Blood Loss: The Chronicle of Rael

Titles by Martin V. Parece II

Blood and Steel (The Cor Chronicles, Vol. I)

Fire and Steel (The Cor Chronicles, Vol. II)

Darkness and Steel (The Cor Chronicles, Vol. III)

Gods and Steel (The Cor Chronicles, Vol. IV)

Cover Art By:

Philip Jarvis

All rights Reserved.

Copyright  2014

Parece Publishing, Martin V. Parece II

All rights reserved.

No part of this book may be printed, scanned, reproduced or distributed in any printed or electronic form without express permission from the above.

Chronicler’s Note

Know, O Exalted Reader, that I have no idea whom you are, whether you be a queen or beggar, priest or witch, warrior or scholar.  But I do know that you are now reading this Chronicle, and that makes you a personage of some import, for the ability to read is a privilege that not all in our world have.  Enclosed in these pages you will find the Chronicle of Rael, a tragic story full of bloodshed and loss, but if you have read any of my previous Chronicles, then you know that the Dahken Rael played a pivotal part in the return of his race to greatness.

Now, I may assume that you know what a Dahken is, but if you have not read my previous Chronicles you would not.  For that matter, you may know nothing of our world at all.  I would hate for you to be lost in the fog of confusion, so I might spend just a moment explaining to you something of how the races of the world came to be.

Of course, the gods had before them a world teeming with life, men and women without direction or reason to exist.  The gods each took a people for their own, bestowing on their chosen the gift of powers.  Garod chose the Westerners, light skinned and dark of hair, and gave them the powers of light and healing.  Urso took the Northmen, hardy and strong like the Great Bear Himself.  The elemental gods looked to the hot jungle continent of Dulkur across a vast ocean to the east, a place as dangerous and untamed as They, and selected a bronze skinned people to wield the elements.  Those gods of technology, mathematics and engineering went south from the West to the continent of Tigol, choosing to give their knowledge to yellow skinned peoples.

Finally was left Dahk, the God of Blood.  It will long be debated, even amongst the gods Themselves, whether Dahk betrayed them or simply created his people accidentally, and likely only Dahk Himself knows the truth.  From him sprang the Dahken – a race of warriors whose blood is their power.  When wounded, the wound strengthens the Dahken’s blows well beyond that of a normal warrior.  When they spill the blood of their foe, the Dahkens’ own wounds heal, and some have other powers as well.  The blood of a Dahken forever calls him or her to various places around the world to find other persons or objects, for good or ill.

The Dahken do not breed as normal persons might, and in fact I know of none who have had their own children.  But this is where Dahk’s power is most keenly felt, for he is the God of Blood, and all of the people of the world have blood within their veins.  A Dahken may be born to a Westerner, a Tigolean or even a Loszian (whom I will discuss in a moment).  Their skin color, no matter to what race the Dahken’s parents may be, always turns to the ashen color of a corpse, a gray associated only with the grave, and they suffer from occasional fits of coughing which some may assume to be a weakness.  Despite this, they are known to live well over a century, even two.

Tannes, the first Dahken to be aware of what he was, established a great stronghold in southwestern Aquis, to which he brought all the Dahken he could find.  Over time, he sent his most powerful to other parts of the world so that they too may seek out their kind and bring them together.  Most met with little success or disappeared completely, and the tower of Lord Dahken Noth on the eastern side of the West was obliterated when the Loszian gods arrived in Rumedia.  Their meteor destroyed the tower, and those that did not die from the cataclysm, died from the corruption of the Loszian magic, for their bodies were not compatible with the change as were the Westerners.

When the Loszians conquered the West, enslaving it for centuries, they avoided war with the Dahken.  They found their twisted necromancy to have no effect on the blood warriors, and so they struck a peace with them.  Eventually the Westerners, the children of Garod, overthrew their Loszian masters and used their own powers of light to forge the Shining West.  This was called The Cleansing.  A titanic battle between good and evil created the huge mountain range we now call the Spine, separating the Shining West from the Loszian Empire, and the two civilizations fell into relative peace.

The Westerners and The Cleansing were not finished however, and the Shining West, angry at the Dahken’s unwillingness to aid them against the Loszian Empire turned its ire upon the gray skinned warriors.   Garod’s priests found their powers equally ineffective against the Dahken, but their abilities to heal their own wounded and dying made their armies virtually limitless.  Eventually, the Dahken stronghold in the Shining West fell.  The Dahken were annihilated, and even disappeared from history.

Except my history of course.  And who am I?  I am the Chronicler, a mere mortal and chosen by the gods to live apparently forever and record everything that ever happens in the world of Rumedia.  I am neither the first, nor will I be the last.  But I can assure you, O Exalted Reader, that the Chronicles of Rumedia shall always have someone to pen them.

