DAWN’S LIGHT BROKE through the forest as the sun guided his steps.
Nyalis wasn’t sure how much farther he had to go. The trees all looked
the same, but somewhere in the distance, he could sense the water’s life and it urged him to keep moving.
Blood stained the side of his face, coloring his beard. The pain was unrelenting. He was beginning to wonder if all his efforts to keep the child out of the White Tower’s hands would be for nothing. Perhaps this would be the end of the Aerodyne wizard line, right here near the banks of Tara Springs in this remote clump of woods.
If it came to that, would he have the courage to do what was needed? Could he kill an innocent baby to save humanity? If this child were to fall into the wrong hands, it would mean the end to everything.
Nyalis could hear the water ahead, but the growling of the sniffers was closing fast.
Without warning, a wave of heat billowed past, singeing his hair, as a poorly aimed fireball struck the trees to his right. The thick bark ignited immediately. Nyalis raised his hand to ward himself from the heat as he ran past.
Breaking through the brush, his spirits lifted at the sight of the swift- flowing water, but his boat wasn’t there. He had exited too far north. Nyalis could see the small skiff down river, but it was too far away to reach before the bulradoer were on him.
He was out of options.
Frantically he spun around, his eyes darting from trees to brush to embankment as he searched for a place to hide the child. With no better options available, he tucked the babe up under the roots of a fallen tree.
Taking a deep breath to calm his nerves and focus his mind, Nyalis turned and marched back inside the small clearing. He let his magic seep into the ground as he waited, its tendrils spreading through the root systems of the giant trees. He extracted as much strength from their natural flow as
he could to aid in what he knew was coming. The warmth of their life force flowed into him, giving him a renewed sense of power. His skin tingled as he drew it in.
The two sniffers slowed when they saw him standing there. Spreading out, they worked to flank his position. He let them come. He continued to infuse the root systems with magic as he waited for the right moment to attack.
Nyalis had been trained to survive.
He had studied the teachings of the great war wizards of old: The Five, as they were called—Pax’Sool, Rascalian, Telvarran, Ballidor, even the mighty Aerodyne himself. He had studied their stratagems, their tactics.
Even though he could not wield half the magic they had been able to, he was dangerous nonetheless.
Behind the sniffers, one of the bulradoer stepped forward. “Give us the marked one, wizard, and we will let you live.”
“How very generous of you,” Nyalis said with a sneer as he took a moment to rub his hand down his long beard. “I have a counter proposal. You walk away, and I let you live.”
The bulradoers’ chuckles held a strong note of cynicism. Even with the rising sun, Nyalis could not pierce the raised cowls of the three wielders. “There are five of us and only one of you. Surrender the child and nothing unpleasant has to occur.”
“Yes, well, if I did surrender the child to the White Tower and its Arch Chancellor, very unpleasant things would definitely occur. So, I think I’ll just have to take my chances, if that’s all right with you.”
Nyalis readied himself for the attack. He was only going to get one shot at this, and he couldn’t afford to make a mistake.
The man in front turned his head in the direction of the sniffers and they charged.
No longer caring whether they could see what he was doing, Nyalis forced a final pulse of magic downward into the foundation of the trees. He ducked to the left to dodge the elongated claws of the first sniffer. He wasn’t fast enough to repeat the same with the second and caught the blow across his upper left shoulder. The force of it spun him around, and he nearly went down.
He cried out. The sharp pain of torn flesh was intense. He couldn’t expend his magic for healing, or even to lessen the pain. So instead, he used
it to fuel his rage.
He hit the first sniffer with a blast of hardened air, throwing it into a nearby tree while maintaining his grip on the trees’ root system. He dove to his left as the second swung for the side of his face. Its claws were close enough to feel wind from their passing.
He couldn’t wait any longer.
