Spirit Blade: Book III of the Dragon Mage Trilogy (18 page)

The second man nodded and finished his ale. “Good point. I’m going to hit the hay too.” He rose and followed his friend from the tavern.

Sherman downed his glass and ordered another. From what he could gather, there was a string of murders that had taken place in this village. He would have to keep an eye out for a man with a black mustache. He got up and made his way back to his table where Harran was talking about the murders that had taken place in the village. They were talking freely since most of the villagers were retiring early for the night, no doubt to get ready for the funeral. The nearest people still in the bar were well out of earshot.

According to Harran, four bodies were found in different parts of the town. All except one were hidden out of sight, the last being discovered just that morning. They were all strangers. It was the reason the people in the village were on edge, especially where strangers were involved.

Olag continued by relating what he had learned as an invisible eavesdropper at another table. Some local men had ridden out to Velden a few days ago with some strangers and three of them were found later that day by a small caravan. Ravens were swarming their bodies and the caravan people chased them away. They would have prepared a burial mound, but one of the escorts recognized the men and convinced them to return the bodies to the village for a proper burial. As luck would have it, there was a mage associated with the caravan, and he was able to freeze the bodies for transport. When they got to the village, the undertaker was summoned. He inspected the bodies and determined they were all strangled.

“Strangled?!” blurted Zylor. “All of them? Are you sure?”

“That’s what they said at the table,” said Olag.

“Isn’t that a little odd?” continued the minotaur. “You would think they were stabbed or something. Maybe the occasional one would be strangled if neither combatant had a weapon. But all three?”

“That is indeed unusual,” mused Kazin thoughtfully. He had been listening intently the whole time and seemed deep in thought. He turned to Sherman. “What did you find out, Sherm?”

Sherman smiled at his friend’s way of saying his name. It used to irritate him, but now he had grown accustomed to it. The big warrior retold what he had heard, including the part about the man with the thick black mustache. “I think we should be on the lookout for that man,” added Sherman. “He could be trouble if we cross paths.”

Kazin nodded. “That could be. If he’s a gang leader, he could cause all sorts of trouble for us.”

“We can’t let that distract us from our goal,” reminded Amelia.

Kazin turned to the red-haired mage. “Good point. But I want to make sure these events aren’t related to our goal. I’d like you to consult your orb often from this point forward. We know the death back in the gully was not correct according to the historical time line. We’re just lucky it wasn’t drastic enough to change history. If it was, we would already be too late to change things back to how they should be.”

Everyone fell silent as the thought of potential failure permeated the air.

Kazin laughed. “Sorry. I didn’t mean to put a damper on things.”

“But you’re right,” said Harran. “We could easily fail if we merely wait for something to go wrong as a sign that history has been changed. We have to be pro-active.”

“But how do we do that?” asked Sherman. “How can we determine when something is about to change history, without knowing when it actually happens?”

“Good question,” said Kazin. “The only thing I can think of is that whoever is causing history to change - and I’m fairly certain it’s a ‘someone’ and not a ‘something’ - is going to impact everything around them to some degree or other. That will cause Amelia’s orb to react. Everything they do or touch will be affected. The orb reacted slightly at the inn. Perhaps whoever is altering history has been there. We don’t know this for sure, but it stands to reason that if that individual was a stranger in town, he would have stayed at the inn.”

“And there’s only one inn in town,” put in Amelia.

“Precisely,” said Kazin.

“So we use the orb to track the culprit who’s affecting history,” stated Olag.

Kazin nodded. “Yes. We have to follow the trail that person is leaving in their wake.”

“If there’s even a trail to follow,” growled Zylor.

“That’s what we have to find out,” said Kazin.

“How do we know we aren’t too late to do anything already?” asked Olag.

“I think the orb is the answer to that question, Olag,” said Kazin. “If we were too late to change things, the orb would probably do something drastic. From what I’ve studied about orbs, they tend to shatter if the magic reaches a certain limit. Dragon orbs often shatter when the dragon dies. In this case, the orb might vibrate and turn such a dark red that the orb can no longer contain the magic, causing it to shatter.”

Amelia gasped. “Are you serious?!”

Kazin shrugged. “I can’t say for certain, but that’s my best guess.”

The red-haired mage looked down at her orb and rubbed it lovingly with her fingers. “I’d hate for that to happen. This orb is priceless.”

“That’s just another reason to stop whoever is changing things from causing a permanent change,” said Kazin.

Amelia looked up at Kazin as the realization of his statement sank in. She now realized that even the preservation of her orb banked on stopping someone from changing history.

Sherman yawned. “How about if we get some rest and start on this trail first thing in the morning?”

