“Bring me either, and I will grant you whatever you desire: an entire kingdom to feed upon perhaps? Or a place of power beside me as I send the world into chaos? Do not fail me, and whatever you desire is yours.”
“Yesss, Shoo-keen. Yesss!” the Choska replied greedily.
It didn’t linger further. It turned and leapt once on its big hind legs. After a second hopping leap, it snapped out its wide leathery wings and took to the air. Roark rode solemnly on its shoulders, looking like some ancient battle lord on his way to face something far worse than death.
Pael shivered at their departure. He could only imagine the terror that the sight of the dark armored warrior riding atop the Choska demon would instill in those who saw it coming. He was almost certain that the sight of his daughter, Shaella, on the back of her massive red dragon didn’t exude as much pure evil-born fear as the two red-eyed dark things that had just left.
The memory of Shaella’s wrathful eyes on him the last time he had seen her, caused him to re-evaluate his estimation. Nothing, Pael decided, was more terrifying, than an angry bitch on a dragon’s back.
Save, of course, for the wrath of Pael.
Morning came, and the hung-over soldiers unknowingly stood in line for their rations of hellcat stew. The meaty slop helped take the edge off the residual ale induced grogginess. The hellcat’s haunch-meat had a succulent sausage flavor. That pleasant taste masked the evil taint that Pael’s experimental spell casting had left upon the meat.
Pael was gone. King Inkling, in Glendar’s body, explained Roark’s absence to his other bodyguards, with the suggestion of a secret mission involving Pael. They wanted as little to do with the wizard as possible. They accepted the information, and as good soldiers do, asked no questions and showed no further concern.
Inkling spent the day’s march getting used to riding a horse, and feeling out the confining body of King Glendar. The imp was pleased that Glendar’s mind was cruel and weak. At least the mental aspect of his new home was comfortable. A few nights later, a bit of Glendar’s consciousness fought to the forefront long enough to get Inkling to experience a woman at a roadside inn in the Dakaneese Town of Pearsh. After that night, Inkling gave his host enough headway to allow himself to tap Glendar’s knowledge of human ways. It wasn’t long before Inkling was enjoying the flesh of women as much as, if not more so, than Glendar ever had.
The towns of Owask and Osvoin were ripe with Wildermont slave women. Inkling didn’t know it, but his obsession with human sexuality kept him in perfect character. Not even the Duke of Portsmouth, one of Glendar’s captain’s, and a man who had spent much time around Glendar over the years, suspected that the King was not in control of his own faculties.
For Inkling, the farther south the march took them, the more he grew to like his new place in the world. He figured he would be disappointed when they finally reached O’Dakahn and they had to start looking for ships to carry them on to Seaward. He was wrong however.
O’Dakahn was a cesspool of lust and greed, full of whores and gambling halls. Anything you could imagine could be had for a price. It was all free to Glendar, of course. The new King of Westland had brought with him gifts, which caused King Ra’Gren to cater to his every whim. As King Inkling and Glendar’s four hundred soldiers boarded the three ships, King Ra’Gren provided for them, he found he was more than content. As they say, “It’s good to be the king.”
It was only later, that Inkling began to have regrets about his situation. A human body can sometimes get very uncomfortable. He, and most of the men aboard his particular ship, began to fall ill, and when the men began to vomit blood and die horribly, the other two ships started to keep a distance. As it turned out, being a King held little weight with superstitious sailors and ships’ captains at sea, especially when everyone on your ship had the plague.
King Jarrek, at the moment, was a bitter man. Not only had he been forced to flee his own lands, he had watched as some of his closest companions died trying to defend his exit. He’d seen the wizard Keedle, his longtime adviser and confidant, blown from the wall like so much fodder. Men, nobles, friends and family alike had died around him in their hard earned, red King’s Guard armor.
He had watched on helplessly as the Ladies’ Twin Towers were toppled by the Westland wizard. Inside them, his own mother and his betrothed, along with most every notable mother, daughter, and sister in all of Castlemont had been killed in the devastating crumble.
He had seen soldier after soldier sizzled in their tracks, and then was held in shocked horror as the pride of this kingdom, the millennia old mountain fortress Castlemont, was leveled by the magic of a single man.
