The Dragons of Bone and Dust (Tales from the New Earth Book 7) (45 page)

“
Now there's a thought. Hmm. It
is remotely possible that they sensed my presence when I slipped
inside the perimeter of the tower.”

“
You never mentioned that,”
Kronk growled at him. “Slipped your memory, did it?”

“
Of course not! I was not
pursued or attacked at any time during my brief reconnaissance. I'm
just saying that, perhaps, they felt a disturbance. Nothing that
would have set off any alarms, but maybe enough to make them wary.”

“
Oh great.”

Simon looked down at the mirror on
the table.

“
So they may have increased the
size or frequency of their patrols. Or both. Wonderful.”

He waved his hand over the mirror and
canceled the spell.

“
Don't assume anything,”
Aeris warned him. “Just plan for the worst scenario and you
should be fine.”

“
Uh-huh. You should be a
motivational speaker,” the wizard told him as he stood up. “I'm
going to go down and sit outside on the front steps. I need to
think.”

As he left the room, Aeris turned to
look at Kronk.

“
Was it something I said?”

“
Almost always,” the
earthen rumbled and then jumped off the table to hurry after Simon.

Aeris watched him leave, looking
perplexed.

“
Why is everyone so touchy
lately?” he asked the suddenly empty room.

The next morning dawned drab and
foggy. Simon woke up early, feeling tired and anxious but not quite
sure why.

Must be the weather, he thought as he
dragged a brush through his hair, wincing at the knots.

Downstairs, he made some tea and
toast and walked outside to sit on the steps and eat.

The world was eerily quiet. There
were wisps of mist in the yard and the top half of the tower was
engulfed in fog. Not a bird or an insect was making a sound.

Neither Kronk nor Aeris were anywhere
to be see and Simon assumed that they were off doing chores of some
sort. The temperature was cool for a change and he wore a robe for
the first time in a week to protect him from the chilly dampness.

After he had finished his toast, the
wizard left his cup on the steps and got up. He walked across the
yard to the front gate, unlocked it and pulled both sides open.

The hinges squealed loudly in the
dead silence and he cursed under his breath.

“
I'll have to oil those,”
he muttered as the two heavy doors swung back.

A dozen yards beyond the gate was a
wall of dirty gray fog; impenetrable and almost alien looking. It
made Simon's skin crawl and he became irritated with his own
childishness.

It's only fog, you big baby, he
chided himself.

It didn't help.

He stared at the thick, swirling mist
for a few more minutes and then turned back toward the tower. He had
things to do and staring blankly at nothing wasn't one of them.

Simon never knew whether it was
instinct or a sound that he had barely heard, but he suddenly dived
forward and rolled on the grass, ending up on his back. And he
watched as a heavy axe cut through the air no more than a foot above
his face. It was so close that he felt the air move as it shot past
him to land in the yard.

“
Mortis, to me!” he
shouted as he leaped to his feet, arm outstretched.

His staff settled into his grip and
Simon planted it end-first on the ground.

“
Shield!” he barked and
the barrier snapped up around him, large enough to fill the entire
space of the open gate.

He was just in time.

With a frightening roar, a mass of
bones and rotting flesh rushed out of the fog and slammed into his
shield. Skeletons; dozens of them.

That would explain the thick fog, the
wizard thought frantically.

He grabbed his staff in both hands
and made a shoving gesture toward the pack of undead that were
flailing uselessly at his shield.

“
Fireball!” he yelled and
focused his will on directing the spell's results.

A mass of flame, burning almost
white-hot, appeared just above the gate and smashed into the undead
attackers, scattering them like twigs and covering their scabrous
bones with sticky fire. They burned like dried tinder.

Simon leaned on his staff and
watched, waiting for the next shoe to drop.

His attackers wouldn't go to all the
trouble of summoning this much fog to only set a few mindless
skeletons on him, that much he knew.

And he was right.

From the wall of fog another wave
emerged in a rush. This time it was a group of zombies; undead still
almost human looking with rotting flesh hanging from their bones and
maggot-filled eye sockets. Their stench alone almost made Simon
retreat.

He scrambled to think of an effective
spell but never got a chance to cast it.

From the top of the archway over his
head, he heard a deep echoing battle cry.

“
Attack! In the name of our
master, defend the tower!”

It was the earthen who patrolled his
outer wall. Six little rocky figures, including Kronk, leapt from the
archway and landed in the middle of the charging zombies. They tore
the animated corpses apart, putrid flesh and bone flying in all
directions.

Simon stared at the carnage, happy
that his shield kept him from being covered in undead meat. His heart
was still pounding from the first attack and was racing even faster
at the earth elementals' surprise intervention.

Leave it to Kronk, he thought with
relief. Loyal and dependable, as always.

The earthen made quick work of the
slow, mindless zombie attackers and then stood between Simon and the
ominous fog, which showed no signs of lifting.

“
Master,” Kronk called
out over his shoulder. “Are you all right?”

Simon dropped his shield to avoid
draining his limited power reserves. It collapsed with a loud snap
and a whiff of ozone.