The next morning it was foggy and damp as the companions emerged from the inn’s breakfast restaurant. Sherman led the dwarf, minotaur-turned-human and invisible skink warrior to the horses and they started filling the packs on the horses with supplies. Meanwhile, Kazin and Amelia watched a small procession of people as they marched past on their way to the cemetery. A dozen and a half mine workers carried three coffins on their broad shoulders. They were well built and shouldered their loads with ease. Sherman looked up from his work and recognized two of them as the two men who were at the bar the previous evening. One woman following the miners sobbed and wiped a handkerchief over her face. Everyone else marched behind the coffin bearers in silence.

As the procession passed, Amelia tugged at Kazin’s sleeve. He looked down as she lifted her cloak. Some of her breast was accidentally showing and it took a moment for him to realize what she was actually trying to show him. The orb pulsed in her hand, emitting a pinkish glow. He nodded in understanding.

“How serious is this as far as history is concerned?” asked Kazin quietly so as not to disturb the procession.

Amelia ducked around a corner and withdrew her orb where passersby would not see. She concentrated on the orb for several minutes. At last she lowered her hand with the orb and her face turned pale.

Kazin, who had followed her, saw the reaction. He gently touched her arm and spoke softly. “What is it? What did you see?”

The red-haired mage turned to look into Kazin’s eyes. Her own eyes were sad, and tears welled within. “This town -,” began Amelia. She blinked the tears from her eyes and wiped her robe across her face to clear the tears that resided there. She spoke again, with more determination. “This town is going to be overrun by ogres. The people in the coffins died before they should have, but they would have been killed not long from now regardless. Anything they would have done from now until the ogres arrive was not enough to change history. Almost all of the inhabitants of this town will die when the ogres attack. They won’t be ready. The town will be destroyed and will not be rebuilt.” Tears welled up in Amelia’s eyes again. “They won’t stand a chance. Their deaths will be brutal. The ogres will show no mercy. It’s - horrible.” She broke off and turned away.

Kazin thought about the time when he was growing up. He recalled his geography lessons and realized that this village did not exist in his time. It wasn’t even mentioned. This village was not only destroyed, but it was forgotten as well. History had made no mention of it. He shuddered. Fate could sometimes be very cruel.

Amelia turned back to the mage and he could see her composure was restored. She was now angry. She pointed after the procession. “Those men who died before their time might have died anyway, but their untimely death means that someone has interfered with history. You wanted to know if these mysterious deaths were related to your quest. I believe they are. Someone is out there killing people. Sooner or later they will kill someone who matters.”

Kazin nodded thoughtfully. “I agree.” He and Amelia went to their horses where the others waited patiently.

“Where to, Boss?” asked Sherman lightly.

“Velden,” said Kazin decisively. He mounted his horse and spurred it forward. The others followed. Before they rounded a bend in the road, Kazin took one last look back at Shara, a village that would soon be forgotten by time itself.

Chapter 16

T
he warlock shook with the effort of the spell, his visage stern and determined. The dead rodent did not move. Unwilling to admit defeat, the warlock tenaciously tried the spell again, using a slightly different inflection and a different set of spell components. He blotted out everything around him so that the only thing that existed besides himself was the dead rat. The magic of the spell began to transform the air around him as he neared the completion of the spell. Something within him snapped, and a small amount of force from deep within himself surged toward the inert form before him. At last, the rat stirred. The whiskers twitched and the dead eyes opened. Everything about the magic felt right as the warlock completed the spell. The rat stood on all fours and observed its master with a dull expression. The rat appeared to be waiting for instructions. The warlock rejoiced inwardly at his success.

He gave it a verbal command to see what would happen. “Walk!”

The rat began to walk across the room.

“Stop!”

The rat stopped.

“Walk!” commanded the warlock again.

The rat complied.

“Sit!” said the warlock.

The rat sat and observed him.

The warlock chuckled. The rat obeyed every word he commanded without hesitation. This instant response to his every command was a side effect he had not anticipated. The spell was more useful than he had imagined!

“Um, Sir?” said a timid voice behind him.

“What?!” exclaimed the warlock in surprise. He spun on the intruder. It was Gorc. “Gorc!” he snarled savagely. “What did I tell you about sneaking up on me?”

“Um, sorry, Sir,” stammered Gorc. “I was just -,”

“I’m busy!” snapped the warlock. “Come back later!”

“Sorry, Sir,” said Gorc. Seeing that the warlock was in one of his moods, he turned and left hastily.

The warlock turned back to his rat and was dismayed to see that his rat was lying dead on the floor once again. He swore and stamped his foot. Obviously, his spell still needed work. In order to be useful, his spell had to have a much longer duration. If a mere distraction was all it took to lose his subject, then it defeated the purpose of even casting the spell.