Leaping backwards to put as much space between himself and the sniffers as possible, Nyalis lifted his hands and the ground around the creatures’ feet split apart. The three bulradoer quickly backed toward the outer edge of the clearing and raised their shields as the deeply embedded root systems reached up and wrapped around the unsuspecting sniffers.
The creatures jerked and thrashed, trying to rip themselves away from
the growing entanglement. The more they fought, the tighter the roots took hold. They howled in rage. Pretty soon their anger turned to fear and shrills of pain as the thick stocks plucked their limbs one by one.
Silence returned to the small glen as the trees finally withdrew back into the rich soil and disappeared from view. What remained of the two sniffers was scattered across the open glen.
The foul smell of death hung in the air as Nyalis fought to catch his breath. He could feel blood running down his back from the open wounds on his shoulder. The tension surrounding the glen was thick enough to bathe in as the three wielders cautiously made their way out to face him.
“That was a cute trick, old man,” the shorter bulradoer on the left said as she pulled back her hood to reveal a mop of frizzy hair. In the early morning light, it had the coloring of a bushel of radishes. “But you’ll find that we aren’t so easy to kill.”
Nyalis was stunned at the young woman’s age. She couldn’t have been much more than twenty and her unique raspberry eyes shone bright with gold flecks. As a wizard, Nyalis had traveled the four corners of the five kingdoms and some places further still, but he’d never seen anyone with
eyes such as hers. For a moment, he had almost forgotten why he was there. The other two removed their hoods as well. The man in the middle, who had been the first to speak, was taller than the others and about as plain as a
loaf of bread. His smooth, pasty complexion helped add to the visage as it bore a similar resemblance to that of a newly baked loaf of white. He had a sharp face and an even sharper nose.
The man on the right was shorter, stockier, and wore a thick beard that covered the majority of his pockmarked face. His skin, unlike the others, was coarse and brown. It had seen enough sun for the three of them.
Nyalis re-wove his shield.
Instead of attacking, each of the three wielders pulled a single item from beneath their robes. The man on the right held out a thick silver shaft about the length of his forearm. It was etched in runes. The young woman on the left held two short rods, each engraved with similar markings, while the taller man in the middle gripped the hilt of a bladeless sword. It, too, was in like fashion as the others.
Nyalis was taken aback. How could they have acquired ter’aks?
Somehow the White Tower had managed to uncover faerie weapons used during the great Wizard Wars of the Second Age. Nyalis thought he was the only wielder still alive to carry one. He had been counting on this fact as a last resort. The mystical weapons were said to have been safely recovered and stored within the vaults at Aero’set.
Apparently, he was mistaken.
With the ter’aks being held at arm’s length, each of the dark wielders conjured their own unique weapon. For the man in the middle, a double- edged blade of orange flame protruded from its hilt. For the woman on the left, two fiery whips extended out and snaked across the ground, igniting
the fallen leaves where they touched. Each whip held a remarkable
resemblance to the reddish color of her hair. Lastly, the short man on the right conjured a blazing battle-axe from the tip of the thick silver handle he held in his right hand. Its greenish flames reflected in the shorter man’s eyes.
It had been almost a thousand years since the last time weapons of the fae were used in battle, and here he was facing three of them.
From beneath his robes Nyalis drew his ter’ak, and a double-edged longsword of golden flame stretched out from the hilt. Unlike most crafted weapons of wood and iron, the ter’aks could be wielded with a single hand.
The only weight each possessed was that of the hilt, making them a very maneuverable and very dangerous weapon.
The three offered a formal bow and called out their names and birth
kingdoms in ceremony from left to right, as if they were considering this an actual wizard’s duel as opposed to what it really was—a forced kidnapping.
“I am Lenara of Cylmar,” the redheaded young woman said as she kept a tight grip on the handles of her whips.
The taller man in the middle raised his hilt. “I am Bellar of Elondria.” “And I am Tolvin, also of Elondria.” The stocky man spun his axe
handle in his hand.