Targon, the Highwander wizard, said it was done by demon’s might, but King Jarrek had seen with his own eyes that it was Pael. When he had attended Glendar’s Coming of Age celebration a few years ago, the spindly, old egg-headed wizard had given him the shivers. And Glendar, oh what a disappointment to old King Balton that boy must’ve been. The only thing keeping Jarrek from crumbling himself was the hope that he might someday get the chance to face Glendar and Pael; that, and the fact that somebody had to go to Dakahn and free his people from the slavers.
King Jarrek suddenly thought about the warning message he had sent to King Broderick. The rider was Marshal Culvert’s son, Brady. The Marshall had died in the battle. Jarrek hoped that Brady would make it to Dreen, the capital city of Valleya, to warn them of what was marching their way. Brady would be safe there. The young man had trained hard with both bow and blade to earn his Redwolf armor, and was a capable woodsman too. With two of the four cavalry men they had picked up in High Crossing riding with him, Jarrek figured that Brady had a better chance of getting through than most would. Old Marshal Culvert would’ve been proud of his son. Jarrek hoped he had remembered to tell Brady as much before he had sent him off.
As his mind drifted from horror to horror, Jarrek stared absently at the dark clouds rolling down from the Giant Mountains to the north of them. A light drizzle fell now, but the downpour was coming. He could feel it in his weary bones. The storm mimicked his mood all too well, and the precipitation hid the occasional tear that trailed down his cheek. They would be in the thick of the lower Evermore soon. The forest would offer at least some protection from the coming weather.
King Jarrek, his three remaining red armored guardsmen, the Highwander wizard Targon, and two cavalrymen made up the party. The cavalrymen were nothing more than glorified bridge guards, who had probably fled at the first sign of attack. Jarrek couldn’t be angry with them for it though. After all, what was he doing?
The group had crossed out of Wildermont and somehow managed to escape the Westlanders’ pursuit. They had made it into the fringes of the Evermore Forest, where it touches the northern tip of the Wilder Mountains and borders the Leif Greyn Valley.
For days, they had ridden up and over rocky ridges, then down through thickly forested valleys. Up and down, over and over again, until finally, they were about to put the hills behind them. They were now descending the last un-forested hillock and about to enter the thick of the Evermore Forest.
Targon had tried desperately to get word to his Queen of what had transpired, but it wasn’t yet to be. He had drained himself so completely when he’d made the tunnel-like tube through the fabric of the world to save the King of Wildermont, that he was only now, days later, beginning to look alive again. Jarrek had thought that the man would die. At first, Targon had looked like a corpse. If he hadn’t insisted on coming with them, Jarrek might have left him in one of the mountain villages that they had passed recently. The wizard’s intense desire to share his ramblings of demon might and broken bindings with his Queen, and the simple fact that Jarrek wouldn’t deny a man who had saved his life anything, had kept him from it.
King Jarrek wasn’t sure he wanted to meet with the Witch Queen. She was rumored to be a strange and powerful woman, who had lived for hundreds of years. Just thinking about the unnatural mess of it made Jarrek shiver.
He doubted that most of the tales were true. Targon had told him that they weren’t; that she wasn’t really an old witch, and that she would most likely help them in any way she could. But who could trust the ramblings of a half dead wizard. The remoteness of her kingdom, and the strange ways of the people who ventured out of it, lent to the spooky image of Highwander, like butter lends flavor to bread.
King Jarrek’s practical side knew that the place, however magical and mystical in nature, was once the seat of all the human lands. The palace in the city of Xwarda was ancient, and had once been the home of many of the realm’s heroes and legends.
Targon didn’t have to defend his Queen, or the Kingdom she ruled over. King Jarrek most likely wouldn’t be alive if it weren’t for him. As a man of honor, Jarrek would dutifully repay his debt by escorting the man any where he wished ago. What could a Witch Queen do to him compared to what King Glendar and Pael had already done? She couldn’t be as bad as rumors would have one believe. Maybe she would lend him enough men that he could ride to Dakahn and try to free some of the people Glendar had sent into slavery there. It was a big hope, but enough to keep him from sinking into the gloom and sorrow that threatened to consume him.
