The Crown Of Yensupov (Book 3) (33 page)

“Yes to all, Highness. We’re prepared to leave as soon as Your Highness commands.”

“It’s time as soon as Tonelia patches up Bodrin.”

Saxthor led Tournak, Bodrin, and Tonelia to the reception hall, where the royal family was resting. He bowed to the king and his family.

“There’s no time to lose,” Saxthor said, looking around the room. “Tonelia, take Bodrin, find someone that can get you bandages, and dress his wounds.” When they’d left the room, Saxthor continued. “I’m sure the master-wraith that attacked Your Majesty is in charge of the city. It’s dark, the wraith will be active. He'll know someone helped the prisoners escape. The wraith’s creatures will search everywhere, building by building, to find the prisoners and their accomplices. The vile specter won’t spare embassies.” Saxthor paused to let the ramifications sink in. “Now that Dreaddrac controls Sengenwhapolis, there’ll be no mercy for anyone opposing the Dark Lord.”

“Is there any chance of reinforcements reaching the city in time?” the ambassador asked. Saxthor looked at the king, whose head dropped.

“The kingdom is teeming with orcs and ogres,” Calamidese said. “The only organized resistance was here in the capital, but my army was neutralized before they learned of the attack. Most soldiers have fled the city with the civilian population. Our generals in the field may try to organize, but that’ll take time with the enemy entrenched throughout the kingdom.” The disheartened king looked down at the floor, having exposed the magnitude of his mistake.

“We must escape the city at once,” Saxthor said. “As soon as Bodrin recovers enough, we’ll leave. Prepare to depart at a moment’s notice. Take only what you can carry. The soldiers will carry the state documents we deem critical. They won’t be able to carry your personal items. The exception will be a small chest for each member of the royal family.”

“What about the rest?’ the ambassador asked.

“Bring all other documents and items of questionable content to the cellar. Cover the papers with oil and run a cord through candle wax several times. Put one end in the papers. Stretch the cord out to the doorway. Tie that end of the cord to a piece of pine lighter wood. Assign a soldier to light the lighter wood when the last of us is outside the gate and run to catch up with us. Tell him twice, he must close and lock the gate as he leaves. With luck, we’ll be out of the city, when they discover the fire.”

“As you say, Highness.” The ambassador nodded, bowed to both the prince and king, and left to make the arrangements.

Saxthor turned to the assembled personnel. “Does anyone know of a hidden way out of the city, so we won’t have to fight our way through the gates? If we slip out unseen, it would give us more time to escape before the enemy discovers our flight.”

Saxthor looked around the room, but to a man, they shook their heads and looked to each other.

“There’s a secret escape gate in one of the palace storehouse’s back wall,” King Calamidese said, standing up. “Unfortunately, it’s masked by magic, and my wizard was the only one that knew the spell to opens it. The poor man was killed in the wraith’s second attack.”

“Thank you, Your Majesty,” Saxthor said. “We’ll take that route then and hope Tournak or I can open the portal.”

“Back to the palace again?” The princess royal said.

Saxthor nodded. Only then did he note her brilliant eyes. “We’ll pass through the city in groups of eight to ten so as not to alarm the patrols. Each group will leave half a block ahead of the next. Keep the group in front of you in sight to get to the palace. Go now, we leave at once.”

The ambassador returned, having selected the soldier to fire the lighter wood for burning the embassy. The man had changed into traveling clothes and had his pack on his back plus a satchel over his shoulder. With him were more soldiers to whom the ambassador had assigned baggage to carry.

“I’ve sent others to the kitchens to carry supplies. The remaining soldiers have gone to collect their personal belonging.”

Everyone assembled in the courtyard. Saxthor and the ambassador assigned the groups to leave the embassy and set their order.

“My group will leave first to find the portal and open it. This group of ten embassy guards will follow to protect those in front and behind. The dowager queen, princess royal, and the ambassador will leave in the third group with Tournak. Six more guards to protect them will be close behind.” Saxthor assigned the other groups of embassy guards and servants and their positions. “Move fast, the wraith will be awake and looking for us by now.”