The heat from the weapons was already warming the small clearing, not to mention the patches of flames rising from where Lenara’s whips touched the ground. All three kept a sharp eye on Nyalis, pensive, careful not to take anything for granted.
Nyalis waited for them to finish before he spoke. “And I . . . don’t care.” The bulradoers’ faces darkened.
“You aren’t wizards. You are a disgrace, an abomination.” Nyalis held out his sword, pointing to each in turn. “And if death is what you seek,
you’ve certainly come to the right place.”
Lenara was the first to react. She drew back her whips and yelled as she lashed at him from the side.
Anticipating the attack, Nyalis conjured a shield of air with one hand and deflected her strike while at the same time parry-blocking Bellar’s sword with his own as the man brought it across with a clean sweep, hoping to sever Nyalis’s head from his body. The heat from the blade was intense, causing Nyalis to squint as it went by.
Bellar’s sword slid off at an angle and Nyalis moved to the right. He knew he couldn’t stay in one place. He wouldn’t last three flicks of a
horse’s tail if he was forced to fight all three at once. The energy provided by the trees had helped, but he had no idea how long it would last.
Tolvin and his green battle-axe hung back, letting the other two bear the brunt of the initial attack while at the same time giving him a chance to
move around to a better position.
Nyalis could tell the bulradoer were reticent in their opening moves, no doubt from having just witnessed their sniffers dispatched so brutally in front of them. Their robes were still decorated with the creature’s remains.
As fast as he could, Nyalis angled himself toward Bellar and unleashed a barrage of forward strikes and thrusts that forced the swordsman to go on
the defensive. Each time the blades met, they hissed. The very air hummed with magic.
Nyalis sidestepped to the right, keeping the taller man between him and Lenara’s whips. She had the most leverage, and he wanted to keep her as far
from reach as he could.
Nyalis angled his shield and struck away Bellar’s counter, driving his sword into the ground to his left. The leaves immediately caught fire.
Quickly, Nyalis pulled away and spun to face his short but stocky axe- wielding assailant.
Tolvin, who had thought to circle around behind Nyalis and catch him off guard, was surprised when Nyalis suddenly turned and swung his ter’ak in a wide arc, forcing the shorter man to use his axe to block instead of strike. Tolvin grunted as Nyalis’s ter’ak hit his axe instead of his shield.
Not willing to let himself get flanked, Nyalis moved to Tolvin’s left, positioning the bearded bulradoer between him and the other two. All around, the trees were beginning to catch fire. Sweat poured from Nyalis’s brow as he fought to keep an eye on his attackers.
Tolvin was powerful. His axe swung with relentless fury. Even with the magic of Nyalis’s shield absorbing the brunt of the force, the attack was all but driving him into the ground.
In an attempt to turn the momentum around, Nyalis switched his feet as if to change the direction of his attack, but instead back-swung from the other side. The effort proved ineffective as the stout man lowered his double-sided axe in time to deflect the foray. The connection sent green and gold sparks flying everywhere.
Tolvin was strong but his moves were slow.
Still trying to gain an advantage before the other two worked their way around to his flank, Nyalis momentarily lost his concentration and missed Tolvin’s under-swing. He barely had enough time to angle his shield before the force of the strike threw him from his feet.
He landed against the base of a nearby pine with a grunt. The pain in his back was severe. He couldn’t be sure he hadn’t broken something, except for the fact he was still able to move.
The air had been knocked from his lungs. Gasping for breath, Nyalis attempted to shake off the sudden nausea rising from the pit of his stomach. His arm felt like it had been fractured. He tried using a healing spell but found he was far too weak. Tolvin was closing in. The other two stopped to watch as Tolvin moved in to finish him.
Remaining where he was, Nyalis struggled as if to stand and then fell back to his knees, letting his attacker believe he was too weak to move. The ruse wasn’t too far wrong. Tolvin, seeing his opportunity, charged. Nyalis
rose to one knee, and instead of swinging out with his ter’ak, he threw his shield like a disk, letting it skim across the ground, throwing up leaves in its wake.
