Protector Of The Grove (Book 2) (37 page)

Djeri changed his tactics. Instead of resisting Blayne’s pull, he ran towards the fire. The surprising move caught Blayne off guard and the ringmaster stumbled. Djeri twisted and yanked forward, pulling Blayne into the pillar with him.

They struck the pillar with a thud, rebounding off a barrier of air at its center. Djeri felt a flash of heat and backed away immediately, not wanting to test the armor’s capabilities further. Blayne came out with him, cursing wildly, his clothes and hair had been set ablaze.

The ringmaster leapt to the ground and rolled, but the magically charged flames were difficult to extinguish. When Blayne stood, he was unharmed, but his hair and clothes had been burned off completely. The only things he was still wearing were the protective wrist bands that generated his protective spells.

“Dag-blast it!” Blayne shouted.

“You look like a big naked dwarf baby,” Djeri said.

The ringmaster roared and came at Djeri swinging, but this time there was no extra strength behind the blow. His magic trinkets had fallen off when his hair had been burnt away. Djeri’s academy hand-to-hand training kicked in and he grabbed the ringmasters arm then, using his newfound leverage, threw Blayne to the ground, climbing on top of him.

“Somebody get me some rope,” he yelled.

*          *          *

Aloysius’ pull on Esmine was formidable, but once she had chosen to go to Tarah, his rights to her had been severed. Sheer force was the only tool he had left and his will was great, much stronger than Tarah’s alone. This changed the nature of the battle. Binding a spirit against its will was solidly in the realm of dark magic.

Aloysius felt defeat coming. With both Tarah and Esmine working against him, there was no way he could win. The problem with using dark magic for binding is that it is strong in the short term, but weak in the long term. Even if he succeeded in his fight, there was no telling how long his sword’s enchantment would last. The spells binding the rogue horse’s resistant spirit would eventually break.

This wasn’t an acceptable scenario for the gnome. Once he had realized that, his anger had faded and he stepped back from his pride. What did it matter in the long run? If he let go, his sword’s magic wouldn’t be boosted, but the rogue horse would be bound to Tarah Woodblade’s staff instead. All he had to do was take the staff from her.

He would have no say in the nature of the staff’s magic but, whatever it was, he could put it to good use. Taking the weapon from her wouldn’t be too hard. After all, she was bound and kneeling. Even if the new power of the staff allowed her to break free, he had her friends for leverage. One way or another, she would give him that staff and he would have that rogue horse’s soul.

Having made his decision, Aloysius let go. He let the rogue horse run to Tarah’s open arms. Then he stepped out of the world of spirit and opened his eyes.

Dawn was breaking and the camp was in chaos. He stood with eyes wide. A great pillar of fire rose from the ground to the right of him. The bodies of dwarves and stewards lay everywhere. Madison was down. Evan was a burnt husk. Only Oliver stayed at his side. Oliver, who liked to be called Shade, was the most capable and bravest of his red sashes.

“What has happened, Oliver?” he said.

“We are losing the battle, Scholar,” Shade said. “I suggest we retreat immediately before they try to strike you down.”

As if in response, one of the academy forces, a tall man with a stiff face, fired an arrow towards Aloysius’ heart. Shade swung his sword, intending to knock the arrow out of the air, but the arrow pierced through his wrist instead. The red-sashed steward cried out with pain, but he didn’t let the wound stop him.

Shade fixed the archer with a promising glare. He reached into his cloak and withdrew a knife, throwing it before the archer had time to fire another arrow. The archer saw the throw and turned his body, taking the knife in his arm instead of his heart.

“We must leave, Scholar,” Shade said again as he grabbed the bloody shaft of the arrow and pulled it all the rest of the way through.

“Not just yet.” Aloysius’ eyes were focused on Tarah Woodblade. The young woman had stood and was staring at the staff in her hands. As Aloysius watched, blood poured from the wood in a gush, covering her hands and arms and pooling on the ground beneath her. She lifted her eyes to meet his. Her hatred reflected back at him.

“Stay back, Cletus!” commanded Shade and Aloysius saw the young gnome warrior approach, his chain swinging in his hand. Cletus didn’t stop as commanded. He approached Aloysius slowly, his head cocked as if confused.

“Cletus stop and apprehend that girl, Tarah Woodblade!” Aloysius commanded. Cletus didn’t answer, but his chain spun faster and faster in his hand.

Shade stepped forward, switching his sword to his undamaged arm and Cletus stopped. He couldn’t harm a steward, of course.

