The Crown Of Yensupov (Book 3) (24 page)

Too late, the wraith started to transform. Saxthor knew where the wraith hovered. He pointed the wand straight as an arrow, as Queen Merritak instructed, and chanted the incantation. His anger and protective instinct for his friends heightened his energy and sent energy from the Dragon Ring to enhance the wand’s power and incantation. A blue fire-bolt shot from the wand, destroying the wraith in a shower of sparks.

Tournak, Astorax, and Tonelia jumped up. Bodrin rushed back to the group. The blue fire-bolt, the shower of sparks, and ball of smoke that rose from it, all vanished with the breeze.

Tonelia’s hair frizzed in the charged air. She glared at Saxthor. “How dare you two play practical jokes on us after just losing Hendrel?” She said. “He was our good friend and a good wizard, too. How could you play gags at a time like this?”

“It wasn’t a joke, Tonelia,” Saxthor said. “You mustn’t chastise Bodrin; he doesn’t deserve it.”

“I’m ashamed of you, Saxthor. This is unworthy of you. I didn’t think you were the type for practical jokes.”

“It was a wraith, Tonelia.” Bodrin said.

Tournak sniffed the air. “I smell the sulfur. That was something with a lot of power to have made that flash and ball of smoke.”

“It was right over our heads,” Astorax said.

“Yes, and if any of you had said my name, it would’ve shot wizard-fire and destroyed us all.” Saxthor returned the wand to its case and back in the satchel.

Tonelia stared at Tournak, glanced at Bodrin then Saxthor. She looked at the last traces of smoke over her head and fell back in a dead faint. When she recovered, her head was in Bodrin’s lap.

“Sorry about that, it’s lucky I caught you before your head hit the ground,” Bodrin said. He gently rubbed his hand over Tonelia’s hair. He patted her forehead with a cool, damp cloth. “Lie still a bit longer.”

“If I’d stood up and stretched my arms, my hands would have gone right through that thing,” Tonelia said. “And I thought that smell was burned beans in the cooking pot.” She smiled, and the others returned reassuring grins.

The next morning, the adventurers sat in a huddle around the camp, where they dared light a fire behind some rocks. After eating, Saxthor, who was silent during the meal, asked for their attention.

“I’ve given the latest developments a lot of thought. It seems to me that the Dark Lord now knows who I am, what I’m doing, and roughly, where I am.” He paused and looked around the circle of friends. “It’s me he wants, and he’ll stop at nothing to get me, the crown, and jewels.

Before these most recent developments, we were in danger, but it was circumstantial danger. Now the Dark Lord is hunting me. The situation is much more dangerous. Hendrel died in a trap set for us. That wraith last night would’ve destroyed us all if anyone had used my name.” Saxthor paused again.

“I think it’s time for each of you to reconsider going on with me. It’s too dangerous now. Someone, possibly all that travel with me, are going to be hurt or killed. You’ve all been the truest of friends and endured more than anyone could ask a friend to suffer. I’m asking you now to leave and travel another route. I don’t want you hurt because of me. The burden I carry is heavy enough without having to worry about my closest friends being harmed because of me.”

There was a long silence and the different group members searched each other’s eyes with long, stone faces.

“Should we abandon Saxthor to his fate?” Tournak asked. He looked around at the others. “Maybe he can travel unnoticed if he doesn’t have an entourage with him?”

Saxthor looked around at each of them as they thought about all he’d said.

“Okay,” Tonelia said, getting up and packing. “Now that we got that crap out of the way, let’s get going. It’s a long walk to Sengenwhapolis and all the so-called smoke around here is giving me the creeps.” She didn’t look around, but continued to pack.

Saxthor saw grins on the others’ faces and realized he had a lump in his throat. He blinked his watery eyes, cleared his throat. As they packed as usual, Saxthor sat, head in his hands.

“You coming?” Bodrin asked.

“As a child at court, I was alone and unnoticed by everyone except you and Habbernee. Even Habbernee abandoned me later. Now that I’m no one, wandering through the peninsula chased by the most evil of souls, I’ve found the truest of friends. I feel loved more than any time in my life. You people think nothing of risking your lives to see me through this journey that you don’t even fully understand. I just can’t get rid of you people, can I?”

