Chapter 35 The Fortress
THE FORTRESS
“No, no, no,” Venrick said, working his way to the rear. He tried to open the door, but it wouldn’t budge. He tried again, pushing harder but the door wouldn’t open.
“Ash,” he swore, searching the wagon for a way out. He tried the hatch on the roof. Nothing. He tried to wedge open the boarded and barred windows. Nothing gave.
“Not good, not good,” Venrick said.
In his indecision, Venrick had squandered their opportunity to escape and find Lark. “And there is no way Hardin would’ve locked me in here,” he told himself.
He took a deep breath, searching the interior of the well-stocked wagon. I can’t imagine that there’s anywhere better to be than in Tel Roan’s weapons wagon if I want to spring forth from a trap, ready and armed, he thought. His eye was instantly drawn to the brismil scale.
“She doesn’t have it,” he said, his heart sinking, but he now knew what he had to do. He had to do what Tel Roan would, fight.
Venrick stripped off the leather armor, slung the spare scale harness on.
He secured the brismil scale into place.
A flash of energy spurred throughout his body.
Crystalizing ice, and crackling fire tore through his veins.
Everything increased around him. His senses heightened, his strength surged, his focus honed.
He drew the largest great sword from the rack and strapped it to his back.
He belted two shorter swords to his sides.
Throwing daggers he attached around each leg.
In one hand, he took a star mace, the other now held a loaded triple-headed crossbow.
Then he hunkered down as much as he could with all this gear in the center of the wagon to wait.
When the wagon finally stopped and a powerful charge of red light ripped the wagon door off its hinges, Venrick was ready.
He let the bolts fly, two Morsythians dropped.
Venrick erupted from the rear of the wagon like a wild animal.
With a wild swing, he crunched the mace from one hulking Morsythian to the other.
One glance told him the stone-walled courtyard where they’d parked was full of the blue orcs.
As they crowded in around him, he noted some had the cursed amulets around their necks.
Many were bound against their wills, just as he was.
All had glowing red eyes and black winding tattoos.
A red mist like the one that trapped had Ingamar ripped through the air toward him.
He rolled, taking a throwing dagger and landing it on its mark, between the rib and pectoral of the orc with a glowing amulet.
The mist evaporated as the orc fell from the dagger in his heart.
Venrick rolled to his feet, sliding a short sword from his belt.
With the mace in one hand and a short sword in the other, he launched his attack.
They came at him as fast as he could strike.
There are so many, he thought, wondering if he were fighting against an entire army. Tel always said a man in brismil plate armor was a walking legion.
Venrick didn’t stop moving, knowing the strength from the brismil would carry him on. He weighted his entire body behind every hew of his mace, crashing it into multiple nine- and ten-foot-tall Morsythians at once. The blue bodies dropped, yet his strength did not wane.
He swung the mace, twisting his hip hard into the throw.
It crunched against the target. A crack sounded and Venrick nearly tripped.
Glancing down, he realized that the handle was all that remained of his mace.
A weight hit him from behind and Venrick rolled forward.
A Morsythian moved in, but he jumped up, stabbing him through with his short sword.
Drawing the other short sword, Venrick set to work again.
Time blurred. He couldn’t tell if he’d been fighting for a few minutes or hours.
The Morsythians continued to press him. Eventually, the swords, like his mace, broke.
He flung the dagger into one of the orcs wearing an amulet.
The only sword Venrick had left was his two-handed great sword.
Energy from a Morsythian spell-caster exploded around him, clearing space on the floor of the courtyard for him.
Suddenly a single clap sounded throughout the courtyard.
All the Morsythians stopped, arms instantly hanging loose at their sides.
In unison, they straightened into the same posture, a blank stare crossed their faces as they peered forward like puppets held tight on strings.
Venrick remained in a fighting stance, two hands firmly gripping his great sword.
A door swung shut at the other end of the courtyard, drawing his attention.
A slow clap from a single set of hands sounded again. The applause from the individual continued as the Morsythians cleared to the sides of the square at once.
“Venrick, well done,” that familiar voice said.
