Bacorium Legacy (8 page)

I should have given up on this futile quest. I should have left when I still had the chance, and returned home, where my children wait for me. This quest was never worth risking my life.

Now it is too late. If I still had the strength, I could turn around and go back. But I cannot. The cold winds drive me only north when I try to travel. I do not have enough left to eat to survive a trip back south.

I will never make it. This cold land will be my grave.

I can only hope that one day, someone will find this journal and take it back to my children. I do not have heart that someone could come as far north as I have and make it back alive. It breaks my heart that my children will never know what happened to me.

There is little light left now, so I cannot write much more. If this diary ends here, then that means I did not make it.

Forgive me. Forgive this foolish man.

That was all there was.

Luca looked at those last sentences, not sure what to make of it. The traveller - he had not survived, and yet someone had found the journal. Had it been Lodin, or had someone given it to him?

It angered him that that was all there was. That man had believed so deeply in his mission, and yet it had led him to death, without ever finding what he had been seeking. It was all nothing more than a shaggy dog story - a pointless waste of time.

He rose and went over to the fire, about to toss the book into the flames when he realised something.

It was not pointless. It was a cautionary tale.

The traveller had hoped that his journal would tell others his story. It was a warning not to throw your life away for an ideal.

Rather than throwing the book into the fire, Luca set it on the shelf of the room.

Maybe later somebody would find the book and learn something from it. Luca would be leaving tomorrow, so there was no sense in him taking the book with him, but if he left it behind in Forga, perhaps someone would end up there someday and discover it.

The cold breeze had not faded, and he felt a strong flow of mana coming from outside the inn. Perhaps because of the Tether, Luca felt the mana was Emila's.

He went to the window, and saw Emila outside in the streets. She had her arms outstretched, and her head up at the sky. Large amounts of mana were being used for some kind of spell he had never seen before.

She seemed to be focusing the mana on the cloud in the sky.

It was then he noticed that it was no longer raining.

Is she altering the weather?

There was no mistaking it. That was exactly what she was doing.

“What a pointless waste of mana...”

He could now see the result. Emila was using her mana, ice-form, as he now realised, to change the raindrops into ice crystals. She was changing the rain to snow.

He frowned. So that explained the cold wind.

Emila was now twirling around as snow fell around her, dancing in the artificial snowfall. She was smiling.

Luca turned away from the window and collapsed on the bed, pulling his cloak around himself to keep away the cold.

So there would be no escaping his nightmares after all.

Outside, Emila continued to dance under the snow.

Chapter III

The Killing Moon

The scent of blood was heavy in the air.

He ran. He ran and ran and ran until his chest burned. Until his veins flowed with liquid fire. Until his eyes bled. And yet he continued to run.

Was he being hunted - or was he the one doing the hunting?

It didn't matter. He could feel the rush of adrenaline. His blade was at his side, ready to be drawn between two breaths. It was a hunt, and that was all that mattered.

Through trees, ducking and weaving, he ran. His feet scarcely touched the ground. He was running so fast he was practically floating.

It was exhilarating, yet terrifying at the same time.

His attacker appeared in a flash. He drew his blade immediately, and parried the attack that would have killed him. They exchanged several blows. They did the dance of blades, swinging and striking, each waiting for the precious moment when the other would make a mistake.

It was he who faltered first. Their blades met, and he was trapped in a parry. His opponent responded by producing a dagger with his free hand, which was used to impale him in the eye.

He screamed. The pain was unbearable. Blood ran down his cheek in tiny red rivers, dripping down to the earth below. But he did not stop fighting, not even for a moment. He was a warrior, and he would fight until he could not fight any more. Even with missing limbs, he would still bite, even if that was all he could do.

His pain and fury gave him strength. His attacks turned to the offencive, and he drove the enemy back. His opponent struggled to block his vicious strikes. Gradually, the tide turned in his favour. He struck a decisive blow. The enemy fell to the ground in defeat, and he mercilessly decapitated the foe.

