The Vaetra Chronicles: Book 01 - Vaetra Unveiled (13 page)

Before Daven could retort, she shook her head and raised her voice. "That's not the case here, though. The ring is a Portal Key."

"I've heard of those," Talon said. "They let sorcerers travel quickly from one place to another."

Sulana nodded. "Right. Portals are scattered throughout the empire, and a Portal Key allows sorcerers to use them. You enter one portal and come out through another."

"But the portals could be miles apart," Daven concluded.

"Exactly," Sulana responded, "and now we need to know who was trying to get his hands on the Portal Key and why."

"So that's why you wanted to go after the buyer right away," Daven said. "You should have told us about this. Maybe we
should
have gone after him while we had the chance."

Sulana shook her head. "No, Talon was right. If this sorcerer has plans that involve a Portal Key, he probably has the power to back up those plans and possibly the support of other sorcerers. We can't confront someone like that with only my limited abilities."

Talon nodded. "Carrying the Portal Key to someone who has the power to take it away from us would have defeated the purpose of our mission to retrieve it."

"So you said before," Daven retorted. "I don't think I fully understood why until now. This guy could be real trouble. Any idea who it is?"

Sulana shook her head. "No. We don't even know enough to guess. I'm hoping Ebnik or one of the councilors will have some theories. But we may not be the ones to find out. They may send a more experienced team to deal with this."

"After all we've been through? Isn't this
our
mission?" Daven asked.

"Our mission is done when we return the ring," answered Talon.

Barek spoke up for the first time in the conversation. "Yes. We finish this mission first. If we get a new mission to go after the sorcerer, we find him and deal with him."

"Barek's right. One thing at a time," Sulana agreed.

Everyone was silent for a moment. Then Daven asked, "If time is critical and these portals are all over the empire, couldn't you have used the key to get us to the Archives faster?"

Sulana shrugged. "Possibly. But I've never used one before, and I've never seen anyone else use one either, so I'm not sure how it works. I'm not comfortable experimenting with sorcery that makes you disappear from one place and, hopefully, reappear in another."

She raised an eyebrow and looked back at Daven, who shuddered.

Interrupting their conversation, Talon suddenly raised his hand and shushed them. "Listen," he said as he stopped his horse. The line of horses closed up behind him and stopped as well.

Sulana listened, but didn't hear anything at first. Then she did hear something.
Thump, thump, crack
. Her horse's ears twitched and it raised its head, nostrils quivering.

Something large was near them in the forest. Talon heard the crack as well and peered into the trees to locate its source, which seemed to be somewhere off to their right. He slowly drew his sword. "Sulana, I think you'd better ready that crossbow of yours," he said quietly.

She did as he suggested, and spoke just loudly enough for him to hear. "This isn't a good place for a fight. Do you remember there being any defensible positions nearby?"

Talon shook his head. "No. The only nearby open area is the landslide behind us, but that has its own problems." Sulana gulped as she imagined trying to carry on a fight while perched on that narrow path where one misstep would mean a tumble down the face of the mountain. Talon tilted his head forward down the trail. "We may be able to reach a spot where the trail's a little wider, though," he suggested.

Sulana nodded. "Okay, let's try for that. What do you think we heard?"

Talon grinned back at her over his shoulder, a fierce gleam in his eyes. "A troll."

Sulana groaned. Fighting a troll in close quarters was not a good idea. Trolls were all teeth and claws and fury. The best way to fight a troll was from a distance, but that wasn't an option on this section of trail.

Sulana looked behind her at Barek and Daven. "Talon thinks we're being stalked by a troll. We're going to try to reach a wider spot in the trail. Daven, ready your bow. Barek, watch for anything coming up from behind us. It could decide to attack at any time."

Barek slid his broadsword from its sheath with a hiss of steel and a grim smile.

Sulana gave Daven a moment to string his bow, which was not an easy feat on horseback. But he'd had plenty of practice trapping one end of the bow in his stirrup and hauling down the other end to loop the string over it. It wasn't something one did on the move, however.

