Message Bearer (The Auran Chronicles Book 1) (37 page)

He didn’t really register
the rumble at first. His mind knew, sensing some dull sound that seemed to growl
beneath the earth, not quite triggering his auditory nerves but tingling at the
edge of his perception.

Even when he was sure he
felt
something
in the air around him he just shrugged it off. There was
Weave magic in the air, he told himself, god knows what weird effects killing
all these magi would do.

Even when the statue
began to move, his mind didn’t quite cotton on. It was only when he fell to the
ground as the giant stone gargoyle stepped off its pedestal did he realise what
was happening. The last thing his eyes saw was the massive stone foot as it
smashed down on his head.

Further down the line,
away from the screams as a stone giant ran amok, sheol soldiers blinked and
squinted as the air shimmered before them. Robed figures stepped out of the
gloom, silver eyes glinting in the moonlight. They moved like cats in the
night, Weave-forged blades flashed. Blood sprayed. Sheol screams filled the
night.

Silas heard the screams.
He felt the disturbance in the Weave. He wasn’t a mage of course, but he’d been
on this earth for over a thousand years and had grown used to the sensation of
its subtle workings.

He wasn’t scared at
first. Silas was never scared. At first he thought it a rogue mage escaping the
mansion, perhaps taking a couple of the sheol by surprise, but when the screams
continued, the concern rippling through the remainder of his army, it suddenly
required his attention.

He’d taken one step when
something moved nearby. He stopped and turned, his bodyguards following suit.
His mouth dropped slightly. For the briefest moment something akin to fear
flickered inside his chest.

A hooded warrior stood on
the grass, head dipped.

Silas’ weak sense blazed.
Something tingled in his memory, the very Weave-signature something he
remembered, something from long, long ago. He couldn’t place a face. A name.
But something wasn’t right about this.

‘Guards’, he said, ‘eliminate
that.’

His men didn’t have his level
of sense. Nor did they notice their leader take a step back. They obeyed
without question, weapons rising to fire.

The air cracked. The
warrior blurred
into
the two men. They didn’t even have time to scream
as a silver sword flashed once. Twice. One gurgled as he fell. The other
dropped with a wet squelch, blood pulsing from his open neck. The warrior
stepped over the dying brother, stopping within a foot of Silas.

‘Who are you, fiend?’
Silas said, ‘I know you, I know I do.’

The warrior raised his
hood, exposing hidden features in the gaze of the full moon.

Silas sagged, knees
hitting the floor, the coldness seeping into his skin.

‘No! No! It cannot be!’

The warrior knelt before
him, their faces level. Silas remembered now, a buried memory bubbling to the
fore.

It remembers.
A voice, ancient as time, pulsed into his mind.

‘You died. I saw you die.’

Silas, Night Brother. You
know better than that.

Silas opened his mouth to
speak, but the words melted into a gurgle as a silver blade slid into his
windpipe. The thousand year old leader of the Brotherhood, Night Brother and
First Sword, died alone, sightless eyes staring at an unsympathetic moon.

‘Cian?’

Seb gently stepped over
the countless sheol bodies. The hooded sentinel warriors had left as quickly as
they’d appeared, slaughtering the sheol with a divine fury, only to vanish back
into the void when not one remained standing. Seb moved through the carnage
now, hoping against hope that they weren’t too late.

‘Seb!’ Cade hissed. Seb
ran over and his heart sank. Cian lay before them, half sat up against the
wall. Piles of dead sheol lay around him, all bearing the injuries from Cian’s
staff. Cian’s blue eyes fixed on them as they approached. He managed a pained
smile.

‘Marek?’

‘He’s dead, Master. The
sentinels returned. Skelwith has been purged.’

‘You did it, boy. You
only went and did it.’

Seb dropped to his knees
before the warrior. He blinked away tears, not wanting to show weakness. Cian’s
aura was fading by the second. He didn’t have long.

‘Don’t worry.’

‘I’m sorry, Cian. I
didn’t want it to come to this.’

Cian coughed. Spots of
red splattered onto his tunic. ‘You have nothing to apologise for, boy.
Nothing. Now come closer. I do not have long.’

Seb leaned in closer. The
building rumbled again. Somewhere in the remains of the mansion another wall
thundered to the ground. Sylph and Cade exchanged worried looks in silence.

‘The Consensus is broken.
Do you feel it?’ Cian said.

‘I do. What does it
mean?’

Cian smiled. ‘I don’t
have a clue. All I know is that change is coming. Already I can feel the Weave
entering this realm, unchecked. How it affects it, how it impacts the Unaware
is a mystery to all of us. You will feature in this new world, boy. How you do
this is up to you.’