“Nope,” Tonelia said. She tossed her knapsack on her back and extended her hand to Saxthor.

“Better hurry?” Bodrin said, as the group moved out. His grin was his response. Saxthor got up shaking his head, took his pack that Bodrin offered, and followed the others heading south again.

* * *

It was impossible to know the extent of the sorcerer-king’s shock, when he felt the energy flash and disappearance of his vaporized wraiths. He stumbled backward, losing his balance, and grabbed an iron table, sending it crashing to the floor. The searing pain and loss of energy drained him utterly and he crumpled to the floor.

That prince has some powerful friends with him, he mumbled. Those three super-wraiths were as potent as I can conjure. Now the other two wraiths would have to stop the prince, and they’d better not fail.

All day the Dark Lord raged in his lair. Even the dragons chained by the entrance to the Munattahensenhov cringed at the anger vented below. Tremors rumbled through the mountain rock, setting off gargantuan landslides. In the end, the king regained control of himself and focused. He’d turn up the pressure to find the prince and that precious crown.

Smegdor stood at the doorframe watching the storm.

“Smegdor, where’s that blundering Earwig? She’s bungled every attempt to destroy that boy and managed to mangle herself in the process. She’s made a useless pet out of my magnificent dragon. It’s time Magnosious came to the Munattahensenhov and served a master worthy of his power. Summon another wraith, loafing around the Munattahensenhov. They drain my energy and do nothing. We’ll send it south to bring Magnosious back here, where we can train him and send him out after the prince.”

* * *

The wraith raced on the night winds to the southeast. It took a long time, but eventually, the specter appeared at the crumbling Earwighof and floated around it. Has the witch abandoned the palace, she wondered. This is a dump. No,… there’re signs of life or something like it, still in these ruins.

The wraith took form in the evening and began searching through the rubbish-strewn rooms for the foul witch. The she-wraith transmuted back to vapor, when crumbling plaster broke loose from the walls and ceilings as she passed, some nearly striking her. When she found Earwig, even the wraith was shocked at the corrupted carcass.

She looked at that thing lying on her soiled bed with scarlet drool dribbling from her mouth. The smell of sour ammonia permeated the bedroom’s stale air. There was a mound of hair-like black fungus growing from broth in a bowl on the floor. The raspy breathing had to be from lungs long since callused by those caustic fumes. That thing on the bed had to be Witch Earwig. The wraith transformed into a more solid form again, and spoke.

“Dreaddrac’s king sends you his greetings and wishes for a quick recovery,” the semi-translucent form said. She meant nothing in the words, but felt she should pretend kindness.

The strained breathing turned to gurgling, Earwig coughed. The feeble witch stirred on the bed and tried to sit up.

“Who’re you?”

“I’m the king’s agent. He sent me to take the dragon Magnosious back to the Munattahensenhov for training.”

Coughing and wheezing, Earwig struggled to rise. She squinted one eye, trying to see who dared to speak to her with such impertinence. She flashed scarlet pushing her lumpy body upright like propping up a great sack of potatoes.

“Who dares to speak to me like that?” More wheezing followed. “No one is taking my dragon from me, do you hear?” She tried to stand, but she was too exhausted and collapsed back on the bed. She looked to the window. “Magnosious! Magnosious!”

The wraith looked out the window to see the dragon. Magnosious rose from the cramped confinement of his lair, where he’d been sleeping for three days. Magnosious stretched his mighty limbs, crept to the cave ledge, launched, and flew to the tower. He looked at Earwig with upper lip curled.

“Magnosious, this wraith wants to take you away. Flame her.”

Magnosious smacked his lips, looked at Earwig, and then the wraith. “The old witch is no fun anymore. She needs to recover or die.”

“Good evening, Magnosious,” the wraith’s solid form said. “I’m here to take you back to Dreaddrac for training. You’re to aid the great sorcerer-king.”