While Daven readied his bow, Sulana tucked her crossbow under her arm and reached into a small pocket on her belt. She extracted a ring with a silver band and a green stone. She slipped the ring onto her thumb, which was the only finger large enough to wear it securely.

When Daven was ready, he nodded at her and the team started forward. As soon as they moved, Sulana heard a low rumbling growl from behind the trees and more thumping noises. She looked over and caught a brief glimpse of dark brown fur moving between the trunks. Her stomach tightened and her pulse pounded in her neck from the adrenalin that flooded her system.

The troll was enormous. She didn't get a clear view, but even on all fours, it looked like it would come up to her shoulder if she were standing next to it.

She had never encountered a troll before, but they weren't uncommon in these mountains, so she knew a lot about them from the tales of others. Trolls were completely covered in thick dark fur and had a leather-tough hide. They had long forelegs and shorter hind legs, both ending with paws that were lethally clawed.

They tended to run on all fours, but would rear up when they closed to attack. The moment a troll reared up was when it was most vulnerable, but the animal was so close to you when that happened that the opportunity to do something was fleeting. In the next moment, you would be fighting off claws that could shred you to ribbons and a long muzzle filled with sharp teeth that could take you apart in chunks.

It was all Sulana could do not to kick her horse into a panicked run, but she restrained her fear and trotted behind Talon toward a wider part of the trail that thankfully appeared ahead. The thumping noise followed alongside them through the trees, with an occasional snap of a branch or swish of a shrub being shoved aside.

The team had just arrayed themselves in a tiny clearing along the trail when the troll charged. It led with a roaring bellow that instantly froze the horses in place. Prey animals were devastatingly affected by a troll's roar because a troll had the natural vaetric ability to lace the sound with paralyzing fear. The horses could remain frozen for up to two minutes.

The humans were briefly affected as well, but Talon and Barek, who had both faced trolls before, snapped out of it quickly. Sulana channeled a little vaetra into her Nullifier ring and invoked it with a stiff word. Her muscles unclenched, and she turned to Daven, who was still struggling to move. She reached over to touch him and triggered the ring again. Daven jumped and then nodded at her in thanks.

In the meantime, the troll was closing in on the team with an easy loping gait through the trees.

Talon slid from his saddle, his long sword in one hand and his dagger in the other. He was grinning broadly now, the light in his eyes almost manic as he stalked forward in a crouch toward the oncoming troll. The troll saw his movement and shifted its trajectory straight toward him, exactly as Talon had intended. Barek slid from his saddle as well, and moved toward Talon's right, ready to flank the troll as it came in for the attack.

Barek called over to Talon. "It's a big one. Think you'll need help?"

Talon let out a harsh laugh. "Probably not, but if you get bored, feel free to jump in. I shouldn't be selfish about these things."

Sulana put her crossbow to her shoulder and took aim at the beast. The trees were a major hindrance, but she thought she could get off one good shot before the creature reached Talon. Daven lined up his shot as well. As the troll emerged from the last of the trees, they fired.

Daven's shot was good, but it bounced off the creature's thick hide at its shoulder. Sulana's crossbow packed enough punch to penetrate the troll's hide, but the bolt to its left thigh didn't seem to do anything other than make it grunt.

Talon looked like a poor match for the animal. The troll reared up on its back legs as it closed with him and opened its mouth in another roar, revealing canines that looked as long as Sulana's hand. It dwarfed Talon, rising to nearly eight feet in height.

The troll reached for Talon, but the old warrior had no intention of letting the beast envelop him. He thrust with his sword at the troll's soft underside and stepped to his left at the same time. Talon's blow was deflected by a rib, but it scored a bleeding line on the creature's chest. Side-stepping carried Talon clear of the creature's chomping bite, but the troll twisted as it came down and slapped him hard in the side with an enormous front paw.

The slap didn't do any serious harm, but the claws scored a furrow of lines in the leather armor on Talon's chest. The blow thrust him to the side and he crashed to the ground, his sword falling out of his hand as the breath was knocked out of him.

Barek came in from behind as the troll turned toward Talon. He swung his broadsword in a two-handed blow that connected just behind the troll's left shoulder. The force of his attack allowed the blade to slice through the creature's hide and damage the muscles controlling its left foreleg.