‘What do I do? There’s so
much I don’t know.’

Cian’s face scrunched as
a wave of pain racked his dying body. He let out a shaky breath. ‘There are
others out there. The mage Families. They will come seeking answers. Some will
help you. You will need them in the trials to come.’

A wave of emotion washed
over Seb. It dawned on him then, the family he’d discovered, the ones who made
him feel like he belonged to something for the first time in his life, were
leaving him. First Caleb. Now Cian. Even poor Harry. He stifled a sob and wiped
a quick-running tear with the back of his hand.

‘No, Seb. Not alone. Not
anymore.’

The hairs on the back of
his neck rose as a gentle force rippled through the Weave like an astral wind. Seb
stood and turned. His spirit soared and a smile broke out on his face that
reached both ears.

Cade and Sylph stood
before him, but behind them, manifested in their astral forms, stood all the
magi that had fallen in defence of Skelwith. Harry. Mik. Don. The Magister.
Dear Caleb. They all stood, proud in their mage tunics. As he watched he felt
the change behind him. Cian materialised amongst the spirits, standing next to
the Magister. None of them spoke, but the sentiment was clear.

You are one of us.

As one their images
shimmered before fading back into the Weave. Only Caleb remained. He
materialised before Seb, his grey eyes twinkling, even now.

‘I’ll come and see you,
old man.’

Caleb smiled and nodded
before fading away into the Weave.

***

Dawn was breaking as Seb, Sylph and Cade
emerged from the rubble of the mansion. In silence they stepped over fallen
brothers, magi and possessed.
They marched in silence through the
ruins, out onto the front lawn, where the sun was just cresting the tops of the
conifers. Seb stopped, eyes closed, letting the warming rays bathe him.

‘Did we win? If that’s
the right term,’ Sylph said, her eyes still wide and alert even after all she’d
been through.

‘I cannot sense any sheol,’
Cade said. ‘Seb?’

Seb dipped his head, eyes
closed. ‘There are some, but not many. They are without a leader and are
running scared. They won’t last long in the sun. The authorities will capture
them as lunatics.’

‘Silas?’ Cade said.

‘I do not know. I cannot
sense him. Although it is unlikely he would’ve survived the sentinels.’ Seb
placed a hand on the warrior’s shoulder. ‘I am sorry.’

Cade nodded slowly. Seb
sensed the pain inside his friend but chose to stay silent. There were no words
to be said.

‘What now?’ Sylph said,
breaking the silence.

‘We go. Away from here.’

‘Where?’

Seb didn’t think he had
an answer to that question until it was actually asked of him. There were
questions he had. The tower. The voice in his mind. The serpentine warrior.
Marek’s master. There were those out there who would have the answers he
sought. Perhaps he would share with Sylph and Cade, but not yet. Not just yet. Instead,
he simply smiled and nodded.

‘The Consensus is broken.
I can feel the Weave in this world now, subtle, but there all the same. There
will be awakenings across the world. Creatures known and unknown will be drawn
here from across the Shards.’

‘That doesn’t sound too
good,’ Cade said.

‘I suspect it’s good and
bad, but I’m not qualified to deal with it.’

‘So, you’re just leaving,
going off on your own?’

‘Leaving? Yes. There are
others out there, other magi. I can feel them. They are different to me, to
Cian, to the others. They may not even know themselves as magi, but they are
there all the same. I need their advice, their learning, and I will find them.’

Cade nodded, his lips
pursed. ‘Then we will follow.’

‘You don’t need to do
that.’

‘And yet you know we
will. It’s not like we have anywhere else to go.’

Seb gave a resigned smile.
‘That’s a good point.’

They set off. Allies of
circumstance, the three survivors of Skelwith. Seb didn’t really have a
direction, but he had thoughts, instincts. He would follow them, and try to abide
by the best of what he’d learned. As he stepped up the path towards the gap in
the trees that led to the open world, he shrugged off the nagging doubt of
being watched, and set off into the unknown.

THE END

From
the author

I
hope you enjoyed Message Bearer, and if so, you’ll be pleased to hear that book
2 in the Auran Chronicles series will arrive in the first half of 2016.

Also, it’s hard getting a novel to be
noticed in this market we find ourselves in. So if you did enjoy Message
Bearer, and if you have the time, please could you drop a review on Amazon? I’d
be most grateful.

Thanks for
reading,

Mike

http://www.msdobing.com

http://www.facebook.com/auranchronicles

Twitter:
https://twitter.com/srealms_author