“Flame the thing!” Earwig screamed. Her flabby arms punched the air above her. “Flame her now.”

Magnosious looked at the charming wraith and then Earwig. He snorted a flicker of fire singeing Earwig’s knotted hair.

“Fool! You got me not her.”

Magnosious turned to the wraith. “I couldn’t care less about that old hag. I indulged her for lack of anything better to do and to stop that incessant whining.”

Earwig stood stunned then smacked her smoking hair. “Magnosious, my pet,” Earwig paused and gasped for breath, “kill the intruder.”

Magnosious looked with indifference at the decrepit thing, leaning against the bed. He rolled the eye that glanced at her and flicked his hand. He turned to the wraith.

“You’re a wraith, aren’t you? I sense real power and a focused mission which that washed up old hag doesn’t have.”

“Kill it, Magnosious,” Earwig said. She turned her head in short, jerky movements, waiting and listening.

“It’s time we left for the Munattahensenhov, Magnosious,” The wraith said.

Wheezing, with spittle foaming at the corner of her mouth, Earwig sank to her knees and croaked, “You can’t leave me, you can’t.”

Ignoring the sobbing behind her, the specter moved to the window. Magnosious stretched out his claw and the wraith settled on it. The great dragon carefully placed the shimmering form on his neck and leapt into the air sending a shower of shingles, raining down from the tower with the balcony. Magnosious circled the Earwighof once for old times’ sake, then, with a powerful flap of his wings, turned north. The wraith looked back, then ahead, and they flew off without another word to Earwig.

*

The shudder that followed Magnosious’ leap into the air went down the tower walls. That, coupled with the wind gusts from the dragon’s flight, finally unsettled the tower’s foundation. After a moment of rumbling, in which Earwig fled, the tower began collapsing in on itself. When the dust settled, the Earwighof was a mound of rubble. The witch looked out on the world through a missing wall in her bedroom.

She stumbled across the floor amid the filth. The only sound was that of the unbalanced broth bowl circling like the dragon before settling again to silence. Only Earwig’s breathing ruptured the silence. “My beloved Magnosious abandoned me without a thought, and he was all I had to show for my life.”

She sunk to her knees knocking over the broth bowl splashing the moldy sludge on what was left of her robe. She, that thing wriggling in its broth down the hall, a few deformed rats, and lots of roaches were the last creatures living in the Earwighof. She clawed her way back up into the rancid bed and lay there staring at her life … such as it was.

* * *

Saxthor and his companions moved across the open plain of northern Sengenwha avoiding everyone. They were wary of potential orcs bands even in the daylight. Where they could find cover, they made use of it. The nights were scariest since the orcs traveled then and used the same limited cover.

“There’re woods up ahead,” Saxthor said. “Let’s take cover before those ranchers herding cattle spot us.”

Extensive open pastures surrounded the thicket, yet brushes and vines provided excellent cover skirting the oaks within. Bodrin led the band along an animal path that continued through a narrow opening into the woods.

When the band entered the grove, they happened upon a group of orcs hidden by their ogre leader who’d spotted the people first. The orcs, swords at the ready, sprang up around the troupe before they could draw a single sword. The ogre leader’s hairy moles twitched, when he grinned at his prize.

“Wonder if that’s them foreigners we was told to look for,” an orc said.

“That deer-man thing ain’t no local,” another said. “We might could eat that one.”

“Drop your weapons,” the ogre said.

The men unbuckled their sword belts and dropped the weapons. The ogre looked the people over carefully; his narrow eyes popped, when he came to Tonelia. The orc that had spoken first took note of Tonelia as well. He walked up to her and tried to touch her. Bodrin jumped between the orc and Tonelia. His eyes confronted the orc with a visual warning. The orc whipped out his sword, but before he could attack Bodrin, the ogre knocked the sword out of his hand.

“We was told to take them prisoners back to Prertsten to the wraith-in-charge,” the ogre said.

The orc ground his teeth and glared at the ogre. The ogre raised his sword and the orc shied, then picked up his sword, slamming it into its sheath. Another glare at the ogre, and the orc turned and walked away.