The bulradoer, clearly not expecting such a bizarre maneuver, didn’t lower his shield far enough and it collided about shin-high. Tolvin hollered as his legs were ripped out from under him. The force of his already forward motion flung him through the air where he landed face-first in front of Nyalis. His axe slipped from his fingers and the ter’ak’s blade immediately disappeared.
Nyalis sprang into action. He leaped to his feet and plunged his sword through Tolvin’s back, severing the man’s spinal column and pinning him to the ground. His body didn’t even jerk. The skin around the blade hissed as
the flesh melted. As always, there was very little blood. The heat from the blade had cauterized the flesh. It had also set his robes aflame.
There was a high-pitched squeal over his right shoulder. Without thinking, his reflexes rewove his shield and raised it just in time to deflect the lash from Lenara’s whip. The sound of it was like a crack of lightning. The tip ricocheted off the top and spun back around to strike her across the left side of her face, hissing upon contact.
She screamed in fury and the fire brand momentarily vanished. There was a deep, enflamed gash that once again left very little blood. All reason fled from her raspberry eyes as she conjured the long strand of red fire and struck at him with everything she had.
Tripping over his feet to get out of her way, Nyalis swung his shield left and then right, trying his best to keep her from splitting him in two.
Lenara’s eyes shone hotter than her weapons as she swung from one direction and then another, searching for a way to break through his
defensive barrier. He knew it wouldn’t take much. He was barely able to stand.
Nyalis coughed. The smoke from the flames surrounding the small open area was suffocating. It took everything he had just to counter her advances.
His arms were tiring. Sweat continued to pour down his face. Complete
fatigue was setting in. Even as light as the ter’ak and shield were, keeping them up and moving was proving more of a challenge than he feared he was capable of meeting.
“I’ve got the child!” a voice suddenly called out above the din of battle, bringing the two combatants to a premature halt. Both fighters seemed
almost relieved at the forced break. Nyalis and Lenara struggled to catch what breath they could amidst the smoking ruins of their battleground.
With all his attention focused on the frizzy-headed young woman and her whips, Nyalis had lost sight of Bellar. Keeping his shield up between him and Lenara, he glanced over his shoulder in the direction of the child’s hiding spot beside the fallen tree. Nyalis watched as the tall bulradoer lifted the cloth-wrapped bundle into the air.
Before he could react, Nyalis was forced to block another harsh barrage of lashes from Lenara’s whips. This time, she was looking to cut his legs out from under him. Dropping to his knees, he deflected the attack and then rolled backwards far enough to keep out of the way as they lit the ground around him. He was halfway to his feet, when Bellar’s unexpected screams brought the two fighters around once more.
They separated momentarily to see what was going on.
Bellar had managed to undo the babe’s swaddling and was attempting to hold him when he suddenly dropped the naked boy into the tall grass and held out his hands.
Nyalis squinted to get a better view of the tall bulradoer through the smoke. The flesh around the dark wielder’s fingers and palms began to dissolve, falling off in clumps around the bone.
Bellar hollered in pain as he ran for the river. He dove in, hands first, desperate to stop the deterioration. “What is happening to me?” he cried out.
Lenara spun around, hatred pouring from her face. “What did you do to him, wizard?” she shouted, raising one of her whips as if to strike.
Nyalis tried to catch his breath. “As much as I would like to claim credit,” he said, his words weak from exhaustion. “I did nothing.” He
glanced at the bulradoer in the water and then at the unwrapped babe. “It was the child.”
Lenara aimed a whip in his direction. “What are you talking about?” She kept her distance. She was apparently as winded as he was and more than willing to use the unexpected diversion as a way to regather strength.
“The child is a faeling. He’s magic born.”
“We know what he is, you old fool!” she spat as she slowly encroached on his position. “What did he do to Bellar?”
“I suspect it was Bellar who did it.”