The rain was coming down hard now, but the end of the storm was in sight. To the north, along the tailing edge of the black swirling clouds, was a golden line of sunshine. A few days of clear blue sky seemed to be pushing the storm southward. Another dark line was on the horizon, beyond the expanse of blue. It was no surprise. In the heat of summer, storm after raging storm came rolling down out of the Giant Mountains. His only realistic hope, was that the sun would still be in the sky when the rain finally passed over them so that they might dry out before nightfall. A glance ahead of them, reminded Jarrek that they would be entering the forest soon. The sun wouldn’t be able to penetrate that canopy, he knew. The sun would heat the soggy woods like a steam bath. He decided that he wouldn’t even begin to look forward to dry clothes until they had a fire raging.
The wyvern’s first swooping attack was so smoothly carried out, that no one in the procession even noticed the cavalryman in the rear being clawed out of his saddle, and hurled to his death. The rumble of distant thunder, and the chink and jangle of the horses plodding along on the heavy earth, masked what sound the steady thrum of the rain on their steel plated armor didn’t drown out. The wyvern’s second attack wasn’t so successful – though it might have been, had its first victim’s horse not whinnied out in fright and confusion.
The noise brought Jarrek’s head around. A dark flash of movement caught his eye, just as the wyvern’s claw clamped down on his shoulder plate. He couldn’t do more than avoid the beast’s other claw, but the fact that he was looking in the right place at that moment saved him from having his face ripped off. Such was the force of the wyvern’s momentum, that Jarrek was unhorsed. He fell from the creature’s grasp, and landed heavily in the sloppy mud. Captain Proct, of the King’s Honor Guard, snatched up the reins of Jarrek’s horse, and began calling out orders.
“Hargh and you!” he pointed at the remaining cavalrymen. “Get the wizard into the forest! Now!” He paused, seeing his King struggling to get to his feet in the slippery mud. “Markeen, help me cover the King!”
The edge of the tree line was just a good hard gallop away. The red armored King’s Guard, Hargh, had already snatched the reins out of Targon’s hands, while the terrified bridge guard spurred his horse ahead of them towards the trees. The fact that he separated himself from the others so quickly cost him.
The wyvern came thumping down on heavy wings, directly in front of the man’s horse. The horse rose up, and lashed out with its hooves, but the toothy maw of the black-scaled terror shot past them like a striking viper. The horse and rider fell, the animal thrashing in its death throes as it did so. Half of its neck and throat was already being chugged down the wyvern’s long snaky gullet. The man screamed again, as the horse’s body crushed his leg, but the sound was drowned out by the thundering storm.
Hargh led the wizard swiftly towards the forest, in a route than arced around the feeding creature. Captain Proct took a chance, and deftly strung up the bow he’d taken from an abandoned shop at High Crossing. He knew the gut string wouldn’t hold its tension long in the rain, but he hoped to get at least two or three arrows loosed before it stretched and was wasted.
In a move that surprised everyone, the wyvern left the screaming bridge guard pinned under his horse, and darted across the muddy ground towards Hargh and Targon. Its hind claws sent up great splashes of dirty water as it threw back its wings, and dove in for a headlong attack.
Hargh slapped Targon’s horse in the rump with the flat of his blade, and then came around with his sword held high. The wizard was carried out of harm’s way. Hargh’s steel met black scales, while razor sharp claws came ripping upward. The man’s sword bit deeply, nearly severing one of the wyvern’s fore-claws, but its other claw, caught Hargh under the chin. Hargh’s jaw was nearly torn from his face and his helmet went spinning through the air, slinging strands of water at odd angles through the downpour.
Black acid-blood spurted from the wyvern’s wound across red armor and horseflesh. Then, the wyvern took two steps back, shrunk in on itself like a compressed coil, and leapt into flight directly at Hargh. As it passed over him, it used its hind claws to rake him out of his saddle. A corrosive hiss, and a small trail of smoke trailed up through the rain, from his writhing body, as it crashed back into the earth.
Captain Proct loosed an arrow at the beast. Then, as quickly as a man in full armor could manage, he sent another. The second struck the wyvern near where one of its wings joined its body. The creature roared out in pain, and the long, snaky thing veered clearly to one side in its flight. The wyvern roared again, as it tried to alter its new course with its injured wing. It did no good. The creature came crashing into the wet earth in a tumbling flailing splash.