Red blood flowed.

He stood over his enemy's corpse, a smiled stretched across his face. He breathed heavily, his skin tingled and glistened with sweat, and he gripped his sword firmly and with passion. The thrill of a kill - it was exhilarating.

He looked down at his dead enemy, noting the white hair and blue eyes. His very own.

And then he saw his own face reflected back at him in the ever-growing pool of blood.

The face of Zinoro.

<> <> <>

Luca awoke, not screaming, but gripped with terror nonetheless. He had predicted he would have nightmares, and he had been right. His fingers drifted to his right eye, the one he had lost in his dream, and he was relieved to find it was still there.

The very eye Zinoro was missing.

He sat up, shivering in the cold night air. Despite how cold he felt, he was sweating. His hands trembled, and he felt slightly nauseous. After running his hands through his white hair, he shook his head, hoping to regain some degree of lucidity. When that did nothing, he rose from the bed and went to the window.

The outside was still shaded by the darkness of the night. It was likely midnight or later. Luca knew himself well enough to realise that trying to get back to sleep would be pointless. Once he was awake, he always stayed that way.

Emila was no longer dancing outside in the snow. She had certainly gone to bed by now. But her artificial snow still remained on the streets outside, preserved by the night's cold air.

A glimpse of movement caught Luca's attention. A goblin roamed the streets, sniffing with its pig-like snout at the air.

Goblins were a simple beast, standing at half a man's height, with grey to green skin, and animal-like features. Like most monsters, they emerged at night to hunt for food. It was a safe bet that if you saw one, there were nine others nearby. They bred quickly, and were even prone to eating one another if they failed to find a meal, but they were more of a nuisance than a threat. They were dumb, slow, and weak. A decently trained swordsman could handle a dozen goblins with little trouble.

Upon seeing the easy target of the goblin outside, Luca was filled with the urge to kill. Lingering sentiments of his dream drove him forward. He pulled on his fur clothes, complete with his coat, and took his father's blade and hung it at his belt. He then went as quietly as he could from his room to the front door of the inn.

He paused there, listening carefully for any sound indicating that he might have disturbed Emila. After a moment, satisfied that she slept, he opened the door and stepped outside.

Luca shivered. The cold was sharper than he had thought, striking him suddenly as he moved from the warmth of the insulated inn to the stark outside. Summer in the southern lands was nearing its end, and the nights were getting colder. The fur coat he wore over his back kept him warm, but his cheeks were bare to the elements.

The goblin noticed his presence immediately, and gave out a shrill cry to the open air. It was a call to its companions, telling them it had found prey. The others would come for this. That suited him fine.

Luca drew his sword and charged at the goblin, running through the snow. The beast raised its weapon, a knife carved from an arm's bone. Its meagre attempts were no match for his trained swordplay - he quickly cut the creature down, and pierced its heart with his blade.

The goblin collapsed in the snow. The creature's thick green blood stained the ground and Luca's sword. Its body did not dissipate into mana as a human's did when death took them. Rather, it left behind a lifeless corpse. Goblins, like most monsters, were soulless beings, and they had no souls to be retaken by the spiritual realm.

The sound of footsteps drew his attention. Luca turned around to find that a set of three more goblins had appeared from behind a building across the street. They were all armed in a similar fashion as their companion, wearing shabby scraps of clothing stolen from their prey, and carrying crude knives carved from bones.

He approached the beasts slowly. He considered using magick to blind them, so as to make the kills easier, but the surge of mana would likely awaken Emila. And he really had little need to, for he was certain he could handle three goblins with nothing more than swordplay.