Prologue

She hobbles through the dark streets of Kashimi with only the moon, faint stars and flickering smoky torches to light her way.  It doesn’t matter, for she knows her path.  Even though she’d been blind in her left eye since birth twenty five years ago, the entire orb milky white in color, her good right eye more than makes up for it.  Besides, she has other senses at her disposal, and they have never failed her.  Though, other Tigoleans do not have the sense in which she is strongest, a sight of a different kind, and this fact has caused people to both shun her and seek her out at the same time.

She knows the whole city street by street, paving stone by paving stone, and no one ever molests her as she goes about her tasks.  Something is different about this night, and she knows it.  The air is thick with it, making it hard to breathe, and it’s almost as if there is a scent on the air.  It’s a warm night, humid too, and sweat forms under her arms between and under her breasts.  But it is not the hot air or the moisture within it that makes this night uncomfortable.  It’s something else, and she can’t quite put her finger on it.

She hobbles as quickly as she can with the heavy burlap sack full of herbs and roots dangling from her left hand, offsetting her weak right ankle.  She had broken that ankle when she was only just learning to walk as a baby, and it never healed right.  Her mother sought out Garod’s priests, as Tigoleans had no wondrous healing magicks, but they would have nothing to do with a heathen.  Despite all their claims of goodness, apparently Garod’s beneficence only applies to His people.

She stops and turns to face an alley to her left, an inscrutable lane that runs between a large smithy and a tanner.  She wrinkles her nose at the horrid smell that always accompanies such places, and she thinks to retrieve the torch that stands on a stanchion next to the smithy’s door.  To an onlooker, and an onlooker there was, she is not unattractive.  She is no more than five feet tall with the small frame common to women in this part of Tigol, a roundish face with almond shaped eyes, and one of which is so dark brown as to be almost black like her long, straight hair.

This is it.  It must happen
, she thinks, and she resists every muscle in her body begging her to run or at least take the torch.

There is a sudden rush of movement within the alley, and for just a split second, she makes out a massive dark form before it is upon her.  The shape exits the black into the torch and moonlight for just a moment, but it is long enough for her to notice certain things.  A heavy brown and hooded robe, not unlike those of Garod’s priests.  The
clinking
and
jingling
of heavy steel armor underneath the robe, and perhaps the glint of the torchlight off the same.  A face hidden in shadow.

Strong hands wrapped in chainmail forcefully take each of her upper arms.  The armor is rough against her bare skin, and she drops the sack as he pulls her back into the alley.  He slams her against the wall of the tanner’s shop, and pain shoots through her back as the breath is knocked from her lungs.  The torch in the street barely outlines her assailant, and he is huge like a Loszian.  But Loszians do not wear armor, and this man’s frame is powerfully built.

“Lay not another finger on me, ruffian,” she struggles out as she gasps for air.  “I am a witch, and I would curse those who dare enter me without permission.”

She watches confusedly, as this seems to have given him pause.  He does not move for long enough a time that her breathe has slowed and steadied, yet he holds her in place against the wood wall no less forcefully.  Finally he speaks, his Tigolean rough in pronunciation as if he has too much tongue or lip, and his voice is one of the most horrible, tortured voices she has ever heard.  Every word sounds like it is a battle for him to utter, as if he chokes, and it is the sound of rough rocks being ground into dust, fading to a whisper as the words end.

“You are a witch?  Then tell me, witch, tell me why!”

“Why what?” she asks, her fear and anger turning to concern for this wretched soul.

“Why do I yet live?  Tell me why the gods do not let me rest!”

“I do not know, leper,” she replies calmly.

“I am no leper, witch!” he says.  He releases her for just a moment, and though she knows this is her chance, she does not run.  He yanks his left gauntlet off with his right, and lets it fall to the ground.  She can make out nothing of his hand in the gloom, and the reflection of polished steel plates lining the back of the gauntlet shines in her eye as it drops.  He takes her right wrist in his bare hand, gripping it with so much strength that she whimpers in pain, and she fears that her bones may crack under the pressure.  “Tell me why!”

She knows he will not leave without an answer to the question, so she focuses on it.  His hand is warm against her skin and uncomfortable with the moistness of it.  Her eyelids suddenly open wide as her wrist grows white hot where he has his hold upon it.  She squirms and squeals, but he will not release her, as if he does not feel the fiery pain.  The realization comes to her, the answer to his question, and her arm no longer burns.

“Because you must be the savior,” she tells him.

He laughs grossly, perhaps the most terrifying thing she has ever heard, and says, “Savior of what, witch?  I am no good man, no hero.”

“You must save the child of blood who would drown in the sea.  Without him, without you, the people of blood will never again see greatness.”

He continues to hold her is his grasp, but the pressure starts to ease until it seems he has forgotten that he still has her.  He lets her go, bends to retrieve his gauntlet and then is gone.  She can hear him running down the alley away from her with impressive speed and stealth considering his bulk and armor.  She imagines that she can see his retreating form in the gloom, or perhaps her other sight makes it possible.

She calls after him, “I wish you luck!”