Venrick’s eyes widened as he recognized the face of the mage apprentice approaching him. Magi Joc, the Archmagus’ pupil, clapped at him, his copper hood falling back to expose his identity.
“You,” Venrick hissed through gritted teeth. He coiled to launch his strike, determined to kill the mage who had cursed him so the curse would end.
Joc raised his hand as though to cast a spell, but instead of casting, he simply closed his fist into a tight grip. Venrick halted immediately mid-stride. The brismil armor gave him more energy as he demanded, urging him to resist, but Venrick couldn’t move.
“I thought you might actually do it. Tel would be proud of you,” the mage said with a cynical smile.
Venrick struggled to speak, to say something to resist whatever spell had ahold of him. But this wasn’t a spell. Joc had never spell-cast on him.
“I bet you’re wondering how you could possibly be stuck in place right now, even while wearing your Paragon’s brismil armor?” the mage asked, walking so close Venrick could feel this man’s awful breath on his face. The great sword stuck straight out next to him, it’s killing blow just out of reach.
Joc casually glanced at the sword and said, “It is remarkable what this power can do to those who are captured by it.”
Venrick’s fingers betrayed him, prying open against his will. The sword clanged to the ground. There was nothing he could do to stop himself from reaching in and unclasping the brismil scale. The armor vanished from his body.
“I’m sure you noticed by now that there are others who wear an amulet like yours. Ones who can suddenly cast amazing magic, without the use of a Yogo or a Hyalite,” Joc said.
Venrick’s arm disobeyed all his bodily will, removing the scale and handing it over to Joc.
“It’s because of this,” the mage said, taking the scale from Venrick and holding it with a long sleeve of his robe.
“Lamar has not been ready to experiment with brismil the way Nordraven has. The Four Kings are desperate. They know what’s coming from the deep North.
They’ve fought the rimeshade. They know what will happen when the Flashover begins. ”
The flapping of wings pounded the air above the courtyard as a pair of smaller dragons dropped down and landed among the dead bodies. A third massive dragon followed but stopped to perch on the thick wall above them.
“You’ve just delivered to me what was right under my nose,” Joc tsked. “And I would wager that the woman is not far behind you. It’s a shame. All that work. All that effort you, Tel Roan, and the rest of your haggard rag-tag group have invested in trying to get it back.”
He sighed dramatically, “And now you’ve led them all right to me.
Wrapping you up in chains will make a nice present for them, don’t you think?
” he snapped his bony fingers. “Better yet, you can be their executioner.” He grinned, exposing a wicked yellow smile.
“Best keep that big sword. We have some heads we’re going to set rolling. ”
Venrick willed himself against the power, but the curse controlling him was too strong. He couldn’t break free.
Lark worked her way down through the snowy ravine, staying out of sight of the city until the moonless night covered her movements.
Once she reached the edge of the forest, she steered toward the road, tracking it close enough to the city that she could see the orcs on patrol.
The few stationed at the outposts sat by fires, chatting loudly and laughing.
She waited as three passed along the road that apparently circled the valley and watched them enter the next outpost. Soon after, three different orcs emerged to continue along the loop to the next post. Once they’d gone, she passed across the road behind them, entering Red Lodge among a few rows of houses to the north.
The chill of the night air cut through her fall weather cloak.
She shivered and took the first opportunity she came across to duck into a covered building where no one was visible in the room.
“Olrug, is that you?” someone called out in a thick Northern accent.
Lark rubbed her shoulders. A rack of thick fur-and-leather coats hung near the door.
She grabbed one and threw it over her shoulders as she silently opened the door and headed back out into the snow-dusted street.
The weight of the fur coat enhanced her ability to conceal her features in the dark.
Lark moved more freely now, trying to get a sense from her necklace about where the Hyalite might be hidden.
The pendant burned as it had when a source of power was close by.
She would be greatly surprised if it wasn’t here.
As she drew close to the fortress, she noted that the entrance was begin guarded by two armored Morsythians with massive poleaxes. Their matching tattoos denoted that they belonged to the same tribe. The black ink rose up their beefy arms to points, that ended on either side of their necks.
