Knights of the Wizard (of Knights and Wizards Book 2) (23 page)

WITH A MOUTHFUL OF FRIED ONIONS Nydarien got up from his table as something caught his eye, a reflection of light. One of the four pieces of the meteorite had broken in two from the impact with the stone wall and as he picked it up he observed some green-gray specks, it definitely looked like the element he had been searching for but was there enough of it? His face showed a crooked smile. His mind rolled out different scenarios that would be pleasant for him but catastrophic for almost everyone else, people dying simultaneously by the thousands.

“Can it really be?” said Nydarien. He took the rock pieces back to his table and examined them carefully, bringing the unknown but powerful element up to his left eye, a beautiful sight he thought. The scenario had come to him in a dream. The dreams of a sorcerer were often helpful and sometimes prophetic, giving a window from the land of the dead to the living. “I’ll need to release the iron around the element to determine quantity.” Nydarien talked to himself out of habit, didn’t have any friends only servants. He got up and made his way down the spiral stairs with a spring in his step and headed for his lab as his wand vibrated; he took it and stared at it.

The boy seeks to destroy you.

“Damn it! So it is the boy from the prophesy.” What an awful time to have to battle, just when the spell was so close to being complete but he guessed that he wouldn’t have any choice in the matter.

Seems so.

“How long before he arrives?”

There are
too many variables. Time is unknown. Soon enough.

“Lack of preparation time could even the odds a little more than I’d like. I need to survive this. How powerful is the little bastard?”

You don’t want to know.

Nydarien shouted a string of expletives as he entered his lab where he was surrounded by thousands of ingredients that he had gathered over the centuries, pouches and jars and beakers and urns and small circular silver cans. One wall was completely covered with small glass vessels. Several turtle shells were filled with ground up dragon scales. A human skull on a long oak table was used for pulverising some ingredients, areas of it now stained black. In the far corner a pet spider as large as the sorcerer’s foot crawled around on his web as it chewed on a dead mouse, keeping two eyes of its eight on Nydarien. The sorcerer had created the arachnid to keep the vermin at bay and it had worked quite well.

He spent the next several hours pounding the rock to retrieve his precious element hoping that he was going to have enough but it was going to be close, it would take weeks to prepare it properly. He would have no choice but to face the other wand wizard first. His wand again vibrated. “What is it now?”

The boy is on the way.

“Of course he is. Damn it!” Nydarien kicked his wooden water bucket on the floor and sent it flying. He would have to take care of the little sorcerer before he could finish and that aggravated him to such a degree that he could barely think. He wouldn’t have time to boost his wand. Since everyone stayed miles away from him from reputation alone he rarely had intruders. He had plenty of spells that would kill a run-of-the-mill human but a wizard was different; they came with a natural defense against magic, the stronger the wizard the more powerful his protection.

Nydarien kicked the leg of the table and broke his big toe.

MARCUS AND HIS GOLDEN KNIGHTS were off to face Nydarien; he figured at about twenty-five miles per day it would take somewhere around eleven days to reach him, even though his horseless buggy never got tired the other horses did. He would have liked to have Ryxa with him but then again he would be worried that Nydarien might spell the dragon and maybe even turn her against him. He didn’t know what to expect when he arrived at Castle Cutmore which was pretty much in the middle of nowhere; he might have horrible monsters to defend him and dreadful spells as well.

The closer Marcus got to Nydarien the more he felt that he was heading straight towards his own demise; he so wanted to turn around and forget the whole thing. Getting himself killed wasn’t going to accomplish anything. The way he figured it his chances of success were minimal because all he could manage was basically a bolt of lightning, of course his wand could help him but he still didn’t think it would be enough. He was already so frightened how could he not hesitate? What if he spent the rest of his life as a toad?

On the seventh night they set up camp in a dry gully, leaving the horseless buggy up on the hill with the knights horses. They killed a rabbit and prepared it for him and as he ate he considered his options and could only think of two, go forward and face the evil sorcerer or go back defeated even before the battle commenced, neither option was attractive however going back he would at least be alive. He briefly envisioned his own funeral but it was too morbid to continue.

Marcus looked up at Brother and wondered what it was like to be one of his golden knights. “Lots of stars out tonight.”

Brother nodded.

Having finished most of the rabbit and burying its remains he had decided that in the morning he would turn around and head back, it was the best course of action, the smarter of the two paths that he had to follow. The book wouldn’t do him any good with his dead body smouldering in the forest. He considered just sending his knights after Nydarien but he didn’t want to risk their lives either, even though he didn’t think that they were really alive like a person was alive. His immaturity was now starting to bother even him and experience was something that one had to earn, his lack of decisiveness was disturbing.