But then Tarah Woodblade was there, out of nowhere, Aloysius could have sworn she hadn’t moved. Her staff arced through the air trailing blood in its path towards Shade’s head. He brought his sword up to block, but she disappeared again. She was behind him now and her staff collided with the back of Shade’s head, knocking him down.

Aloysius lifted his sword, settling his body into defensive stance and shifting his vision to spirit sight. How had the girl done that? Was it part of her staff’s new power? Tarah stood over Shade’s unconscious form, looking down at the steward’s face while the blood from her staff poured over him.

“Strike her, Cletus!” Aloysius commanded. “I want that staff!”

“No,” said the gnome warrior. “I won’t hurt Pretty Tarah.”

“You will!” Aloysius raged. “I am your scholar and I command it.”

“You are no scholar,” Cletus said and his chain flashed out, its heavy lead ball striking Aloysius between the eyes.

*          *          *

Tarah stood over Shade, still not sure whether or not to kill him. She let the blood from her staff continue to drip on him as she decided. The flow of blood had slowed now. She wondered how much was left.

“I didn’t kill him all the way.” Cletus looked down at Aloysius’s body with a conflicted expression on his face. “Did I do good or bad? What if he was a scholar?”

“You did good, Cletus,” Tarah replied. “You hurt the bad man.”

“Tarah!” shouted Willum. He rushed over to her, his face concerned. “We’ve got to get out of here. Theodore says an army’s coming.”

“An army?” she asked. “Who are they?”

“He’s not sure who they are, but he’s more concerned with what they are,” he said. “He says it’s an army of imps and kobalds. They’re at least a thousand strong. There hasn’t been a gathering of demons like this in centuries.”

Tarah looked down at the fallen gnome, bleeding but still living, then looked back at Blayne and the few survivors of his band, hogtied on the ground. “Then we go. Let’s let this army deal with them.”

“It’ll be tough to get away,” Djeri said, walking up to her. “There’s no way we leave this camp without being seen.”

“We’ll be fine,” she said. “Gather everyone. I’ll take care of getting us out of here.”

She looked down at her staff again. It was no longer bleeding. The wood of the staff was a light gray and shimmered with a faint glow. “Are you ready, Esmine?”

Hide
? the staff asked.

“Yes,” Tarah said. “Let’s hide.”

Justan walked with the Roo-Tan soldiers towards their camp, his left hand clasped with Jhonate’s. He was still in shock, but it was guilt he felt more than anything else. Yntri was dead because he stood in the assassin’s way and Vahn had known it. The moment of the elf’s death replayed itself over and over in his mind.

Jhonate’s feeling of loss was much more profound. Her face was stoic. Only the tears that welled in her eyes gave away her sorrow to the outside world, but Justan felt her grief through the ring like a violent storm straining for release.

Justan had known Yntri for a short time, but to Jhonate, Yntri had been a mentor and a teacher and, in some ways, more of a father figure to her than Xedrion. Justan didn’t try to console her or speak to her about it. He knew Jhonate well enough to understand that she did not do well sharing her emotions at the best of times. Right now all she wanted from him was his presence.

Nothing
, reported Deathclaw. He and Gwyrtha had been searching the forest for a trace of the nightbeast, but as far as they could tell, there was no trace to find.

Then come back to me
, Justan said. In a way he was relieved. Deathclaw and Gwyrtha together were a formidable force, but this nightbeast was something they had never faced. An assassin almost as old and experienced as Yntri was hard to comprehend. There was no telling what he could do.

This Vahn has unnerved you
, Deathclaw said.

Yes
, Justan admitted.

He killed the old elf
, Gwyrtha explained, her tone laced with sadness.

Why do you mourn
? Deathclaw said, his thoughts curious.
He was not of your human family. He was not part of your pack
.

He wasn’t
, Justan said.
Not directly. But he became important to me on this journey. He saved my life. He taught me things. He made me laugh
.

I can see that he was useful
, Deathclaw admitted, though he didn’t understand why laughter was an important part of it. Deathclaw had a sense of humor, Justan knew because he had been the butt of it on many occasions, but the raptoid still didn’t understand the things that humans found funny.

He was more than useful
, Justan replied.
He was a fixture for the Roo-Tan. He had shepherded them through hundreds of years, helping them build relationships with the trees. I suspect that we are about to experience an entire country in mourning over his passing
.

This was something Deathclaw had no point of reference for. There was not an equivalent for something like Yntri in the raptoid world.

Like John
, Gwyrtha said, thinking back on her experience.

Yes
, Justan said.
They know the Prophet as well, but Yntri was probably much like that to them
.