The troll flinched and roared over its shoulder at Barek. It leaned down and kicked out with a rear leg, connecting solidly with Barek's chest as the big man raised his sword for another blow. Barek's feet left the ground and he flew backward several paces to land on his back in a short skid. He sat right back up, cursing and shaking his head. Then he climbed back to his feet, squared his shoulders, and narrowed his eyes at the troll as he readied his sword and moved forward in a crouch.

With Barek out of his line of fire, Daven twisted in his saddle and leaned forward to see around Sulana for another shot with his bow. He was still unable to move his horse forward to a better position.

Sulana leaned back to give Daven a clearer view, and he let the arrow fly. This time he got lucky. As the creature turned back toward Talon once again, Daven's arrow thudded into the wound that Barek had just opened in its shoulder. The arrow penetrated deeply, leaving nothing showing but the fletching. The creature coughed and pivoted toward Daven and Sulana with a menacing growl.

Talon had recovered himself and took advantage of the troll's distraction to bury his dagger to the hilt in the softer hide under its right arm. The troll flinched back, tearing the hilt out of Talons fingers, leaving the dagger in place. The troll screamed so loudly and with such fury that everyone froze for a moment. The troll looked at Talon, its eyes narrowed in hate. It bared its teeth and exhaled a rumbling hiss at him. As it did, flecks of blood colored its teeth.

Talon reached down for his sword, keeping his eyes on the monster in front of him as it gathered to strike again. Meanwhile, Barek approached the creature's back in a crouch.

Sulana thought the battle might be nearly over, and she considered using the ring to release Daven's horse and hers from their immobility. However, the troll wasn't dead yet, and she could feel her horse shivering beneath her, struggling against the fear spell to run away. She wasn't sure she could control her horse in the presence of a live troll, so she decided to leave it be.

Instead, she pulled the silver ring from her finger and returned it to the pouch in her belt. She drew a short jeweled dagger instead, right as the troll made its move.

Talon had just gripped his hand around the hilt of his sword when the troll leaped forward at him. He tried to raise his sword to skewer the beast in its underbelly, but rather than stay back to take another swipe at him, the troll simply crashed into him and pushed him to the ground. Talon's sword waved uselessly from under the creature's bulk.

The troll's forward leap also carried it away from Barek's blow, which barely grazed the creature's back. Barek stumbled forward, nearly losing his grip on his sword.

Sulana shook her head in frustration. The troll had Talon down again. Barek was positioning himself for another attack, but he was barely able to hack through the troll's thick hide with his strongest blows. He might not be able to kill the creature before it killed Talon.

The troll raised itself up off Talon with its right arm, while its left arm dangled uselessly from Barek's first strike. It opened its mouth wide and prepared to bite down on Talon's head. Even with the creature's weight off of him, Talon did not have enough room to bring his sword into play, and for the first time since the battle began, his eyes showed fear rather than glee.

Sulana made a split-second decision. The troll was about to bite down on Talon, but he was otherwise clear of the beast. Barek was bringing his sword back for another blow, but he was still clear as well. She jabbed her dagger toward the troll and shouted a word. The shout was as much to warn Talon and Barek as it was to release her spell at the troll.

At her shout, the gemstone set in the hilt of her dagger flash once, and then a bolt of lightning arced from the tip of the dagger into the troll's upper back. The crack of the lightning bolt in the small clearing was deafening, and Sulana felt the boom of its thunder in her chest. She nearly fell from her horse in a faint as she channeled the vaetra necessary to power the strike.

Daven reached across to Sulana, grabbed her arm, and steadied her. She smiled up weakly at him and nodded her thanks. Then she looked over to see what she had done.

Talon was still on the ground panting. He sat up to regard her with a nod and a weak smile. Barek leaned forward against his sword, also breathing heavily. The troll was rolled up against a tree at the edge of the clearing facing them. Smoke curled up from behind the animal. Its eyes were staring, and its mouth sagged open with bright red drops of blood dripping around its teeth to the ground.