Mask of Dragons

 MASK OF DRAGONS

Jonathan Moeller

Description

MAZAEL CRAVENLOCK is the last of the Demonsouled, and has defeated every enemy who ever challenged him.

Yet in the sinister Prophetess of Marazadra, he faces a subtle foe unlike any other adversary.

And unless Mazael's masters the Prophetess's deadly game, the dark goddess Marazadra will rise in blood and terror...

Mask of Swords

Copyright 2016 by Jonathan Moeller.

Published by Azure Flame Media, LLC.

Cover design by Clarissa Yeo.

Ebook edition published March 2016.

All Rights Reserved.

This novel is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are either the product of the author's imagination, or, if real, used fictitiously. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without the express written permission of the author or publisher, except where permitted by law. 

Author's Note

MASK OF DRAGONS has many characters and locations. At the request of numerous readers, I have added a 
Glossary of Characters 
and a 
Glossary of Locations
 to the end of the book, providing a short, spoiler-free description of all the characters (living and dead) and locations mentioned in the book. Both Glossaries will appear in the Table of Contents, and should you need to consult them, you can use your ereader's Table of Contents function to quickly check one of the Glossaries and then return to your previous place in the book.  

A map of the book's setting is 
available on the author's website at this link. 

Prologue

For three thousand years the Old Demon walked this world, shaping it as he pleased. 

When he began so long ago, many dark powers contested for the rule of our world. The Imperium of the Dark Elderborn, which ruled from ocean to ocean. The soliphages, who feasted upon the souls of mortals. The Trichirabi, whose mastery of necromancy made the High Lords of Old Dracaryl seem as feeble children. The San-keth, worshippers of the serpent god. The princes of the deep waters and the lords of the burning realms, and a score of others. 

Yet the Old Demon overcame them all with his cunning, banishing them from his sight and locking them away in desolate places and the underworld, forcing them to creep through the shadows. 

He did this not out of benevolence nor kindness, but only that they should not hinder his plans. 

For the Old Demon raised up generation upon generation of Demonsouled, leading them to their doom so that one day he might feast upon their power and become a god. For thirty centuries the Old Demon moved unchallenged through the world, making kings and nations and empires dance upon his strings, until at last he was ready.

Yet at the very moment of his triumph, in the instant he reached out his hand to claim the power and become the new god, the Old Demon was defeated and slain, and mankind saved from his malignant grasp. 

But his old enemies remain, watching the realms of men with hungry, covetous eyes. 

For the Old Demon was the darkest horror of the ancient world…but with him slain, who left has the strength to vanquish the other creatures of dark power? 

Chapter 1: Spiders

Mazael Cravenlock rode west, battle on his mind.

Behind him rode his men, five hundred knights and armsmen upon fierce warhorses. Tervingi horsethains flanked them, clad in chain mail and furred cloaks, long spears in their hands and axes and swords at their belts. Behind Mazael rode his standardbearer, Sir Aulus Hirtan, and from his lance flew the banner of the House of Cravenlock, three crossed swords upon a field of black. Mazael heard the horses’ hooves clomp against the grassy earth of the Grim Marches, the creak of the wagons, the clatter of armor and the murmur of men speaking in low voices. He smelled the scent of horses and sweating men, but the wind coming from the west was cold and clear. 

To the west he glimpsed the distant, hazy shapes of mountains rising over the rolling bleak plains of the Grim Marches, gray and craggy and topped with mantles of white. 

“Skuldar,” said Mazael. 

“Aye,” said Romaria Greenshield Cravenlock.

Mazael’s wife was tall for a woman, and sat in her saddle with the easy grace of long experience. Her face was lean and just a little too angular to be human, a legacy of her mother's Elderborn blood, and her eyes were a shade of eerie, icy blue. Her black hair had been tied back in a thick braid that brushed her hips, and she wore leather armor and a green cloak darkened with the dust of their ride. A bastard sword hung sheathed upon her saddle, and the staff of her Elderborn bow rested behind her. In her hands she carried the short hunting bow favored by the men of the Grim Marches when on horseback, the bows they had used to devastating effect against the Malrags and the Tervingi and the Justiciar Order. 