The goblins saw the sight of their fallen companion, but gave no reaction. No anger, no rallying cry, no sorrow. They were mindless creatures of instinct, and death to them was merely a part of everyday life. They did, however, take note of his approach, for they eyed him warily. At last, the dumb things seemed to decide they could handle a single human, and they moved in to attack. The goblins on the left and right moved to either side of him, while the centre goblin approached him directly. A simple strategy - they likely figured that he was unable to defend himself from multiple attacks. These goblins were clearly new to the hunt, though there was really no such thing as a veteran goblin. They never survived long enough to learn from their mistakes.

Luca sprang suddenly to the left, decapitating the first goblin before it even had a chance to react. The goblin on the right cried out in its thick, wordless voice, and raised its bone-knife to stab him while his back was turned. Luca anticipated the attack and rolled aside, which caused the goblin to stumble. As he came back to his feet, he slashed the goblin across the chest. The sharp blade cut through the goblin's thin skin like paper, and the beast fell forward with a choked cry to bleed to death on the ground.

Luca turned to the final goblin, which had ceased its approach and was now reconsidering its attack. He figured there was likely a fifty percent chance of the beast turning and fleeing for its life, or stupidly attacking him anyway.

Not caring to wait for the beast to make its own mind up, he swung his sword through the air and severed the goblin's hand, which held its weapon. It gave out a cry of pain and stumbled back, clutching its bleeding stump. He stepped forward and drove his sword through the goblin's head.

Silence took the air once more.

He kicked the goblin back, pushing it off his father's sword. He turned and saw the second goblin, which still lived, breathing in ragged gasps. He raised his sword up and drove it down into the beast's neck, putting it out of its misery.

After cleaning his sword off on the rags of his fallen opponent, Luca sheathed the blade and walked slowly back to the inn. A modicum of his stress had been eased by the bloodshed. He cared not for the bodies, for other monsters would be drawn to the scent of blood and feast on the corpses. An easy meal. Therefore, unconcerned by further visitors, he went back to the inn.

A cold breeze enveloped him, and he felt the hairs on the back of his neck standing up.

Luca stopped.

He listened carefully. It was almost inaudible, but he had no doubt of it. He could hear the sound of breathing.

Luca turned, his hand drifting to the hilt of his sword. He searched the area, peering carefully into the thick darkness. There was no movement that could give away the location of the unseen voyeur. But now that he had detected it, he had no doubt that he was not alone. He could feel a single set of eyes locked on him, studying him like the meal it no doubt thought he was.

Whatever this new arrival was, it was no goblin. A goblin would have charged stupidly to its death, as the four he had already slain had. This beast was watching him, waiting. It had no doubt been doing so since he had emerged, and had silently witnessed his slaying of the goblins as well. It was intelligent enough to keep its distance, yet it had also seen him effortlessly kill four goblins. And it likely realised he knew it was there, too, yet it did not flee.

Luca drew his sword slowly. The sound of the steel blade brushing against the metal tip of the sheath carried through the dead silence of the ghost-town. It was his announcement. He was saying, '
I know you are here, so come and face me
'.
 

And the creature responded, emerging from the shadows with certain, unhesitating steps.

The monster before him was shaped like a human woman, with a pretty face and hair was black as the shadows that had concealed it. And indeed, it had once been human. But its skin, as grey and lifeless as a corpse's, and its eyes, as red as blood, betrayed its true identity.

The vampire spoke to him, with a voice like lavender wine.

“Your instincts are refined for a human. I expected you would return to the building and return to sleep.”

“You would have killed me in my sleep,” Luca spat.

“Of course,” the vampire said with a raised eyebrow, as though surprised that anyone would be surprised by that. “Two humans staying in the town? I would be a fool to pass such an opportunity. I grow weary of these goblins. Their blood sustains our kind, but it lacks in flavour.”

The vampire grinned, displaying her sharp incisors. Luca kept his eyes away from the vampire's own. If one met a vampire's gaze for too long, the vampire could hypnotise them.

“I first saw the girl when she arrived here, two days ago,” the vampire told him. “What a beauty. And her hair is already dark as the night. She would do well as one of us. As for you - your blood would make a fine meal, but your mana reeks of light.”