Quest for the Dragon Soul Pt. 04

I

Once upon a time, the world hinged on the decisions made by the Seeded Council - they had been an assembly of the most powerful wizards and witches and royal envoys from across the realms and city states that orbited and touched the Cardinal Roads. They would meet in the great tower forged of dark obsidian and bright crystal called the Heligopol. The Heligopol throned in the center of Melit'Zay, home of the Academia Arcana, the great schools of magic. It was also in the Heligopol that the wizards and witches had tried to converse with the Gods after the outbreak of the Arcane Ailment that brought death to many users of magic. Asteytis, Tiengal the Blind, the Sil'hazat, even Thull'Achar ... all the gods remained silent as the Arcane Ailment decimated the Magii Dominii - and those untouched by the Arcane Ailment fell to the growing menace of the Call of Skaelor.

The Call had come from the South and its forces swept through the city states until the great northern kingdom of Ordeyirgoss united the city states of the East and West and thundered down the Cardinal road and halted the Call - fearless warriors and loyal soldiers fought alongside mages young and old to protect the Heligopol. But the Matron Sonorous spoke in a thunderous voice and many soldiers offered their hearts to the Call. Broken lines allowed the Scything Souls and Quieting Angels to overrun the city and the remaining defenders fled North until they regrouped at the gates of Melzay, sister city of Melit'Zay and entry point to the Kingdom of Ordeyirgoss. The battle had been long but the Magii Dominii and the allied forces of men had succumbed. Survivors had been allowed to leave unscathed to spread the story of the fall of the Magedom.

But even after all the death and destruction, life was a tenacious force and beneath the once golden streets of Melit'Zay, beneath the melted tower of the Heligopol, survivors of the Magii Dominii and the Seeded Council had congregated. They had also welcomed refugees from the southern regions and from the neighboring city states. With the little magic possessed by the surviving mages and the presence of an underground river, the survivors built a series of tunnels and caves where they could hide from the Call of Skaelor and contemplate the future.

It was in such a cave that the old wizard and former head of the Seeded council, Thierann, opened his weary blue eyes just as a guard armed with a long bardiche and wearing a simple bronze and leather chest plate and a plain round, bronze helmet with chain mail hanging down the back and sides entered the chamber.

"My lord Thierann," the guard said. "Our spies ... reports are coming in: Videsh'Achar to the east, Gul'Vadesh to the south and even the realm of Ordeyirgoss to the North and West! The Call of Skaelor is silent!"

The old mage nodded grimly as he stood and removed his meditation robes and dressed in his plain gray and green tunic - though he had advanced in age, Thierann maintained a lean physique born of a strict regiment.

"Is this not good news?" the guard inquired as he placed his bardiche by a wall and assisted the mage with his dark cloak.

"No, Liervel," Thierann said, shocking the guard by speaking his name. "It means they have him."

II

All he could hear was a continuous roar as the boat crashed forward into the cold waves of the Ardent sea. The water struck him across the chest and face with force enough to splinter wood but he remained conscious and in agony as his lacerated flesh pulsed with deep pools of red light that illuminated the spidery design of the veins and the scars of battle that pock marked his skin.

Khaln Dharrec, the Second Son, had been chained to the masthead of a stolen ship as it set sail from the harbor of Videsh'Achar and towards the West, its course leading towards the Isles of Seven Thunders and the Everlasting storm. The ship was manned by a crew of obedient seamen under the spell of the Matrons of the Call of Skaelor. The three mysterious women watched the rollicking seas as they stood on the bow of the boat, each accompanied by a Scything Soul - they were the foot soldiers of the Call, made from a willingly sacrificed human heart deposited on a piece of dark, eldritch fabric.

The Matron Sonorous walked down the steps of the aft bow of the two masted ship and towards the forward bow, the torn white cloak stood the only obstacle between her bare flesh and harsh elements that whipped around her, keeping the splashing water of the broken waves from hitting her. She stopped and pointed towards the masthead and two ensnared seamen began to pull on an intricate assembly of chains and pulleys; Khaln was slowly hoisted from the cold water and pulled onto the deck - dripping and shivering, he was unhooked from his painful harness and dragged to a mooring ring and bound there by heavy shackles.

"Feed him," the voice of the Call of Skaelor ordered. One of the sailors yanked Khaln's head back and held his chin while the other brought over a pail full of gruel. The first sailor forced Khaln's mouth open and the second poured the lukewarm gruel down his throat.