Saxthor opened the gate, when a sentry high up flashed the signal the street was clear. They crept out, then moved as ordinary citizens up the street. There was little traffic and a steady stream of groups moved along in succession. Saxthor’s group again slipped through a dark alley to the back of Sekcmet Palace, then to the rear kitchen doorway.

“Bad luck, the entrance is guarded by a group of orcs,” Saxthor said. “I guess our earlier escape with Bodrin and Tonelia has alerted them to the vulnerability of this entrance. The invisibility ploy won’t work this time.” He looked back at another approaching group. “There’re too many people for the wand to hide, sneaking through the palace.”

“What if we hid the others, and you and I pretend to be vendors, delivering food for the kitchens?” Tournak asked. “We could borrow that cart from up the alley and load our foodstuffs on it. It already holds several barrels.”

“Best idea we have,” Saxthor said. He turned to the others behind him. “There’s a change of plans.”

Tournak explained his idea. The king led the growing personnel into a lot next to the palace wall, whose shrubbery could hide them from passing patrols.

“You go up the street and keep the others out of sight,” Saxthor said to a guard. “You two bring that cart down here and load the supplies on it. Then hide in the shadows on either side of the door.”

Tournak banged his fist on the kitchen door. When two orcs opened it, Tournak pretended to be half-drunk. He wobbled a bit then said, “Good ethening,” he wobbled a bit more. “Coulth you genthlemen help me unload the ale from my cart?” He wobbled a turn and pretended to lose his balance, then caught himself. The scene tickled Saxthor.

I’ve got to talk to Tournak about his drinking, thought Saxthor, peering through a bush. He’s too good at this.

“What you got on the cart?” an orc asked.

“Oh juth some food, and a few kegs of ale,” Tournak said.

The grinning orcs looked at each other. “We’ll help you unload the ale.”

A young orc from the back pushed through. “We ain’t got no orders for ale.”

He couldn’t see, but Saxthor heard a cracking sound and the dissenter said nothing more.

“Yeah, well, ain’t no people gonna be bringing ale voluntarily to us orcs,” the first orc said.

Two guards propped their spears against the wall and came out to get a barrel of ale. As they reached into the cart to get the barrel, the embassy guards popped out and knocked them unconscious. Saxthor, Tournak, and the guards hid the unconscious orcs in the dark alley. They returned to the door and knocked again. As orcs came to the door, Tournak repeated his request for help.

“What happened to them others what come to the door before?” a suspicious orc asked.

Weaving in the doorway, Tournak replied, “The others said they were taking that barrel around to another door.”

The orcs grinned and nodded to each other, stepped out to get a barrel, and two more orcs joined the unconscious ranks in the shrubbery. The invaders gagged and tied the eight orcs and hid them down in cellar.

The remaining embassy personnel arrived at the palace as Saxthor hid the last incapacitated guards. Again, Saxthor, with the king, took the lead to find the hidden entrance to the tunnel beneath the city.

As the only wizard among them, Tournak stepped forward and cast several spells. He was finally able to expose the gate, but it remained sealed, when Tournak ran through his known spells.

“You have any more ideas?” Saxthor asked.

Tournak shook his head. “We can’t stay here, there’re too many of us and we’ll soon be discovered.”

Calamidese shrugged his shoulders. The others milled around, glancing at Saxthor and Tournak with increasingly furrowed brows.

“We’ll have to go back,” Tournak said. “We can’t stay here.”

“We can’t go back,” Saxthor said, “The embassy compound will be in flames now. There’s nowhere else we can go.”

“What can we do?” Tonelia asked.

“Well for want of a better idea…” Saxthor raised the dragon ring and commanded the door to open. Nothing happened. He tried again, nothing happened. An orc groan close by reminded him time was running out. His heart raced and nerves tingled.

He thought back to the time, when as a boy, he commanded the shackles to open and release Habbernee in the rock-dwarf chamber on Tixos. Saxthor remembered extreme stress coupled with exceptional concentration activated the ring’s power. He concentrated hard as the pressure of discovery and failure excited his own energy on the third try. Another, louder groan alarmed him.