The subject had to last long enough to carry out his commands, as well as manage on its own without his supervision, possibly miles from where he currently happened to be. His goal was to resurrect a dragon and use it to create havoc with the humans. Unfortunately, undead creatures could not exist very far away from the spell caster who created them. At least, that’s what the spell books he was studying had indicated. A dead dragon brought back to life would only be useful within his realm of magical influence. Outside of that boundary, the dragon would cease to be animated and return to its original lifeless state. If he wanted to achieve something far away from himself, he had to do it with a live subject.

The warlock thought about this for a moment. How could he control a live dragon? How could he direct its thoughts to carry out his commands? He looked at the dead rat on the ground before him. It had shown no hesitation in following his orders. There were no errant thoughts to interfere with his commands. It was a willing subject. The warlock scratched his head. The spell book had mentioned that dead creatures were the most willing subjects, once animated. Part of the spell he had cast was meant to animate the rat. The latter half was meant to control the subject. What if he used the latter half of the spell on a live subject? The spell book had indicated that this was difficult because of the errant thoughts of the living being. However, it didn’t mention anything about clearing the subject’s mind before attempting to control it.

He dashed back to his spell book and leafed through its pages, stopping on the page he sought. “Here it is!” he muttered excitedly. “How to clear a subject’s mind; removing its memory.”

The warlock looked up with a gleam in his eyes. That was it! Now all he had to do was find a subject to experiment on. He looked toward the exit curtain. “Gorc!” he called in a voice much more pleasant than before. “Gorc, come here!”

A few minutes later the curtain was tentatively drawn aside and the goblin-orc poked his head into the room. “Y - you called?”

The warlock rose and beckoned his servant to enter. “Come in, Gorc. You had something you wanted to tell me earlier?”

Gorc blinked. “Y- yes, Sir. I was just informed that a contingent of trolls have arrived from the south and wish to speak with you.”

“Trolls?” said the warlock excitedly. He decided to postpone his experiment for the moment. “Is their leader among them?”

Gorc shrugged. “I don’t know. The sentry said she had a hard time communicating with them because they all tended to talk at once. It seems they have no chain of command to speak of.”

“I kind of had that impression,” mused the warlock. “Did they figure out who to send back to me?”

“Yes,” said Gorc. “They chose three of their number to talk with you, claiming three would be able to negotiate better than one.”

The warlock chuckled. “With their level of intelligence, the entire contingent of trolls wouldn’t be enough to do proper negotiating.” He put his hand on Gorc’s shoulder. “But let’s keep that to ourselves, shall we?”

“Yes, Sir,” said Gorc.

“Prepare the table for our guests,” said the warlock. “They should be arriving soon.”

“Yes, Sir,” said Gorc.

The table was set and the warlock waited in the command center for his guests. It was not long before Gorc entered to announce the arrival of the trolls.

The trolls were larger than the warlock would have guessed, rivaling ogres in height, about six and a half feet tall. They were the same greenish colour as the orcs, but that’s where the similarity ended. Their flesh sagged all over, making them seem uglier than any creatures who currently served under him. Their long arms were muscular and menacing, with brown hair barely masking the green skin beneath. The arms ended with hands twice the size of an ogre’s. Long, sharp claws emanated from the tips of the fingers making an effective weapon capable of ripping and tearing. Their eyes were mere slits between sagging skin folds in their faces, and their cheeks and chins hung in a grotesque manner.

The warlock shrugged off a feeling of revulsion and smiled, beckoning them to sit at the table. They grunted and complied, eyeing the food speculatively. One of them immediately began to pick up the food with his gigantic hand and placed it into his mouth. Spittle dripped from the folds of skin under its droopy chin.

“Please, help yourselves,” said the warlock warmly. “You’ve come a long way.” The other two trolls began to eat sloppily and quickly finished off their meals. The overlapping folds of skin covered any evidence of sexual orientation on their naked bodies. The sagging breasts all looked alike. When the guests had finished eating, the warlock opened the conversation. “So would you like to tell me what the reason is for your visit? I hope you have come to offer your aid in my battle against the humans.”

The trolls responded in unison, but the warlock tried to understand their response.

“The humans don’t interest us,” said one troll.

“They aren’t important,” said the second one.

“We have other battles to fight,” said the third.

“Then why have you come?” asked the warlock.

“The elves are nuisances,” said the first one.

“We hate the elves,” said the second one.

“Elves are in our way,” said the third.

“Their magic is hard to beat,” continued the first troll.

“Magic - bad,” added the second one.

“The dragons are drawn to magic,” said the third.

“That’s why the dragons interfere,” said the first one.

“They are drawn to magic,” said the second.

“It makes battle difficult,” said the third.

“What?!” said the warlock. “Dragons are drawn to magic?”

