Sovereign Stone (63 page)

One soldier noticed them and called out. Dozens of soldiers turned and looked back through the Ruathan gate at Alexander. As they started to mount a charge, Alexander touched the bar above the map and the Gate abruptly turned to stone again.

Ruatha was under siege. Alexander only hoped he’d stopped the flow of soldiers in time to give his father a fighting chance against the invaders. He had hoped he would be able to use the Reishi Gate to return home and escape the wyvern riders, Phane, and the tentacle demon, but that was clearly a bad idea with so many enemy soldiers surrounding the Ruathan Gate.

Next he touched the island of Fellenden. The outlines of the Reishi Isle and the island of Fellenden began to glow pale blue, and the Gate shimmered to reveal a different army stretched out on the rolling grasslands of Fellenden. There were thousands of big, hardy-looking men armed with an incredible array of gruesome-looking weapons.

“Zuhl,” Jataan said. “Lord Zuhl is a mortal enemy of the Reishi. He blames the Reishi for all of the hardships his people endure. He is every bit as much your enemy as Phane.”

One soldier with emblems of rank on his shoulders was standing off to the side of the Gate, watching to see if it would open again. When he saw Alexander, he called out to the other soldiers and charged through the Gate to attack. Before any of the other soldiers could follow him through, Alexander touched the bar above the map and the Gate returned to black stone. In the same moment, Jataan P’Tal threw a knife at the charging soldier. It struck him in the chest just left of center and buried to the crossbar. The man toppled forward and crashed to the ground.

“Darkness comes, My Love,” Chloe said silently in his mind.

“It would seem our troubles are multiplying again,” Jack observed.

As if to punctuate his remark, there was a thud on the door. Then another. Alexander looked back and saw a little piece of the magically protected door burn through and the tentacle of the demon start to push into the room through the hole. A moment later, a second hole started to form.

Alexander’s mind raced. He didn’t want to fight that demon. It had dozens of tentacles, each dripping with stone-eating acid, and he knew he could only cut off one or two before the thing would be on him.

He thought of Isabel and Abigail. More than anything, he wanted to go to the fortress island and free them—but he couldn’t do that if he was dead. With a deep breath and an act of will, he touched the Isle of Ithilian on the map and the Gate opened again. This time the dawn revealed nothing but a wild grassy plain empty for miles beyond the magical portal.

“Everyone through the Gate, quickly,” Alexander said as the tentacle demon reached inside the room through the first hole in the door and began thrashing about wildly in a blind effort to snare its prey. Alexander and Jataan were the last ones through the Gate just before the door gave way. The demon entered the Gate Room with alarming speed.

Once he was through the Gate, Alexander quickly found the map of the Seven Isles etched into the stone of this Gate. The only difference was the addition of an engraving of the glyph of the House of Reishi exactly the same size as the raised glyph on the butt of the Thinblade. He touched the rectangle above the map, and with a shimmer, the open Gate solidified into a slab of black stone. A single section of demon tentacle lay smoldering on the platform.

“Don’t touch it,” Lucky said to the two Rangers approaching it. “Use your spears to toss it into the grass.

They did as he said. When the points of their spears melted away before their eyes, they tossed them into the grass as well. Then they both looked behind the Gate and gasped.

“Trouble,” the first Ranger said.

Alexander went to them and saw an army encamped not a hundred feet behind the Gate. It looked like they had been there for a long time. They had a fortified position surrounded by a berm lined with sharpened wooden stakes. There were wooden towers with catapults lining the edge facing the Gate and a trench filled with oil-soaked straw surrounding the entire thing. It was big enough to house a legion or more.

Alexander scanned the countryside looking for any tactical advantage but saw none. They were in a vast rangeland that stretched out in rolling fields for as far as the eye could see, and a column of cavalry was thundering from the encampment toward them. He looked at the map on the Gate and thought about trying another island but none made any sense. Karth and Zuhl had armies that were moving through the Gates just a few minutes ago. Andalia was probably poised to move through the Gate as well. Ruatha and Fellenden weren’t good options. Phane was on the Reishi Isle. That left Tyr.

He turned to Jataan, “Would we be safe on Tyr?”

Jataan thought for a moment before shaking his head. “Phane was on Tyr when you secured the Sovereign Stone. He was no doubt watching and knows the Protectorate will no longer serve him, so I suspect he has set something dark loose on the Reishi Protectorate’s island, which is where the Gate is located.”

“Let’s hope the stories about the House of Ithilian are true,” Alexander said, walking out onto the center of the platform and facing away from the Gate. “Form up on me,” he commanded. “Disappear, Little One,” he thought to Chloe. “I don’t want them to know you exist until it’s safe.”

Chloe buzzed into a ball of light and vanished. The Rangers arrayed themselves on either side of Alexander with Jataan on his left, Jack on his right, and Boaberous at his back. Lucky remained with Anatoly behind the formation. Alexander concealed the Sovereign Stone beneath his armor and covered his sword with his cloak. He thought about Isabel while he watched the company of heavy cavalry approach.

The horsemen rode with skill and discipline. They maintained formation and wheeled into position for a charge but stopped fifty feet short and held. Alexander appraised their colors. They were mostly honorable men. He began to feel a bit more optimistic. He had enemies enough. It would be a welcome change to find a friend.

Two men dismounted and approached on foot with open hands. Alexander watched them come. One was dressed in a breastplate emblazoned with the crest of the House of Ithilian. He was a fair-haired man in his middle twenties with strong facial features, a sturdy build, and grey eyes. The other was older and softer-looking, with long white hair and dark brown eyes. He was a wizard, but Alexander couldn’t discern his calling, only that he was a mage. They stopped ten feet from him.

“I am Conner Ithilian, Commander of the Gate Legions of Ithilian and son of King Abel,” the younger man said as he appraised Alexander and his companions. “Who are you? What is your purpose here and how is it that you have come through the Reishi Gate?”

Alexander took a moment to look at their colors more closely. The younger man wasn’t afraid, but he was nervous. The wizard had clearly cast a few spells prior to their approach and he was looking at Alexander with a mixture of curiosity and apprehension.

“I am Alexander Reishi, Seventh Sovereign of the Seven Isles,” he said as he withdrew the Stone from beneath his armor and let it fall against his chest. The blood-red, teardrop ruby glowed gently with the ancient power of the Reishi Sovereigns.

“I’ve come to offer Ithilian an alliance.”

Here Ends Sovereign Stone

Sovereign of the Seven Isles: Book Two
www.SovereignOfTheSevenIsles.com

The Story Continues…
Mindbender

Sovereign of the Seven Isles: Book Three

***

Dear Reader,
I hope you enjoyed reading Sovereign Stone as much as I enjoyed writing it. I’m always trying to improve my stories, and ultimately, you are the best judge of my work, so I’d like to humbly ask for your help. Please click the link below and write a short review. Your honest feedback will help me do a better job in the future and will also help others decide if they would like to read my stories.
Thank you,
David A. Wells

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