Khaln gagged at the sudden influx of food down his throat but offered little resistance and swallowed the tasteless concoction until he felt some of his strength return - the sailors loosened their grip on him as Khaln was listless. But Khaln seized the opening and threw his arms up and seized the head of the sailor behind him and then fell back onto the deck of the broken ship. The sailor's chin crashed against Khaln's skull, shattering some of his teeth while Khaln kicked at the sailor holding the pail of gruel in the thigh, knocking him off balance. Khaln then shoved his shoulder into the stomach of the first sailor, knocking him back with enough force to push him overboard and send him plummeting into the cold, harsh sea. The second sailor had regained his footing and lunged at Khaln. The warrior's skin had erupted in a series of pulses of crimson light and Khaln knocked the sailor's reaching arms aside while side stepping to the left - he came around behind the sailor and Khaln managed the wrap his muscled arms around the sailor's head and he wrenched it brutally upwards and backwards, snapping the sailor's neck.

But Khaln's triumph was short lived as he slumped next to the sailor he had just killed, his new found strength sapped from his limbs - he noticed an acrid taste in his mouth and realized the gruel was somehow tainted with an unknown substance. He pondered if that was what enlivened him enough to exact some retribution against his gaolers.

The Matron Sonorous had observed the entire scene with interest as her white, tattered cloak whipped around her, carried by the voracious winds of the Ardent sea. Khaln watched her as the wind swept cloak seemed to tease him with glimpses of the pale skin of the swell of her breasts and the pink hardness of her nipples - Khaln also remembered his dreams of her.

"Why did you kill them?" she asked as she kneeled by his side.

"You weren't close enough," Khaln groaned, turning towards the matron Sonorous. "When I had the strength"

"Why would you have killed me?" the Matron Sonorous's voice was less thunderous than when she had first spoken to him following the battle of Melzay - she pushed the hood of her cloak back. Her white hair hung around her slim shoulders while a strip of white fabric covered her eyes. Her per breasts were nearly touching his arm.

Khaln balked at her and said, "You took everything from me."

"That you had anything worth taking implies you had a choice in amassing them," the Matron explained as she touched his black and stone gray hair. "But for our kind, choice is ever only an illusion."

The Matron Sonorous reached between his thighs and caressed his limp cock. Khaln grunted and turned away from the Matron - she possessed all the attributes to be beautiful but she was of the Call of Skaelor, yet through the pain and anger he felt, his manhood soon stood as erect as the masts of the ship.

"I'm not your kind," Khaln hissed.

The Matron Sonorous scoffed and stroked Khaln's hard cock. "Of course you're like us, Khaln Second-son - you were made." The Matron Sonorous straddled his lap and reached between her thighs, grasping the top of his cock and placing it at the entrance of her pussy.

"You were made for ..." the Matron whispered as she lowered herself onto his erection - Khaln moaned as he sank into the velvety grasp of her pussy. He closed his eyes and tried to summon all the hate he had felt for the Call, but the perfection of the sensation of how she entrapped his flesh skewered his hate towards desire.

The Matron stayed on his tool for a few moments before slowly standing, exposing her arousal to the harsh elements of the riotous Ardent sea. Khaln looked up at her and noticed her expression had changed - he could not see her eyes but the frown she bore signaled regret. A sentiment he sorely felt.

The Matron Sonorous pulled her cloak close as though she felt the chill of the sea churned air and gestured towards Khaln - two new sailors unshackled him and strapped him back into his harness and the slowly lowered him back into the water before the ship. The cold water did not quell his erection and his body glowed. A helmsman navigated the boat in the direction that made his flesh glow the strongest - the sails were set to capture the wind and propel the ship forward. It broke through the waves and Khaln cursed the gods and men.

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The Cardinal Roads were once paved with richly colored bricks of orange and brown and stretched out from the city of Melit'Zay in the directions of the four winds - now they were cratered and cracked, the brightly colored bricks marred by dried blood and burnt flesh.

Ziel-Tan pushed her mount with duress as the horse's hooves danced across the ragged terrain of the Cardinal road - she was closely followed by the former Blade Bride and follower of the goddess Asteytis, Bailla'Tayne Jeva. The Qoazti archer had bound the displaced warrior woman for having unwittingly lead the forces of the Call of Skaelor to where she was about to spring into action and free Khaln Dharrec from the clutches of the surviving daughters of the Vanguard Draconis and the last survivor of the Vanguard, Slodovor Ven Tivar. But the Scything Souls had fallen on them even as Bailla'Tayne Jeva had slaughtered the daughters of the Vanguard.