“Quit talking in riddles, you old white beard, or I’m going to cut you in half and feed you to the corax!”
The two continued to circle each other, just out of range for either of their weapons.
“The child’s magic is pure,” Nyalis said, attempting to drag out the explanation as long as possible in order to catch his wind. “It hasn’t been twisted into a perversion of what it should be as you and your master have done. So when Bellar touched the child,” he said, pointing off in the direction of the river, “I suspect his own polluted form of magic could not coexist with magic in its purity and it tried correcting itself by peeling off the taint.” Nyalis took a deep breath and shuddered. It was all rather fascinating. “Removing pieces of him, I guess, is just a side effect.” He lifted his arms out to the side. “What can I say . . . Lucky me.”
“Ahhh!” Lenara snapped her wrist and her whips flung into motion. Not bothering with his sword, Nyalis concentrated all his effort on holding back her violence with his shield. Back and forth he danced, ducked, spun, and rolled, giving every last ounce of strength his body possessed to hold her at bay. His arms were bruised and swollen from the beating they had taken by the strikes on his shield, and he was quickly losing blood from the gash on his forehead and the claw marks on his upper left shoulder.
His magic was nearly depleted.
Seeing a quick opening, he raised his ter’ak just in time for one of her whips to wrap completely around the blade and meld. Without waiting for what he had done to register with the young bulradoer, he snatched his arm back with all his might and jerked the whip from her hand. The fire
immediately vanished as the silver rod hit the ground behind him. A look of shock crossed her face just before swinging out with her other arm and nearly taking off his head.
Nyalis dove to the ground and rolled as the whip flew over and sliced clean through a thick mountain fir. The enormous tree toppled, crashing to the forest floor and forcing the two of them to dive in opposite directions to prevent getting hit.
It was the distraction he needed.
Nyalis scrambled to his feet and ran for the faeling. Scooping the babe up in his arms, along with the discarded blanket, he sprinted along the water’s edge with as much speed as his aged legs would carry him. His chest burned with every breath. Sparing a brief sidelong glance as he passed
Bellar, Nyalis could hear the man’s sobs from where he sat neck-deep in the water, both hands still held under.
“That’s what you get when you mess with a real wizard,” Nyalis hollered on his way by, just before tripping on a protruding bit of rock that sent him sprawling into the soft mud of the riverbank. “You old fool!” he berated himself as he climbed back to his feet, checking to make sure he hadn’t injured the child in the process. “Serves you right for opening your big mouth.”
Up ahead, his boat was resting half on shore, water lapping against the stern.
Behind him, Lenara’s curses broke from the tree line as she ran after him. If he could reach the boat with enough time to toss the child in and push off, he might in fact escape with his life, something he had honestly not expected to happen up until this point.
Her younger, more stable legs were gaining on him. Continuing to half- hobble, half-run down the embankment, Nyalis could see he wasn’t going to make it in time. In a miserable sort of way, his mind briefly wondered if it wouldn’t be easier to just let her end it. A quick snap of her wrist and his problems would be over. No more sleepless nights, no more trekking over mountains, no more tireless pursuit of protecting a world which cared nothing for its own protection. Why was he killing himself anyway? Then he felt a slight tug on his blood-stained beard.
He smiled inwardly.
Reaching the boat, Nyalis placed the naked faeling on top of a stowed tarp and turned to face the young bulradoer. She was coming fast. What was he going to do? She was far too close for him to be able to make a safe push off without her whips cutting him in two. Frantically, he tried to think. His energy was too depleted to weave a shield, and too drained by far to conjure his ter’ak. The noise of the river’s flow pulled at his thoughts, sparking a slight possibility. It wouldn’t take much, he thought, just enough to slow her down.
Without wasting precious time pondering the validity of his idea, Nyalis reached out and emptied himself of every last bit of magic he had left. He stretched his hands out to the already flowing river and gathered some of its natural force. Using its energy, he swiped his arms sideways from right to left and sent a wave of water slamming into the side of the oncoming bulradoer. The unexpected attack threw her into the embankment, dousing
both whips in the process and pasting every last strand of her frizzy locks to her face.