The forest grew thicker and thicker as they walked, the plant types changing. The road they were on was a long gradual slope and Justan could practically feel the air becoming more humid. It was something he would need to grow used to, especially as spring came and it grew warmer. Most of Malaroo was either on the ocean or swamp land.

“Are you alright, Jhonate?” Justan said finally as the intensity of her emotion ebbed.

Her hand tightened on his. “I do not know what that means right now.”

Hilt jogged up to them. His eyes were red, his expression grim. “You need to prepare yourself. Several of the men ran ahead with Yntri’s body. Xedrion will see him long before the rest of us arrive.”

“Then won’t he have more important things to worry about than me?” Justan asked.

“No,” Hilt said, shaking his head. “From what I’ve gathered talking to Fleen, your name has been on Xedrion’s lips constantly. All he has spoken about since they left Roo-Tan’lan was seeing his Jhonate again and that ‘bastard that has stolen her from me’.”

“That is unfair,” Jhonate said, her grief momentarily overcome. “Justan’s parents were married long before he was born. What is wrong with father? Perhaps I should speak with him first.”

“I definitely think that would be for the best. I asked Qurl and Jhexin to go ahead with the other men. They will be with him when he sees Yntri,” said Hilt. “I can only hope that they will temper his reaction to the news.”

“Yeah,” said Justan. “I hope so.”

Qurl and Jhexin had seemed to warm up to him by the end of the journey, but Justan had no idea what they would include in their report to their father. Would they tell him that it had taken Justan years to commune with the tree? Would they tell him how Justan was unconscious through most of the battles with the basilisks? There were many ways they could make him come out to look bad.

“I will start now,” Jhonate said suddenly. “The longer I am with him the better.”

“Are you sure?” Justan said, gripping her hand. Her sadness still leeched through the ring.

“Yes,” she replied, leaning in to kiss him lightly on the lips. She let go of his hand and reached up to cup his cheek. “It will feel good to run anyway.”

Justan watched her run ahead in her familiar lope, bobbing around and between Roo-Tan soldiers as she went. “I don’t like this. I feel like I have been ineffective on this trip. Everyone has been doing so much for me. Teaching me. Fighting my battles. I don’t feel like I’ve carried my weight.”

“Well if that’s how you feel, don’t worry,” Hilt said. “You are about to do your part. Facing Xedrion is going to be hard and from what I hear it’s worse now than when I left.”

Deathclaw and Gwyrtha melted out of the trees ahead of them, startling many of the Roo-Tan as they moved to keep pace with Justan and Hilt. Deathclaw met Hilt’s eyes from his crouch on Gwyrtha’s back and shook his head.

“It’s okay, Deathclaw,” Hilt said as the raptoid hopped down to walk beside him. “I didn’t expect you to find it.”

Justan’s heart began to beat faster as it sank in. He was going to face Xedrion soon. It was finally going to happen. “Tell me something, Hilt. Tell me anything that will help when I meet him.”

“It depends,” he said. “The best result is that he refuses to see you for awhile. That would give him a chance to mourn and give Jhonate and I more time to calm him down. Though, like I said earlier, I don’t think that’s likely to happen. The next best reaction would be if he just ran at you screaming the moment he saw you.”

Justan’s eyes widened. “Why would that be good?”

Hilt laughed. “Because it would mean he’s crazy out of his mind. This would take away his effectiveness on the battlefield and give you a chance to defeat him.”

Justan thought on that for a moment. “So you don’t think I have a chance otherwise?”

“It will be hard for you to win without giving him a major injury.” He reached up and scratched his head. “That’s the problem with your particular abilities. We’ve sparred a lot on this trip and I’ll admit, you’re pretty good. In fact, I’d say you are really good. You can slow the world. You have a great strategic grasp of fighting. This makes you, skill-wise, as good as maybe all but the top five percent of warriors in the known lands.”

Justan didn’t know whether to be happy or worried about this praise considering the context. “But?”

“But Xedrion is as good as any of them. If he were in the academy, he’d be on the council. He fights me to a standstill most times and I’d say you could put him against anyone. Tolivar, Hugh, your dad. They would be about a draw, skill-wise.”

“Okay,” Justan said, feeling a stomach ache coming on.

“Now that’s grading them all with the same broad measuring stick. But situationally they aren’t equal. You put Hugh the Shadow against any of us in a fight through the streets of a major city and he’d win. Give your father room to operate and he has the advantage. In fact in the right situation, you are one of the elite. If I put you against any of them, myself included, in an open arena, fight to the death, you could win maybe half the time,” Hilt said.