Just then Adorok appeared to him with his glow lighting up the night even more than the campfire. Brother went over and passed his hand through the spirit. “Stop that it tickles,” said Adorok. “I’m not supposed to interfere in the land of the living but here goes. Marcus you have no choice but to face Nydarien; he’s working on an enchantment that will for all intense purposes destroy the world. None of your loved ones will survive his spell and neither will you.” Someone or something pulled Adorok back and in the blink of an eye he was gone.

Marcus sighed. He really wanted to run away. He was just a young boy and to have the weight of the world on his shoulders was unfair. He thought of his family and friends and what might never be if he didn’t try to defeat Nydarien. He had a sickening feeling in the pit of his stomach. He wondered if knights were ever frightened; he imagined they were but their courage kept them going.

THE GROUND WAS COVERED IN THE BRIGHTEST FOG which hovered at knee level, dispersing somewhat as Adorok was dragged through the courtyard by two tall silver knights and placed in a small jail cell that had a cot in it and nothing else. The sky was filled with puffy white clouds against a blue sky and it never changed, it was always noon or at least the sun’s position in the sky appeared as such. Adorok heard the door slam shut and then the key
click
as it locked him in; he of course knew that he had gone too far, interfering in the land of the living was forbidden but he couldn’t let Marcus return to his castle without warning him of the consequences. The door and the stone dwelling were solid as he was now trapped inside.

Adorok wasn’t in heaven or hell he’s was in the middle; he was in limbo and had no idea how long he was going to be stuck there. It was a pleasant enough place, no aches or physical pains although he was certainly able to worry about things, the fate of Leeander in particular. He didn’t have to eat and just thinking about the taste of food was sufficiently satisfying, even filling. He was able to see somewhat into the future but Marcus’s fate was blocked from him although he could look into what Nydarien was doing, and it was nasty business, and if that sorcerer’s future wasn’t disrupted it was going to be a horrible fate for all.

What had been most surprising upon his death was that limbo was a physical world with buildings and towns and lots of souls wandering around. One fellow believed that he had been in limbo for a millennium but time was different here, no morning or night, one didn’t get tired or sleepy, so to Adorok there was no way to judge time, and for all he knew he might have only been here for two weeks. A person could will oneself to sleep but it wasn’t quite the same and if one wasn’t careful could spend years asleep, missing out on what was happening with one’s family. But with time being immaterial it was of no consequence; it was only when one peeked into the world of the living that one became aware of things and concerns, which is why most didn’t.

Adorok checked the solidness of the door and unfortunately he couldn’t walk through it like he could where Marcus was; he stood peering through the prison bars as he observed a young man appear, laying prone on the ground, having just been run through with a sword. He stood up, seeing that his wound was now nonexistent and wandered off being in a state of confusion, wondering what the hell just happened. He had not believed in heaven or hell and now he was really in a state of panic.

Aeneas walked up to Adorok’s cell and looked in at the wizard. “Adorok I told you not to interfere but you wouldn’t listen.” He was dressed in a soldier’s uniform but to Adorok it looked ancient.

Adorok shrugged. “It’s comfortable enough in here.”

Aeneas and Adorok had had many discussions, although Aeneas would always ignore personal questions and so the wizard had stopped asking. Aeneas tried hard to open the door from the outside but it solid and wouldn’t budge, couldn’t even make it rattle.

“Do you think you might be in there forever?” Aeneas asked.

“One never knows,” said Adorok. He made his way to the comfortable cot and lay down, outside Aeneas wandered off. That was another peculiar thing about this place, one was never bored and he couldn’t really figure out why, but being trapped in such a confined space perhaps he would be soon enough.

MARCUS AND HIS KNIGHTS COULD SEE NYDARIEN’S CASTLE in the distance
or at least the top of one of its towers over the trees, and it gave him a scared feeling in the pit of his stomach. If it hadn’t been for Adorok’s warning he would be more than halfway back to his castle by now, with thoughts of kissing and hugging Raina, but instead he had to think about killing the sorcerer or being killed by him. Marcus had no idea what the best course of action would be; he didn’t have enough knight’s to surround the place, and walking right up to the castle didn’t appear to be a good idea but there weren’t many options. In any case it would be magic against magic. The boy wondered if Nydarien was aware of his presence and he imagined that he was and that thought was scary in itself.

Suddenly they could all hear something making its ways through the forest, coming from the direction of the castle, some sort of monster perhaps? Whatever it was it was knocking down trees as it went, pushing them down as if they were twigs, making a hell of a racket as they hit the ground. They could see the trees toppling in the distance as Marcus jumped out of the buggy with his wand in his hand; most of his knights pulled their swords and some readied their bows. Every inch of his body screamed
run away
but he couldn’t make himself do it.

Now they could see glimpses of red through the woods and realized that it was a red knight, thirteen feet tall with a sword that must be at least nine feet long and carrying a crimson kite shield that was bigger than Marcus. Bloody Radek pushed down yet another tree so that he could face the golden knights, but in reality it was Marcus he was focused on; his orders was either to kill Marcus or to at least take his wand and to bring it to Nydarien.