With a shove, Nyalis pushed the small skiff off the edge and into the fast moving current. He struggled over the side and collapsed into the bow. He didn’t have the energy left to even lift his head to see if the bulradoer had made it to her feet, or was giving chase, or if they were still close enough to the bank for her to reach them with her whips. At that moment, none of it mattered. He had expended everything he had and the rest he left in the
capable hands of the Creator.
Pulling the child down into the bottom of the boat with him, Nyalis closed his eyes and listened to the sounds of the river as he lapsed into unconsciousness.
 |
Unaware of how long he had been out, Nyalis struggled to raise his head.
Blinking against a late afternoon sun, he pushed himself into a sitting position. The sky was clear and the air warm as the current guided them along. His nap had resuscitated a little of his magic, and he could feel it struggling to build within him. He needed nourishment.
He pulled out one of the last remaining costa roots from his robe and bit off the end. He squeezed what milk he could into the babe’s hungry mouth. He watched the naked child squint against the light of the setting sun,
bubbles seeping from a toothless grin.
The old wizard’s smile was loving and warm. “Well, that simply won’t do, now will it?” he said, staring at the boy’s head of white hair. The last thing Nyalis needed was to have gone to all this trouble to hide the child and then have something as mundane as the color of his hair give him away. “Hmm, let me see what I can do. I think I might have enough magic for
this.” He placed two fingers on the soft part at the crown of the child’s head. Focusing his magic, he mumbled a few runic words and the boy’s hair shifted to a modest ash-blonde. “Yes,” he said, inspecting his work. “I
believe that will do nicely. Once it starts to change back, it will be time for you to begin your journey.”
After spending a significant amount of time squeezing the last drops of the root’s milk into the child’s mouth and dunking the boy’s backside into the river to clean yet another one of his gruesome bowel movements, Nyalis rewrapped the tattered swaddling to fend off the chill of the evening air. With a weary sigh of relief, he leaned back against the seat and contemplated his next move. The boy needed protection, which meant he had to be kept hidden for as long as possible.
Nyalis knew that the White Tower and its new Arch Chancellor would expect him to take the boy to Aramoor, the capital city of Elondria. It was the largest and most magnificent city among the five kingdoms and would certainly offer plenty of places to hide. Yet, he couldn’t shake the feeling that he did not want the child raised amidst the politics and corruption that thrived in such a place.
Instead, Nyalis believed the boy should stay close to the magic that had helped bring him into existence—the forest. He needed to learn humility, not the pursuit of power. He needed to be taught how to respect and love those around him, not how to manipulate others for his own gain.
Such values were rare in a city like Aramoor, and Nyalis didn’t want the child to be tainted by them. The boy’s destiny was far too important to risk him being drawn into the temptations of self-indulgence. While Aramoor was a splendid city and its current High King was a just and fair ruler, along with many of its people, the safest way to avoid trouble was to steer clear of its path.
Nyalis thought of a small community of wielders he knew in Easthaven, on the edge of the great Sidaran Forest. He could leave the boy there. They would be able to keep him hidden for as long as needed, but more importantly, they could raise him away from the corrupting influence of power. Being near the life-giving force of the forest would also help to nurture the magic within him.
Raising someone with the power and destiny of this child would be no easy task. Nyalis could only hope that the boy’s new guardians would be equal to the challenge. Looking down at the now-sleeping child, Nyalis was filled with a deep sense of pity. He knew the immense burden that would one day rest upon those tiny shoulders. The fate of Aldor rested on this marked child.
Drawing on what little energy he had left from his brief rest, Nyalis conjured a funnel of air, pointed the boat eastward, and pressed on.
“Rest, little one, while you still can.”
For sixteen years, the old wizard watched and waited.