“Really?” Justan said, though the thought of fighting any of the men mentioned to the death was sickening.

“The reason why is your powers. They give you a distinct advantage. One touch with Rage, boom, we’re spattered,” Hilt said. He raised a finger and jabbed it into Justan’s arm. “However, your powers are also your weakness.”

“Because I depend on them too much?” he guessed.

“It’s not just that. You do everything the hard way.” He chuckled. “Oh Justan I should have seen this coming back when I first met you. So determined. You picked the hardest sword style from the beginning. Then you bond with Gwyrtha and gain stamina. You bond with Fist and gain strength. You bond with Deathclaw and gain control. What do you do with these new abilities? Do you use them to take your fighting style to the next level? No, you go to Lenny and convince him to build you the most awkward swords for your sword style.”

“I don’t think they’re awkward,” Justan said, feeling a little hurt. “Even if they are a bit heavy, there are so many ways I can use them in battle-.”

Hilt held up his hand. “I know why you chose them, Justan. You looked at the designs and thought of all you could do, blah-blah-blah. Here’s the thing, once again you’ve made it hard on yourself. You’ve got the strength to fight with a large weapon like your father and the speed to fight with two smaller swords like myself. Instead you choose to fight with two large weapons. That makes it difficult for you to ever become as good as either one of us.”

Justan looked at him with jaw agape. He had a point. “Isn’t it kind of too late now? These are my naming weapons.”

Hilt chuckled again. “Don’t get me wrong. I’m not saying you should change. I’m just making a point here. You’ll never be able to fight with the strength your father does because you fight with two weapons. You’ll never be able to develop the kind of finesse that someone like Tolivar or I have because you’re using heavy blades. In your haste to be amazing at everything you’ve decided on a middle road.”

“You’ve shoved my thoughts all over the map here, Hilt,” Justan said. “What is the point you were making?”

“I was trying to cushion this by building you up is what I was doing, Edge,” Hilt replied. “The point is that Xedrion bin Leeths is a finesse fighter like me. He’s fast. He’s strong. And there’s no way you can win if you fight by his rules.”

“Because this isn’t a fight to the death,” Justan said in understanding. “He has the advantage because he is a finesse fighter and I can’t just blow him away.”

“You understand now,” Hilt said. “The problem is you’re handicapped even more because he just might try to kill you. Then you have the problem of facing someone with superior skill in their environment and you’re unable to use your best assets. Even if you were to go half way with your powers and say, blow one of his arms off. There aren’t any wizards here to reattach a limb. You would have just disabled The Protector of the Grove, one of the most important and powerful men in the known lands.”

“Then . . .” Justan ran through the scenarios in his head. “Is there a way I can get him to fight with practice weapons? I use wooden swords and he can’t use a Jharro staff?”

“No. Jharro weapons are their practice weapons. They can make them as deadly or as soft as they want,” Hilt replied. “To ask him to use anything else would be an insult.”

Justan went through all of it in his mind. He thought back on the times he had sparred with his swords against finesse fighters like Jhonate and Sir Hilt and the finality of it sunk in. Hilt was right. “I can’t win. So what I need to do is fight my best and hope to somehow impress him enough that he doesn’t kill me when I lose.”

“That is your task, my friend,” Hilt said, patting his back.

“I’m feeling sick,” Justan replied. That stomach ache had turned into full on nausea.

“You’d better not be,” Hilt said. “Chances are he wants to fight you today. Probably as soon as you’re finished with introductions.”

Justan had been expecting that. It was the way warriors often greeted each other among the Roo-Tan. A warrior could learn a lot about someone during a battle and a good sparring match was a way to get to know the capabilities of someone new.

“Hilt is right about his assessment of you, Justan,” Deathclaw said. The raptoid had been silent up to this point. Just observing the conversation. “This is not the right battle for you. You cannot allow yourself to die. Perhaps the best strategy would be to escape while you can.”

“I know what you’re saying. If he kills me, he kills you too,” Justan said and the weight of the battle got even heavier. “But you also know I can’t run away from this. I would lose Jhonate and she is part of our pack.”

“You know what, though,” Hilt said. “That is an angle I hadn’t thought about. You’re a bonding wizard. The Roo-Tan respect that. Even if he is angry enough to kill you, can he justify killing you and all of your bonded?” He rubbed his chin. “I’m going to see if I can’t talk to him myself before all this starts. You stay with the others. I’ll hurry ahead and see if I can’t slip in there.”

Hilt ran ahead and Gwyrtha sidled up to Justan, nudging him.
You can win, Justan. Hilt is wrong. You are better than anyone
.