“Yes,” said the first one.

“They are aroused by magic,” said the second.

“We need magic to win,” said the third.

So that’s why the dragons had always appeared out of nowhere when the fighting began! The battles with the humans had been getting more and more magical in nature, and the dragons more numerous. The warlock wondered why his lizardmages had never discovered this. They were always reminding him how intelligent they were, yet these simple trolls have discovered something relevant about the dragons that he could potentially use! He put the information to the back of his mind for further examination later. “So,” he said slowly, “you want to obtain magical aid from me.”

“Yes,” replied the trolls together, nodding excitedly.

“We hear you have magic,” said the first one.

“You are known for your magic,” said another.

“We want your magic,” said the third.

“And what do you offer in exchange?” asked the warlock.

The trolls looked at one another.

“What do you want?” asked one.

“What do you need?” asked the second one.

The third one shrugged.

The warlock stroked his goatee thoughtfully. “I have an idea. What if you help me defeat the humans, and then I’ll have my entire army assist you in eliminating the elves for good?”

“Won’t work,” said the first one, shaking its head.

“No time,” said the second.

“Our lands will be overrun with elves by then,” said the third. “They have declared war on us.”

“They have?” asked the warlock. This was an interesting development.

“They have,” nodded the first troll.

“We beat them to it,” added the second one.

“They didn’t expect it,” said the third.

“But they are fighting with magic,” said the first troll.

“If it wasn’t for magic, we would have finished them,” said the second one.

“Magic would put them back in their place,” said the third.

“I see,” said the warlock. He stroked his goatee again. After a moment, he spoke. “Unfortunately, I cannot spare any magic wielders without depleting my own forces.”

“Then we wasted our time,” said the first troll.

“This is pointless,” said the second one, rising.

“That’s too bad,” said the third, rising to its feet as well.

The warlock held up a hand. “Hold on! I haven’t finished.” He beckoned to the table. “Please, sit.”

The trolls sat back down.

“I can arrange something that will work for both of us,” said the warlock. “I can supply some magical items to aid you, and I’ll even spare some lizardmen to do magic for you, but you will have to give them command of your forces to help you to do the most damage to your enemies. Your success can only be assured if you have an organized army. The lizardmen are clever and have the ability to outsmart your enemies.”

“So you’ll help?” asked the first troll.

“Sounds good to me,” said the second.

“I like it,” said the third.

“I will, however, expect an equal trade for my lizardmen,” said the warlock. “For every lizardman I give you, I want a strong, capable troll to fight for me here against the humans.”

The trolls looked at one another again.

“This works for me,” said the first.

“I think that’s fair,” said the second.

“Good enough,” said the third.

The warlock smiled. “Then we have a deal!” He rose and held out his hand. The trolls took turns shaking his hand and then left the tent, jabbering excitedly with one another. How they listened to each other while talking at once was a mystery to him. Thankfully that was not his problem.

It was time for a lizardmage to command his own battalion. Saliss was the most qualified among the lizardmages, and the most dedicated to this war, so it would fall to him to command the trolls and keep them in line. Communication with those creatures was something he would have to figure out. With Saliss in command of the trolls, the warlock could coordinate the attacks of both his forces and Saliss’ to coincide and do the maximum amount of damage.

Fighting on two fronts was not something he particularly desired, but keeping the elves occupied was a good way to prevent them from deciding to assist the humans. Furthermore, if Saliss could get the trolls to split up and attack the elves from the north as well as the south in a pincer movement, the northern contingent had a good chance of becoming involved in conflicts with the humans, who were merely on the other side of the Jackal River. All the warlock had to do was run some of his forces south of the Boot Plateau and march for Claw lake. From there he could have Saliss’ forces secretly join him and go to attack the human army’s encampment from the south. It wouldn’t be a surprise attack - undoubtedly human scouts would be watching his meager forces every step of the way - but the addition of trolls at the last minute would catch them off guard. Combined with the bulk of his forces from the west, the warlock had the upper hand. If the lizardmage Harse, who had been assigned with a number of other lizardmen to the ogres north of the human settlements, managed to time his own attacks properly, the humans would surely be thrown into turmoil.

The only problem with that scenario was that the ogres still had command of their own forces. But they were tired of defeat. They needed a leader who could bring them results. It was up to Harse to try to manipulate the ogres to attack where and when he suggested. If Harse could prove that his decisions and timing were effective, the ogres might just look to him to lead them. Then true progress could be made on the northern front. Only time would tell if this strategy would pay off.

The warlock wrung his hands in anticipation as plans formed in his mind. He would summon Saliss first thing in the morning. As for right now, he had an experiment to perform.

“Gorc!” he called. “Gorc, where are you?”