This try must succeed, he thought, focusing on the consequences if it didn’t. He concentrated on the door lock. The dragon ring glowed as if molten and a blue spark popped. The portal sprang open.

When the ring’s glow dimmed, Saxthor wilted back against a table. Tournak helped him stand, and he rested against the wall, while the other group members passed through the gate and under the city. As the last group went into the passageway, Tournak, supporting Saxthor, started through the opening.

A sudden stench of sulfur engulfed the room. Saxthor looked up to see the master-wraith’s vapor floating into the chamber, taking form above the boxes and barrels.

“The energy surges alerted the wraith to our presence,” Saxthor said. “It’s traced the energy here.”

“He’s transmuting his essence into mass to strike with full power,” Tournak said. He tried to push Saxthor behind him, while drawing his sword.

“Your sword will be nothing against the pure concentrated energy charge in the wraith,” Saxthor said.

“We can’t outrun it.” Tournak hunched down to confront the transmuting monster.

Saxthor held onto the doorframe, exhausted.

The outline of a heavily muscled man formed from the vapor. It was twice a man’s size and naked to the waist. Its dark gray and mustard colors reflected the charcoal and sulfur dust origin in the crucible. For a moment, in its translucency, they could see veins begin and then the red glow of blood streaming through it before its skin began to form. While still semi-vaporous, the vile head stood backdrop to pools of glowing yellow eyes punctuated by vertical, coal-black snake pupils. Two thick, short horns grew out of its skull above the high, pointed ears. The creature was unlike anything they had seen, even among the wraiths with which they were by now familiar.

I must act now, Saxthor thought. In a moment the creature will be solid mass enough to shoot wizard-fire bolts, vaporizing both Tournak and me. Tournak’s wizard powers are no match for this thing. There’s no reprieve in sunshine this night.

Leaning against the wall, Saxthor shoved Tournak into the tunnel.

“Good-bye, my friend and mentor, I can’t let you waste your life in a futile attempt to resist this fiend. Run!”

Maybe if the creature destroys me, it will let the others go, he thought. Cripes, the jewels are in my tunic. If it vaporizes me, it will expose the crystals. The wraith will take them to his master in Dreaddrac. I’ll have failed not only myself, but also all Powteros. There’ll be no stopping the Dark Lord with these gemstones in his possession.

He slapped his hand on the crystals in his tunic. Surging energy pulsed through Saxthor. The predicament in the tunnel chased by Yamma-Mirra Heedra, where giving up would’ve doomed Bodrin in his youth, flashed in front of his eyes.

I’ll not fail and let everyone down after all my friends have been through so much for me, he thought. Anger swallowed his momentary self-doubt, as the prince turned to face the wraith. A wraith is only a wraith, after all, he thought. This wraith’s hatred is second-hand from Dreaddrac; the love of my friends is direct. I’m the stronger. The great dragon Yamma-Mirra Heedra, whose strength is the greatest I’ve ever known, the dragon and I are one.

That realization activated the dragon ring and it glowed. “I am Yamma-Mirra Heedra,” Saxthor’s said standing straight. “The dragon, the ring, and I are one!”

Energy surged he’d never known. A powerful energy pulse slammed back the wraith, seeming to singe it as it formed.

Tournak stuck his head back through the gate, and froze.

The glow radiated out from the ring. Saxthor felt it spread surrounding him as he stretched out his hand, pointing his finger at the specter. A silent gasp appeared on the wraith’s partially formed face. The creature drew back; but partially formed, it couldn’t escape. The two adversaries stared at each other as the golden dragon ring pulsed. The Celestial Blue Fire Topaz sucked energy from the wraith that squirmed, as it dimmed.

The two men watched the blue topaz triple in brilliance. The twin dragons holding up the gemstone appeared to focus the stone on the specter. The trapped wraith writhed; its lined and shrinking face trembled. A stream of brilliant blue light shot from the dragon ring striking the wraith. A shower of sparks exploded as the two energies clashed. A brilliant light flashed in a thunderous boom then both died away to the former silent darkness. All traces of the wraith were gone leaving only a trace of sulfur dust settling onto the floor.