Khaln had freed himself and dispatched Slodovor Ven Tivar in a bloodied fashion - but when he had come face to face with Bailla'Tayne Jeva, he faltered in the face of her betrayal and the Call took him. Ziel-Tan witnessed Bailla'Tayne Jeva realizing her unwitting duplicity once the Matron Chameleonedae revealed her chicanery. They had been knocked out and when she awoke, Ziel-Tan saw the ship she had seized as part of her infiltration of the Daughters of the Vanguard Draconis sail out of the harbor of Videsh'Achar with Khaln glowing red beneath the masthead of the ship. She had retrieved all the undamaged arrows that would fit her quiver along with the unconscious body of Bailla'Tayne Jeva, bound her to a saddle, and left Videsh'Achar as the Quieting Angels and Scything Souls stayed oblivious to their retreat.

But not all were blind to their flight - after the first day riding, Ziel-Tan had heard a faint, far away rumble of horses. They were being pursued. Ziel-Tan had taken the Cardinal Road North towards one of the last Ordeyirgossian border outposts, separating that united kingdom from the city states of the south, hoping to double back by the East and circumvent their pursuers but they had moved more swiftly than she had anticipated.

The Qoazti archer and her former Blade Bride prisoner were within spitting distance of their pursuers: highwaymen bent on plundering whatever ruins the war with the Call of Skaelor left, and raping what ever woman they could find. Ziel-Tan had shot an arrow high into the sky while summoning her blind-sight to see what the arrow saw. It was over two dozen hardened riders on mangy horses hellbent to run the two women to ground.

That arrow lost, Ziel-Tan pushed onward, hoping to attain an Ordeyirgossian outpost before the horde found them. Even abandoned, an armored keep was easier to fend off the highwaymen.

"Damn it, I'm tired of running!" Bailla'Tayne Jeva cried out as she fought to keep her balance on the violently pitching saddle she was bound to.

"Thank whatever gods you pray to I don't leave you to them," Ziel-Tan screamed back, her voice barely audible above the thundering hooves of the approaching horde. She still remembered the sight of scores of Scything Souls appearing behind Bailla'Tayne Jeva at the Videsh'Achar harbor.

Bailla'Tayne Jeva was enraged at herself for having been duped and betraying her only friend and lover in this new, desolate era. She looked down at her body, stripped bare but for a band of gray fabric across her pert breasts and another piece covering her sex - her hands were tied to the bridle of the saddle. But the rapid trek of their horses had loosened the rope. Bailla'Tayne Jeva struggled against the bridle until her hands were free but still bound at her wrists. She grabbed the reigns and smacked her mount's flanks with her bare feet and the horse sprinted forward, its nostrils flaring. Within seconds, Bailla'Tayne Jeva was riding alongside the Qoazti archer.

Ziel-Tan gasped in disbelief as Bailla'Tayne Jeva reached down between the racing horses and snatched the fighting ax the archer carried at her side with an deft hand. Bailla'Tayne Jeva then lead the horse to commit to a nearly impossible breaking turn that should have sent the horse crashing - instead, it turned nearly 180 degrees in a few ground tearing strides and Bailla'Tayne Jeva was now hurtling towards the pursuing horde, ax in hand.

Ziel-Tan stared in frustration, but also in awe as the former Blade Bride, and now former prisoner, disappeared into a cloud of dust. The Qoazti archer brought her horse around with more prudent action, but her prods at its flanks were as sharp as her voice as the colt she rode sprang forward after its stablemate.

Bailla'Tayne Jeva was awash in regret at her actions in Videsh'Achar - she had been duped by the Call of Skaelor. She had succumbed to despair at the thought she was alone in the world and they had fed on that. Now, they had left and taken Khaln with them, tearing from her grasp her one chance at atonement. Her despair had now turned to rage and it would be calmed only by blood.

The Blade Brides mount was within sight of the pursuing horde: she saw numerous men dressed in dusty cloaks and ragged tunics. She caught a glimpse of the glint of steel catching the sunlight and saw the spears some carried. She also heard their voices as they hollered obscenities at her - Bailla'Tayne Jeva took their words and used them as a fuel. Time seemed to slow for her and her senses were now preternaturally acute.

