Battle Mage: The Dark Mage (Tales of Alus) (2 page)

“There were kiriaks and armored viles in the vanguard. If a battle mage could get to less than a single floor from here, then I would have to assume they are dead. If those beasts could be slain, then your orcs, goblins and even trolls will be no match for whoever killed them.

“We can stand here holding the gateway open until Southwall finds us or we can return home, Atrouseon, unless you want to join those sent to sneak out of the castle to find a place to open the next portal,” Palose stated to the warlock that had returned life to him.

“
Djerah, can you hold this open while I try to scry for the rest of our forces?” At the second warlock’s nod, the elder warlock released his power holding the gateway and started a new spell.

Palose watched him closely. Ever since his resurrection, as Atrouseon called it, the battle mage had felt different. He knew that some form of command from the warlock must have been in play to ensure his loyalty to the man. While he didn’t care what happened to Windmeer, Palose was unsure if that was his true feelings or simply from the spell placed on him.

He also felt more powerful than he had ever been in life. The magical strength of a battle mage was minute before a wizard or powerful warlock like Atrouseon, but now he had been forced to hide his new strength. His “miraculous recovery” from a life ending fall on the northern plain had been taken for just such a miracle by the men and women of Southwall, but if his increased magical strength had been noticed by the wizards they would have suspected something was amiss.

Atrouseon’s mumbling had ended for several minutes as Palose watched the castle doorway waiting for the possible pursuit from the men of Southwall. He doubted that they had an exact idea of
where this magical gateway was located, but if the emperor’s creatures were destroyed, they would search until every last one was captured or killed.

When the warlock finished spending several minutes using his magic to scout the castle to assess the battle, his face darkened for a moment in anger. “There are only a few small pockets of our forces left. They are being driven back and some are hurrying this way to escape. The idiots will lead Southwall straight to us unless they get lost along the way.”

“How intelligent are these orcs and goblins?” Palose asked turning to look at his master.

“Smart enough to find their way back and stupid enough to try,” the warlock groaned. “Come on. It’s time to head back.”

Wanting to look smug and tell his maker ‘I told you so’, Palose controlled his face and simply nodded. Let the warlock believe that it was his own conclusion or perhaps Atrouseon simply didn’t feel that he needed to confirm the younger man’s opinion. Either way, Palose figured that it would win him no favors to anger the warlock.

He followed Atrouseon through the glowing doorway and felt his body being pulled. His ears heard a rushing wind and his mind said he was falling a great distance. When his lead foot felt stone underneath that split second later, the world changed and his body readjusted to the feeling of a return to this reality. Where they went to travel to another place on Alus, he didn’t know, but even that split second of using another dimension felt alien to him.

A moment later and Djerah followed him before the glow of the gateway began to flicker. Atrouseon waved off the two men holding the Ensolus side and they released their hold. Palose watched the floating doorway flicker one last time and die out like it had never been there at all.

Palose noted a handful of warlocks along with the pair holding the gate. There were no more bodies for sacrifice since the Windmeer side had already paid the price for the spell, but the mage noted
that this room would have held nearly three of the storeroom that they had just been in moments ago. He had witnessed the hundreds of creatures spilling into the far off storeroom and had to believe this place was a gathering center for Ensolus’ forces.

The resurrected mage had never been to Ensolus or even the Dragon Spine Mountains where it was said that the city lay. He had been a citizen of Southwall from birth and only recently had he traveled north of the wall on missions as a cadet in the falcon corps. It was there that he had fallen from his horse fleeing from the enemy forces and died. It was there that Atrouseon used a controversial spell and returned Palose from the dead as well.

Waving Palose to follow him, Atrouseon led the young man from the massive chamber out into the streets of Ensolus. He attempted to take in his surroundings even as he kept up with the quick pace of the warlock. Where he was being led meant little since Palose had never been in the city and knew virtually no one there. Even his maker Atrouseon and portal partner Djerah were near strangers to him though he had spent part of a week being trained to summon the portal that he had used to lead the army into Windmeer. The coordination of Ensolus with the agents in the field had even managed to arrange a large army near enough to the castle to draw out a large amount of defenders to weaken them for the assault from within.

So much preparation and still the taking of Windmeer had been foiled.

Looking about, the first thing Palose noted about Ensolus was a stone ceiling hundreds of feet above them. The capitol city had been built within the mountains inside of a cavern made large by his wizards and warlocks. After so much time, even stuck between the multiple stories of stone buildings, Palose could tell that Ensolus surpassed other frontier cities like Windmeer in sheer size.

The second thing he noted soon took over his senses and that was the smell. Earth and stone blended with a certain smell that reminded him of decay. Ensolus wasn’t healthy and, whether it was the evil of the emperor or simply so many creatures trapped in one place, the young man didn’t know.

They made a turn and Palose spotted a lake inside the cavern. The buildings were nearly in the water it seemed from his vantage point, but however the city was situated, the lake seemed to occupy a large part of the cavern. He guessed that was Ensolus’ water supply and such a lake could probably provide for a huge population while being used for crops as well, though Palose had no idea what kind of crops they would grow in the cave. While there was light coming into the city, it wasn’t bright and lanterns driven by magic lined each street that Atrouseon led him along.

Another turn brought his attention to some stone spires reaching to the ceiling. Though there were dozens throughout the cavern city, these were near the center and hundreds of feet across. In the dim light, Palose could make out light coming from squared windows on the large columns and he realized that not only had the denizens used the stone to brace the ceiling they had created organic castles within the spires. He guessed that, if every inch of the rock was used, the central column would be more than double the height of Windmeer’s tallest tower.

