand, pushing Charox back and hurting him. Charox pumped his mighty wings and held himself in place as he accessed the situation; he backed up and went through many different spells and then launched a fiery spear and it did stick into the kite shaped shield but was unable to penetrate it fully. Within moments the spear turned to black dust and was blown away by the wind.

The gray dragon ran himself into the shield, not flying as fast as he could but hard enough to break just about anything, only a small section of his shoulder scales was visible from inside the cave as he hit, so hard that it felt like an earthquake. When the shield didn’t break he went up on top of the cliff and sulked for several minutes, decided to dig his way in, but the shield followed him, went under him and blocked Charox. He flew back to the entrance as fast as he could but the shield beat him there, frustrated he gave the obstacle a mighty kick but only managed to hurt himself. The grey thought that he was one of the greatest dragons that ever lived, might be best to pretend that he really didn’t want to get in there rather than admit that he couldn’t. Things usually went so well for greys that it was psychologically difficult to admit defeat. He envisioned burning them all to a crisp but it didn’t help.

“I see you in there you little bastard!” screamed Charox. “You can’t live without food and I’ll starve you out.” The fact that the shield had hurt him made him wonder just how powerful that young dragon was. He couldn’t be more powerful than him, equally powerful would be bad enough. The dragon flew up and out of sight, suddenly reappearing as he tried to get behind the shield, but his effort only brought him another smash in the forehead. Charox wasn’t sure if he would have the patience to wait them out because his stomach was already growling.

Cinder-Ella ran up to Ash hugging him. “You saved us.”

Zedock looked worried. “You either have to kill him or transform him into something that can’t hurt us. He’s certainly determined to hurt you. Did you see the size of that monster?”

“The worst part is that he’s also a wizard,” said Ash.

Several days passed and everyone was getting restless, not being able to fly was driving them all bonkers and Charox’s huge eyeball peering in every now and then didn’t make it any easier. Firestorm and Cinder-Ella were flying around inside the cave but it wasn’t the same, even the baby dragons had a strong desire to go outside and feel the wind on their faces. In a race to the end of the cave Firestorm bit Cinder-Ella’s tail to try to stop her from winning and then they got into a fight, biting and pushing, bouncing fire off one another and off the walls. For a time they both bit into one another’s tails and wouldn’t let go.

“Stop it the both of you!” Ella screamed. “Zedock do something with your kids.”

Zedock shook his head. “My kids? My kids wouldn’t be acting like that. I think those two are yours. The wizard’s mine.”

Ash liked the sound of that.

Ella gave Zedock a stern look. “Trapped in here is driving us all nuts.”

“Father is a mountain,” said Cinder-Ella. “Let’s climb him!”

“I’ll race you!” Firestorm screamed.

Zedock shook his head. “Don’t you dare!”

But up Zedock’s tail they went, fighting and scratching their way up until the both of them were on top of his head.

Cinder-Ella jumped up and down. “I won!”

“No you didn’t! My nose was here first!” said Firestorm.

Ella giggled. “Oh for goodness sake, get down off your father’s head.”

Zedock took the both of them off of his head. “That is it! I’m going out there to talk some sense into that beast.”

Ash had been sitting near the wall going through a myriad of spells in an attempt to find one that would work when he noticed his father heading towards the exit, and had to quickly fly in front of him to stop him. “Father no! I’ve had dreams about him biting your head off.”

Zedock sat dejected staring out at the blue sky. “Ella will you still love me without a head?”

Ella nodded. “Might love you more because then maybe you’d shut up! I didn’t mean that honey it’s the stress of being trapped in here.”

“I’m hungry,” said Firestorm.

“I’m hungry too.”

Ella shook her head. “What did we say? We can go a long time without eating although we’ll be hungry. You don’t want your father to go out there and get his head bitten off do you?”

They both shook their heads and they spoke. “No.”

Cinder-Ella spread out her wings to make herself look big and started toward the door. “That’s it; I’m going out there to kill that grey beast. Don’t try to stop me. Here I go. I’m going now.” She slowly walked towards the exit. “Somebody better stop me!” Charox’s huge eyeball suddenly looked in, making her scream and run behind Zedock.

Ash was blinking as he went through spells in his head, came upon a spell that looked interesting.

BALLS OF STENCH

Probability of success against a grey: Unknown

Potency: Few able to withstand

“I’m gonna try something.” Ash launched five balls of stench outside, encapsulating a brown mist within each one and after they floated up a ways they exploded releasing the stench, and soon they could hear the grey coughing and complaining, finally flying off because he couldn’t stand it any longer.

“You dragons are lucky that I didn’t really want to get in there.”