Lark crossed the street in front of them, her head bowed, covered by the large hood.
She peered through the open gates of the entrance and into the courtyard beyond.
She paused when she noticed the wagon, Tel’s wagon.
Giant and Thunder were tied to a chain in the wall.
The draft horses snorted, stamping their feet, clearly under some kind of duress.
The rear of the wagon, though warded by powerful magic, had been ripped apart.
She couldn’t help but stop to stare through the opening.
This drew the attention of one of the guards at the entrance, who tilted his head slightly as he looked at her.
His voice was barely audible as he spoke to the orc across form him.
Now they both took notice of her. One made a move toward her.
Just as Lark thought she might be sniffed out, the orc’s posture relaxed.
His face slacked and his arms sagged. He suddenly completely lost interest in Lark and returned to the gate.
She heard them mutter something about a shift change, and then they turned to enter through the raised portcullis and disappear around the corner.
Lark’s heart sank. Venrick and Hardin, they could’ve been captured.
Before the gates could close, Lark sprinted through into the open fortress. She passed by without hitting any wards that would alert the guards. Giant and Thunder calmed at her touch.
“Shhh, it’s okay. I’m going to get you out of here, but I need to know if Hardin and Venrick are somewhere inside?”
The horses whinnied, bobbing their heads up and down.
“Are you sure?”
They bobbed again.
“Good boys,” she said, untying them and slapping them lose. They charged out through the gate, snow flying up behind the wagon wheels. She heard orcs gasp as the unmanned wagon flew past.
Lark slipped off the fur and drew her blade.
Power tingled as it coursed through her.
She darted farther into the fortress at breakneck speed.
She slid into the courtyard. Morsythians lined the walls, all standing at attention.
Each one wore the same slack-jawed expression as the two outside had.
The black dragons were nowhere in sight.
The burn pile they’d been torching all day was a heap of Morsythian bodies.
Lark charged back through the halls of the fortress, searching for any sign of animate life. Each soldier or guard she passed by was flaccid, staring straight ahead as though their minds were not attached.
“What the ash is going on?” Lark thought.
She burst through another door, this one opening into a long great hall. At the far end was a throne. Morsythians lined the open-air throne room. Venrick sat in the center in front of the throne wearing the same expression as the Morsythians.
“Venrick,” she said, using a burst of power from Stormbreaker to slide right up to him. “Venrick, come on, let’s get out of here!”
He didn’t respond.
“Venrick?” she said, shaking his shoulder.
He didn’t move, didn’t blink, didn’t even acknowledge that she was there.
“What’s happened, Venrick? Say something,” she demanded. “Is the Hyalite here? Is Hardin alive?”
No reply.
“Venrick, wake up!” she said swinging to slap him awake.
His hand shot up lightning fast, catching her wrist before it landed.
Lark’s eyes widened in horror as he turned his expressionless face toward her, a red glow cast on his features from the amulet around his neck.
His grip tightened. He blinked, his expression changing ever so slightly to fear as he struggled with his words.
“Lark, you should not have come here. I’m… ”
“What, Venrick. You’re what?”
“Sorry,” he forced out before the emotionless slate replaced his pained expression.
“Venrick?” she said.
With the same speed, he snatched her hand holding Stormbreaker.
She tried to pull away, but his grip was powerful.
Too strong to be his own. He twisted and a gut-wrenching sound echoed through the hall.
Her wrist snapped, the bones breaking clean through.
She screamed as she dropped the sword. Something slipped under the strap holding the blade on and cut it free.
The weight of the sheath on her back was lifted.
Nausea and pain blurred her vision. Another familiar figure moved in from behind the throne to stand beside Venrick.
The rider in the brismil plate armor, his helmet sporting two curling horns.
Lark’s heart dropped. She recognized him from the recent firestorm.
Venrick’s grip tightened on her broken wrist, increasing her pain.
Just before she passed out, Lark saw a robed man with black hair and slender features walk in, his grip in one hand formed a tight fist. In his other hand, he cradled the Hyalite.