When finally they entered one of the smaller spire castle’s to the side of the central column, Palose found hallways and doors like any other castle he had been within, but less decorated. Art seemed unimportant and, though there were carpeted hangings, they were quite plain and simply used to reduce drafts and minimize the cold. Carpets lined the halls in long rectangles pushing back the chill in the stone floor and the mage became a bit more impressed with the scope of the attempt. It was rare for the tough northerners to bother carpeting their halls, though most bedrooms had at least one placed beside their beds.

Their long walk ended in front of a pair of guarded doors. For Palose, the brown skinned orc guards were perhaps his biggest surprise. After living with the humans of Southwall all his life, it was strange to think of the beasts they had fought against so long as being intelligent enough to guard anything. They were killers of men and any other place in life seemed impossible to him.

At the sight of Atrouseon, however, the brown skinned guards moved to open the doors as any human guardsman would. Palose tried to avoid making eye contact with the creatures as he entered a large room. More guards lined the walls. Stocky, powerful orcs made up the main ranks, but two trolls stood to either side of a dais with a throne like chair set upon it. The seat was vacant, but a table on the lower floor held three men seated before a table and they all looked up at their newest guests.

The man in the center dressed in black, with dark hair and tightly trimmed beard, looked up blank faced at the interruption with his black eyes; but he said, “Atrouseon, I hadn’t expected to see your return so soon. I take it the attack failed.”

Palose heard no surprise in his voice and doubted that this man would show it even if he was. He was one of those who hid his emotions from lesser men. His power in magic was palpable and the mage thought in his previous life it would nearly be blinding. Somehow in his return to life Palose found his own strength had increased beyond his once meager battle mage level. Still, stronger or not, this man’s power was so far beyond his own that it was like comparing a lit candle to a forest fire.

Atrouseon bowed from the waist looking at the floor motioning behind his back for Palose to follow his example, so the mage bowed as gracefully as he could. It wasn’t a motion often used by the soldiers and mages out in the field or training at the schools where nobles were rare.

“My Lord Devolus, we think that a large force that was supposed to be north of the wall returned before our army could take Windmeer castle from within. My new apprentice said that he knew they had returned and my use of sight magic confirmed that a new group of nearly as many soldiers as we sent inside were enough to repulse our forces.”

The dark haired man seemed to frown with nearly every word of the warlock before him. He frowned at the word apprentice being used for Palose, though the young man was unsure exactly why. He frowned at the information of an army destroying their best attempt at taking the castle in over a hundred years and he also frowned hearing Atrouseon putting so much faith in his “apprentice”.

“You would call this thing an apprentice now, Atrouseon? He is little better than a wraith or some other puppet created from necromancy. Even in Ensolus few dare use such magic and giving it the sense of self is ridiculous. Your resurrection man spell is an aberration and your faith in something made from the body of our enemy leaves me questioning my faith in a warlock like you.”

Atrouseon waited patiently and meekly as the man spoke. Hearing the condescending words for his own existence made Palose want to frown in kind, but the former battle mage did his best to avoid showing any emotion. He had always tried to remain quiet to hold some air of mystery among his peers. Training his face to remain blank in front of a mirror at night, the battle mage had worked hard to perfect the skill.

When Atrouseon believed it was his time to speak, he did so carefully. “My lord, when we caught this mage in flight back to the wall of Southwall, his fall broke his neck giving us an opportunity that we have rarely had. I have studied the various spells of necromancy as my master once ordered me. This resurrection man was returned to life using commands to bind him to me. His obedience to my whims is unquestioned. I made sure to also purge him of his allegiance to Southwall that he might infiltrate their world and still follow our needs.

“He is no imperfect wraith with his skin dying on the bone held together by simple magic. This resurrection man is truly alive and breathing as any other creature. He simply has no will to defy me, his master.

“Though I understand your beliefs, my lord, you may question him and see for yourself.”

Another frown was revealed through the lord’s words as he replied, “Like I need your permission, Atrouseon.”

The man paled and looked ready to explain he had meant nothing of the kind, but already Lord Devolus was already scrutinizing Palose. “Tell me,... boy, how did you come by the opinion that this was a new force that repulsed our attack. When the plan to hit Windmeer from within was brought to us by your master, we were assured that you would wait for the best time to bring the attack through.”

Nodding at the statements, Palose tried to appear calm as he explained himself, “My lords, I summoned the attack force to come at night. The Southwall lords had sent a sizable force north of the wall believing that there was a large army from Ensolus nearby planning to attack.”

“They were sent out as a distraction to buy time for your part of the plan. Nearly a thousand soldiers formed of three brigades were sent to destroy any force sent into the field.”

Shrugging, Palose replied, “That may have been the plan, but one of the battle mages I know was with the force sent north was already deep inside the castle before we pulled back. Erdeeth and Kerlorish had thirty goblins and orcs as well as three trolls to kill the one mage, who had become separated from the rest; but if he was there then, however many returned with him, must have turned the battle.”

“You had armored viles, kiriaks and trolls to destroy any resistance. How could our forces lose?”

“I was there to bring our army into the castle and if the attack failed I was to help get as many of our warlocks clear of the city to find a way to open more portals. Invading Windmeer was a risky plan, which is why I was given alternate options. What exactly went wrong I don’t know, but this mage that I confronted knows some new magic that may have been used against even kiriaks and viles,” Palose informed the men trying to bring worth to this man’s eyes. He was no undead thing to be dismissed as garbage, even by this powerful lord.

Looking unconvinced, one of the men beside Devolus asked, “What kind of magic could a battle mage come up with that is so important?”