Gathering Of The God-Touched (Book 4) (7 page)

The passage inside was cold, and rose so steeply he sometimes needed to use both hands and feet to climb on.

He cast magelight upon the edge of his dagger, gripping it with nervous energy.

The passage necked down, forcing him to squeeze through rock that was cold and hard. Soon he came to a chamber the size of Alistair’s laboratory. There was power here. He felt it as an unpleasant tingle inside his belly.

A caustic wall of odor hit him like a mix of vinegar and rotten seaweed.

An amorphous mass of green and brown slime coalesced before him, a strange, formless thing with appendages that might have been eyes. Bile caught in his throat as the creature sluiced a tentacle toward him.

Garrick slashed with his dagger.

He missed, but it bought him time to draw his sword and hack at it. The slime fell back with a hiss, but his blade became warped and useless. He tossed it aside, giving the creature time to reach another slimy arm toward him. He ducked and funneled magestuff into his spell work.

Fire sprang from his palm, and a roaring sizzle filled the chamber with noxious mist.

Garrick’s head swam, and the chamber spun. He fell to one knee and found the air cleaner near the floor. So he drew a quick breath, pulled his bandana over his mouth, and rolled away as the creature swung a mottled arm the size of a tree trunk.

From this angle, Garrick saw he had burned a gaping hole into the creature, but the wound didn’t stop it. It swung another gooey pod, forcing him to cast a barrier that deflected the blow before unleashing another stream of fire. A roar like water hitting oil filled Garrick’s ears. Swamp fog brought tears to his eyes.

He covered his face and ran through the mist, preparing himself to crash into the girth of the creature’s bulk.

But instead his leap found nothing but air.

He tumbled headlong through the chamber, rolling by luck into another small crease that fell into another tunnel, slanting upward. The creature didn’t follow. Had Garrick killed it? Now was not the time to find out.

He scrambled away, crawling on hands and feet and elbows and knees until he was certain he was out of danger.

Then he sat back against ice-cold rock and gasped for breath.

That had been close. So close. After all this, his story had nearly come to its anonymous end at the hands of a magical ward-beast. “That would be fitting, eh?” he said to himself.

What dangers were the Koradictine and Lectodinian god-touched mages finding?

He stood up and waved the magelight of his dagger before him.

This tunnel curved in a lazy spiral further upward. He climbed until he came to a place where the passage suddenly opened to a platform like a stairwell might open to a roof, and where brilliant light blinded him.

He blinked and shaded his eyes from the blazing light with one hand as his sight adjusted.

It was as if the room had been sliced cleanly from the mountain, leaving the peak floating in open air above. The floor was smooth and polished, as was the ceiling above. They both reflected the sunlight that streamed through the non-existent walls as natural as day.

This, Garrick realized, was the chamber atop God’s Tower.

Chapter 15

“Looks like it should crush us, doesn’t it?”

Garrick whirled to find a man standing behind him. He wore a blue shirt with white laces running up the front, tanned breeches that clung to him like a second skin, and gemstones that glittered from his fingers. His dark hair was cut short along the top and sides but flowed down his back in a cascading river. His cheeks were sunken. Dark circles ringed his eyes.

“And you would be?” Garrick said.

“Parathay,” the Lectodinian said with oily smoothness. “Commander, lover of books, and occasional mage. At your service.”

The Lectodinian bowed with a flourish, then gave a cold grin.

“Marvelous place for a battle, isn’t it?”

The Lectodinian’s spell came so quickly Garrick barely had time to cast a barrier. It was weak, but enough. The Lectodinian’s magic was cold as ice, bold and strong. It was also exploratory, an early volley meant merely to test him.

Garrick glared and struck a defensive pose. He brought life force up to support his shield as Parathay strolled about him with a confident swagger.

“You thought I would wait for Jormar?”

“It seems only appropriate.”

“Koradictines are always late. It will be their eventual downfall, you know? They have no discipline, no vision.”

“And what, I wonder,” Garrick said, “would the Koradictine say about you?”

A throaty voice came from behind Garrick.

“He would say they have no creativity.”

Garrick instinctively rolled to the side and came to one knee as a bloody flash of fire blasted by him.

“Greetings, Jormar el’Mor,” Parathay said. “So good to see you.”

The Koradictine was a large man, fleshed out as if he rarely left an empty dinner table. His bulging red robe flowed around him like a skirt. A yellow sash rode up over his ample gut.

They glowered at each other. These were the most powerful mages on the Adruic plane, and it was obvious they could barely stand to be in the same room together.

“Best friends, I see.”

“Common goals make great partnerships,” Parathay said as he cast another bolt of cold energy at Garrick.

Garrick’s shield throbbed, and his hands grew numb.

“And when those goals are no longer common?” he said.

“We’ll address that when it becomes necessary,” Jormar responded.