Radek stood motionless with sword in hand as he was surrounded by the golden knights, so still that it was as if he was frozen in place and that in itself was disturbing. He stared at Marcus for what seemed to be a long time and then he attacked, hitting the knight’s horse and knocking it down but the knight immediately got up and counterattacked. The horses attacked too, no ordinary horses but a creation of Marcus’s powerful magic; the white stallions kicked the giant knight with their hind legs knocking it down. Brother jumped in the air pushing his sword through the red knight’s visor but with no effect; it simply pulled the sword out and tossed it.

Marcus hit it with a bolt of lightning from his wand, knocking the red knight off its feet but it immediately got up and went for the wizard, knocking his wand out of his hand before he was tackled by several knights and taken down. Kadyn grabbed the wand and threw it back to Marcus before Radek could get his metal hands on it. They all jumped on the red knight and held him down, even the white stallions used their weight to immobilize the monster, but it was an impasse at best.

The wand vibrated.
Bind him with these words. Isicsi stabra.

“Isicsi stabra!” Marcus pointed the wand at the knight and instantly he was bound by so much rope that the red knight was no longer visible, only his shape covered by the heavy rope. Radek rolled on the ground in an attempt to rise but the effort was unsuccessful. One of the stallions went over and urinated on Radek to make a final point.

Marcus and his knights approached the impressive castle, the biggest one that he had ever seen; skulls were carved into different parts of the wall. One of the murder holes was also fashioned to look like a skull. On the outside of the south wall hung an upside down skeleton, some poor soul had been impaled on a stake that remained wedged between his ribs, definitely a warning to others to stay away.

As Marcus approached he set off several nasty spells but fortunately he was immune to all of them; one was a sickly green gas that hung around him for several minutes, an ordinary fellow would have perished instantly. He was right not to let Raina follow him for she would have succumbed for sure. Marcus imagined the castle had been created by magic, either magic or slaves but probably magic. Instinctively he looked up and saw Nydarien climbing up on the inner curtain wall, the boy pointed his wand and hit him with a bolt that knocked him off his feet but more importantly he dropped his wand, they all watched as it fell down to the grass below, now outside the castle wall. Nydarien losing his wand would definitely be to Marcus’s advantage.

Marcus smiled and thought that he couldn’t ask for a better break. “If I can get my hands on his wand he’ll be a hell of a lot weaker than he is with it.”

Touching that wand will kill you.

“What if one of my knights gets the wand and breaks it?”

There was a pause before the wand responded.
Unknown.

Nydarien launched several balls of green fire from up on the castle in their general direction, not wanting to stick his head up and maybe get it blown off; one fire ball hit one of Marcus’s knights and melted it down into a pool of golden metal. The realization that his golden knights could be killed was an unpleasant one. Several other fireballs fell missing their mark but they could all detect the putrid scent from them, the heat being uncomfortably hot.

Marcus sent another knight to fetch Nydarien’s wand but as soon as he touched it he fell to pieces, arms, legs and torso had come apart and he lay motionless with the evil wizard’s wand in his hand. Perhaps the same thing would have happened to him if he would have dared to touch it. The remaining knights and Marcus entered the castle without resistance, which made him nervous; the castle was so large that it would take them a while to search it. He walked forward with five knights in front and four in back, having left their horses outside. Inside the sorcerer’s castle the unknown was as scary as hell, he knew he wasn’t going to be able to just walk up to the book and take it.

A spell was triggered and they found themselves inside a large prison cell, the bars that surrounded them were red hot. Marcus hit the fiery bars with a bolt but it was ineffective, didn’t do anything to the cell that they found themselves in but it did blow a chunk of rock out of the ceiling.

“What do we do?” Marcus asked his wand.

Unknown.

And then they saw them, more than ten thousand poisonous spiders crawling toward them on the floor, on the walls and ceiling, black spiders with the shape of an orange hourglass on their abdomens. Marcus wanted to run but the cell made it impossible, wanted to scream but what good with it do.

“Marcus,” Brother whispered. “There are too many for us to kill them all. Some will get to you.”

Marcus wasn’t particularly frightened of spiders but this many wouldn’t be good and of course they would be poisonous, no way of knowing if his magic would protect him. He shot lightning bolts at them which dislodged and killed some but they continued to advance by the thousands. The first spider made it into the cell and Kadyn squashed it with her foot. Marcus jumped as one dropped from the ceiling and landed on his shoulder and was promptly squashed by one of the knights.

Although they couldn’t see him they could hear Nydarien’s laugh bouncing off the castle walls, laughing so hard that he was almost choking. The spiders overwhelmed them and Marcus was now covered and they commenced to bite, injecting him with their poison that had been modified by Nydarien.

“Help me! Get them off me!”