And, unless Mazael missed his guess, they would soon use them against the Skuldari and their valgast allies. 

“Eager to return?” said Mazael. 

She smiled. “Not particularly. The Skuldari are a secretive and unfriendly people, and not fond of travelers. Nevertheless, I did make some friends there. I hope they are safe.” She gazed the distant peaks. “The mountains are beautiful, though.”

“Bah,” said Mazael’s daughter. 

Molly Cravenlock, Mazael had been told, looked a great deal like him, with the same brown hair, gray eyes, and perpetually grim expression. Fortunately for Molly’s husband, the resemblance ended there. She wore clothes similar to her stepmother, and looked like a lovely, albeit unusually fit, woman in her twenties. 

Many people had made the fatal mistake of underestimating her.

“You don’t care for mountains?” said Mazael.

Molly tossed her head with a scoff. “They’re great damned piles of rock, father dear. Everyone always goes on about how scenic they are, but I just don’t see it.” 

“The Tervingi traveled through the passes of the Great Mountains to reach the Grim Marches,” said Riothamus, Molly’s husband. The Guardian of the Tervingi was a sober-looking man with blue eyes and thick black hair, and even after coming to the Grim Marches, he was still uncomfortable in a saddle. He wore chain mail and leather, and across his saddle rested a long staff of bronze-colored wood. The staff of the Guardians of the Tervingi was ancient. It was, perhaps, the oldest single object in the Grim Marches. “By comparison, the mountains of Skuldar are foothills.” 

Romaria laughed. “This is so. Still, I would not wish to bring an army into them.”

“As we are doing,” said Molly. 

Mazael grunted, one hand upon his reins, the other tapping the pommel of his sword. He called the long, curved sword Talon, mostly because it had been wrought from the claw of the dragon he had killed in the Great Mountains. Riothamus had enspelled the sword, giving it the ability to wound creatures of dark magic. 

“Aye,” said Mazael at last. “As we are doing.” He turned his head. “Sir Aulus!” 

“My lord?” said Aulus. 

“Call for a halt,” said Mazael. “We’ll wait here.” 

Aulus lifted his war horn, blowing a long, wailing blast. Mazael reined up, and around him the knights, armsmen, and horsethains came to a stop. Molly frowned in puzzlement, but Riothamus and Romaria both looked to the west, towards the dark shape of the mountains of Skuldar. 

“Why are we stopping?” said Molly. “It’s not even noon. We’re to meet the host of the Grim Marches at Weaver’s Pass, and that’s still a few days away.” 

“I know,” said Mazael. “We’ll need to fight first.” 

A smile went over Molly’s face before she could stop it. Mazael understood. She was his daughter, and she shared the blood of the Old Demon. The Old Demon was dead, destroyed by his own pride in Cythraul Urdvul, but the blood of the Demonsouled lived on in Mazael and Molly. Mazael knew that she felt a savage joy in fighting, a furious rage that filled her with strength and power and speed, exultation in slaying and slaying until her sword and arm ran red with the blood of her foes. 

He knew she felt those things because he felt them himself, save that he felt them more strongly. 

She met his gaze, and a flicker of dark emotion went between them. Mazael had been a terrible father to her, but he could do one thing for Molly that no else could. 

He understood her completely. 

“Not that I object to a good fight,” said Molly, “but why do you say that? I don’t see any foes.”

“Nor do I,” said Romaria. 

“Not yet,” said Mazael, “but soon. We’ll see our scouts first, and then the enemy.” He pointed. “A dry streambed is about a half-mile to the west. It’s the closest thing to a road in this part of the Grim Marches. If a raiding party came down from Skuldar, this is the best path.”

“And that,” said Romaria, “is why we rode this way?”