The Koradictine spoke thunderous words. Lightning flashed, and Garrick tumbled to avoid a shower of sparks redolent with the odors of burnt honey and curdled blood.

Where Parathay’s magic was cold and hollow, Jormar’s carried overwhelming heat and vitality.

Sweat beaded on Garrick’s brow. He retreated to give himself space, totally on the defensive, now. His life force dwindled, and the other mages seemed to be just now warming to their work. He needed a moment, so he latched onto his link and cast flames at Parathay.

The Lectodinian caught the spell with one hand, then kneaded its energy like clay between his palms until it was a ball of brilliant blue light that he eventually absorbed, the energy simply seeping into his skin until it was gone.

Parathay grinned at Garrick.

“Quite tasty,” he said. His eyes flickered with life. “Is this the best a Torean can manage?”

The Lectodinian twisted his hands together, and a cold web whipped itself around Garrick, its filaments burning against his skin. His life force was drawn toward it like iron to a magnet. Rather than fight it, Garrick used its momentum, sending life force through his arms and legs that burned the net into a cloud of gray ash.

“Fine shot, Parathay,” Jormar el’Mor said. “Alas, it didn’t do the job.”

The Koradictine’s body jiggled as he whipped his arm forward to throw a wave of power toward Garrick, a flow of golden current that rolled through the cavern with dark fishes riding its breaking crest, their over-sized jaws clacking with metallic teeth.

The wave pushed him backward with a rush of salt and sewage.

The fish bit into his legs and arms.

Garrick set gates and cast what remained of his life force at the fish. They fell away, leaving him gasping for breath and in smoldering pain, prone on the floor, and sopping wet as the wave died out.

He was near the edge of the chamber, now, nearly blinded by sunlight, but able to make out the ground below. The Lectodinian army had closed in on the western flank, and the Koradictines were pinching from the east. The Torean decoy mages bought them time, but the eventual outcome was obvious. The orders’ armies were too large. The Toreans’ would soon be destroyed.

His muscles ached and his vision swam.

His life force was all but gone, and the god-touched mages of the Lectodinian and Koradictine orders strode forward, each vibrant, and each with wickedness pasted on their faces.

It was over, he realized.

He would not win.

The thought made him angry. He had been a pawn his whole life. If he was going to die today, he was not going to go out as a meek apprentice.

Garrick grimaced against his pain, willed himself to one knee, then stood as straight and as tall as he could.

Then he turned and faced the Koradictine and Lectodinian god-touched mages one last time.

Chapter 16

Smoke and swordsong rolled over the battlefield as Darien rode among his soldiers. Blood colored the soil, and the screams of the wounded filled the air. Dorfort’s army had held their own until a gathering of Koradictines cast great bolts of magic across their positions.

He called for a retreat to the next line, but three of his men were trapped.

Darien spurred his horse forward, hacking at Koradictine mercenaries as he raced across the field. A battle-ax clanged against his armor, and a sword slashed at his thigh, but his men slipped through the opening he created, and they raced away with shouts of victory.

Koradictine troops chased until a line of Freeborn mages leapt upon the fortified ridge and cast magic into the fray. Flames of blue and orange gave Darien the time he needed, and the hooves of his horse thundered as he made the Torean line.

An arrow pierced the chest of one black-garbed mage, though, and she fell, screaming.

Darien’s men turned to defend once again.

The retreat had been successful, but Darien understood the critical word in that thought was “retreat.”

The orders were winning. They had more men, and their wizards were stronger. It was only a matter of time. The end was drawing near, and there was nothing he could do for it.

His gaze went to the peak above.

Chapter 17

Sweat poured down Garrick’s face, and his body ached. His life force was spent and his hunger ravaged his mind. He had used his rage to force himself to his feet, but once there he had nothing left.

Braxidane!
he thought, or maybe he actually spoke the name, he couldn’t tell.

Braxidane!

Help me!

There was no answer.

He could barely stay on his feet.

“You were unwise to call us out, apprentice,” Jormar said.

“Now you’ll pay the price,” Parathay finished.

Hunger stirred deep inside Garrick, seeming to rise to the movement of the other two. He felt the god-touched mages as they prepared their killing blows. The portly Koradictine soul was a blazing kiln of fire, and the Lectodinian’s the cold breath of winter. Their dichotomy was as painful as a blade.

A thought came with crystalline purity.

He remembered his conversation with Suni, and his eyes widened.

“The most complex spells require the least energy,” she had said, “but the greatest clarity of thought.”

He hoped this was true.

Jormar raised a hand, and Parathay’s eyes focused into intense beams.

Garrick put his thoughts together, setting about creating a spell armed only with a vision of how it ought to flow—matching order with chaos, setting gates and creating an empty loop, a vessel he knit together but left vacant of either magestuff or life force.

He timed his sorcerous phrasing just as Jormar and Parathay unleashed their red and blue streaks of magic.