Bailla'Tayne Jeva saw an arm extend and a spear was launched in her direction - its line was accurate and precise. But as she saw it trace a perfect arc for her neck, she nudged her mare ever so slightly and the spear passed harmlessly by her, missing her by a hair's breadth. In turn, Bailla'Tayne Jeva gripped the bearded fighting ax she lifted from the archer-woman and she pulled her feet from the stirrups and hopped into a standing position on the saddle. As the line of rushing horses parted at her mad advance, the Blade Bride kicked off the saddle and seemed the hang in mid-air as highwayman rode past her. With impeccable timing, Bailla'Tayne Jeva landed on the saddle of the highwayman's horse and dropped into a seated position behind the stunned brigand. He could barely react when the Blade Bride yanked his head back with her left forearm braced across his forehead while digging the pointed beard of the fighting ax into the soft skin of his throat. Bailla'Tayne Jeva pulled the ax across the highwayman's neck, ripping through his jugular. A geyser of warm arterial spray shot upwards from the wound and fell onto the Blade Bride's face like a crimson rainfall.

Bailla'Tayne Jeva threw the dead highwayman off the horse, but before she could bring the steed around, she caught the glint of a spear tip and she quickly rolled to her right as the weapon had sought her head. The attacking highwayman retracted the weapon and cocked it for a second thrust while struggling to keep his mount from crashing into the Blade Bride's. Bailla'Tayne Jeva saw her opening and when the spear came for a second time, she grasped the weapon's shaft and with uncommon agility she slid her legs onto the side of her horse that faced her attacker - instead of sliding off the steed, she pushed off with her legs and managed to jump over the attacking highwayman's horse. The brigand had been unbalanced after she had grasped his spear and while he stared incredulously at her leap, Bailla'Tayne Jeva crashed into the highwayman's chest and their momentum toppled his horse. As they struck in the hard ground in an awkward roll, Bailla'Tayne Jeva felt the jagged rocks and unforgiving gravel tear the skin of her upper back and shoulders. As blood oozed from a dozen small wounds, she rolled to her feat and sprinted towards the stunned highwayman - before he could draw his short sword, Bailla'Tayne Jeva was upon him. He was a large, bulky man but his heavy tunic made him slow and the Blade Bride was able to duck beneath a wild swing from his powerful arm and the spiked tip of her fighting ax found a spot in his thigh, above his knee. The spike tore through the thick linen of his trousers and blood sprang from the wound.

Bailla'Tayne managed to pry the ax free from the wound with little effort, but it was enough time to allow the highwayman to smash his elbow into her side. Although the blow glanced of her ribs, she felt them buckle under the highwayman's strength - the Blade Bride jumped to the side to dance around her aggressor's follow up blow, managing to slip behind him and she launched herself at the back of his head. Her momentum added power to the weight of the ax and it burst through the thinner bone of the rear of the highwayman's skull - an eruption of blood, brain matter and fragments of bone flew from the wound. The highwayman feel with a garbled curse punctuating his passing.

Bailla'Tayne Jeva had to dodge to her right as the mounted highwaymen circled her - she had managed to seize the spear of her second victim and she held the horde at bay while it closed on her. She could smell their rancid breath and the rot from the infections many of them harbored. Some where fiercely built, but most were mangy and dirty and deserving of pity. But their condition could not dispel the desire for blood and rape and meat in their eyes.

The Blade Bride gleamed movement on her right and she instinctively threw the spear with deadly accuracy and it pierced the charging, hungry highwayman through the chest and and through his heart. The others froze as their dead comrade was tossed to the ground from his immobile horse. Bailla'Tayne Jeva was breathing hard as fatigue gnawed at her muscles from the exertion of battle - she also felt a throb from where the highwayman had elbowed her. Each breath caused a sudden, stabbing pain and she understood at least one of her ribs might be cracked. The horde of highwaymen noticed her labored breathing and some snickered.

But the laughter ended quickly when a rain of arrows falling from the North hit the riders - Bailla'Tayne Jeva saw three arrows bury themselves in 3 necks. The Qoazti archer Ziel-Tan had finally caught up with them and was making up for her tardiness with the swiftness of the death she delivered - two more highwaymen fell before the rest of the horde panicked and turned south. But even as they turned - the clamor of voices and armor and hooves had reached their ears.