Mazael nodded. “If I was the lord of Skuldar, that is how I would begin my war upon the Grim Marches.” He felt a hard smile go across his face. “And if I was Mazael Cravenlock, that is how I would start making Basracus and the Skuldari regret ever setting foot upon the Grim Marches.”

“Start?” said Riothamus in a quiet voice. Riothamus had more of a conscience than Mazael, which he had to admit was not all that hard. The Guardian could not use his magic to harm or kill a living mortal.

Of course, Riothamus son of Rigotharic was clever enough that it never slowed him down.

“The Grim Marches are my lands,” said Mazael. “Its people and the Tervingi nation are under my protection. Anyone who makes war upon them shall answer to me.” He looked to the west again. “And unless I miss my guess, at least some of them shall answer very soon.” 

“Here come the scouts,” said Romaria, shading her eyes.

“I don’t see them yet,” said Molly. “I…wait. Yes.” She looked at Mazael and rolled her eyes. “You do like showing off, don’t you, father?” 

“A lord needs to inspire confidence in his men,” said Mazael. “It helps to guess correctly now and again.” 

A dozen horsemen appeared on the horizon, riding hard. The men were horse archers, wearing light armor and carrying spears and the recurved short bows of the Grim Marches. At their head rode a thin, sharp-featured knight in chain mail, his green surcoat adorned with the sigil of a black crow perched upon a gray rock. 

“Sir Tanam!” said Mazael. “What news?”

Sir Tanam Crowley reined up before Mazael. “Another Skuldari warband, it seems. The bastards don’t know when to give up.”

“Stragglers from Greatheart Keep?” said Mazael. 

“Nay,” said Tanam. “Fresh lads, I deem. About two hundred, maybe two hundred and fifty. Heading down the streambed. Probably think to find a little loot and plunder.” He grimaced. “They have about fifty of those damned spiders.” 

Mazael nodded. “Mounted?”

“Aye, they’re riding the damned things like horses,” said Tanam. He shook his head. “Disgraceful. The gods intended men to ride horses to battle, and that’s all. Not giant spiders.”

“The Tervingi,” said Molly, “might disagree with you on the topic of griffins and war mammoths.”

“Well,” said Tanam, grinning at Riothamus, “a man must make allowances for the peculiar ways of outlanders.” 

“Even the Tervingi have taken to horses,” said Riothamus. 

“How far are they?” said Mazael.

“Four miles that way,” said Tanam, pointing. “They are coming fast. Those spiders aren’t as fast as proper horses, but have better stamina.”

“Did they see you?” said Mazael.

“I don’t think so,” said Tanam. “Impossible to swear to it, of course, but they didn’t react when we left, nor did they change direction.”

“Very well,” said Mazael. “Romaria. Take the horse archers, all fifty of them, and ride ahead. Once the Skuldari see you, hold their attention.” 

Romaria grinned. “Irritate them, you mean?”

“Exactly,” said Mazael. “Ride circles in front of them and shoot them until the spiders pursue. The footmen couldn’t possibly close with you. Then draw the spiders back here. We’ll smash through them, keep riding, and trample the footmen. They’ll run to follow the spider riders and stretch themselves out, and we can ride them down.”

“A good plan,” said Riothamus.

Molly snorted. “Something will go wrong.”

“Something always does,” said Mazael. 

His daughter rolled her eyes. “How very profound, father.” 

Mazael chose to ignore that. “Sir Hagen!”

Sir Hagen Bridgebane, the armsmaster of Castle Cravenlock, eased his horse forward. He was a big knight with a scowling face and a bushy black beard that made his scowl all the more formidable. Despite that, he had a steady temperament, and did a fine job of keeping Mazael’s armsmen ready for battle. 

“It will be done, my lord,” said Hagen, turning his horse as he stood in his stirrups. “Knights and armsmen in the center!” His voice roared like a thunderclap. “Horsethains on the wings! Mounted archers to the banner. Move!”