“
I'm fine, my friend. Thanks
for the help. You and your brethren surprised me.”

“
You are welcome, master. And
these monsters surprised us. I am just happy that I was walking the
wall this morning. Do you know why we are being attacked?'

Looking around in disgust at the
still wriggling bits of zombie flesh, Simon could only shake his
head.

“
You mean besides the fact that
the dark gods hate me and I'm sure their servants do too? Nope, not a
clue.”

The wizard watched as Kronk rolled
quickly in the grass to wipe off the bits of gross detritus that was
coating his body.

“
Perhaps Aeris really did tip
off the necromancers with his scouting after all, master.”

“
I heard that.”

Aeris shot across the yard from the
tower and stopped next to Simon.

“
I was out back checking on the
horses in this dense fog. They're fine, by the way, and the rear gate
is secure. So, undead attackers, hmm?”

“
Yep. I was just thinking that
it would take a considerable amount of power to generate this much
fog and hold it here. It's to protect the undead, obviously, but
what's the point? I mean, not to brag, but surely the enemy knows
that skeletons and zombies aren't much of a threat to me?”

The air elemental moved closer to
float beside Simon's shoulder. He glanced at the array of earthen
that were watching the fog closely and lowered his voice.

“
Surely you don't think that
the attack is over? Those useless lumps of flesh and bone were just a
feint. Whoever is directing this attack is feeling you out before the
main assault.”

Simon stared at him, suitably
impressed.

“
You missed your calling,
Aeris. You should have been a tactician.”

The elemental grinned at him but
quickly became serious again.

“
It's common sense, my dear
wizard. Now prepare yourself; I can sense something coming.”

He winked and then shot straight up
into the fog and disappeared from sight.

He's up to something, Simon thought.
Devious as ever. I'm just glad that he's on my side.

“
Master!”

“
What is it, Kronk?”

“
Something approaches, master.
I can feel the ground shaking.”

“
Something large?”

The little guy cocked his head and
listened, then knelt down and placed his palm on the ground.

“
No master; many feet, moving
quickly.”

“
Great,” Simon said to
himself. “Now what?”

He waited and then frowned at the
wall of fog that surrounded the tower. Was it receding?

“
Kronk? Is the fog
dissipating?”

“
I do not think so, master, but
it is pulling back. I do not know why.”

Part of the field became visible, but
the majority of it remained shrouded by the thick mist.

A low rumble rose from the fog, a
strange sound like the distant passing of many wagons.

“
What the hell is that?”

“
Running feet, master. But I do
not know what is causing it.”

With an ear-splitting shriek, a
mounted form raced from the fog and came to a skidding stop. One,
two, three more followed and Simon gaped at something he had only
read about in stories.

Skeletal horses were stamping and
pawing the ground, tearing furrows in the earth and glaring across
the field at him with blood-red eyes of flame. They were all wearing
misshapen, rusted armor and heavy war saddles and they sidled and
reared, eager for battle.

On their backs were the real
nightmares. Huge warriors wearing black armor. Ripples in the air
around them made Simon think that they were giving off heat but then
he noticed that the ground beneath the horses was white with frost.
The armored figures were surrounded by bitter cold.

Their faces were hidden inside heavy
helms but, like their steeds, their eyes blazed with the flames of
hell. In life, the warriors must have each been nearly as large as
Malcolm was. In death, they were wearing armor and sporting
two-handed weapons that not even that big man could have used.

“
Death knights? Seriously?”

“
I do not know that term,
master,” Kronk called to him, obviously hearing Simon mutter to
himself.

“
Just something I read about in
one of my books,” the wizard replied. “It kind of
describes these guys. Undead warriors who feel no pain and attack
relentlessly. Unfortunately they can only be harmed with blessed
weapons.”

“
What should we do, master?”

The ominous figures sat like statues
atop their restless steeds, watching Simon in silence. They were no
more than twenty yards away, but the wizard calculated that it would
take them a few seconds to begin a charge. It might just be enough
time.

“
Okay folks,” Simon said
as quietly as he could, hoping that all the earthen could hear him.

“
On the count of three, I want
all of you to retreat underground and meet up back inside the wall.
All right?”

“
But master, what about you?”

“
I'm going to slam the gate
closed and lock it. Once I've done that, the wards will kick in and
the undead will be blocked. I hope.”

“
Master, you can't...”

“
No discussion please. Here we
go.”

Simon slowly bent down and left his
staff on the ground, trying not to make any sudden moves. He would
need both hands to close and bolt the two halves of the gate.

“
On three. One...two...”

He jumped toward the left side of the
gate.

“
Three!”

The earthen slipped into the ground
in the blink of an eye. At the same time, the four death knights
spurred their hideous mounts forward, the huge steeds slipping and
digging at the frozen ground beneath them.

Just what I was hoping for, Simon
thought as he frantically slammed one side of the gate closed and
leaped across to the other one.

He pulled the heavy portal over and
feverishly slid one of the thick iron bolts into place. There was a
flash of blue light as the wards engaged and from beyond the sealed
gate, he heard a bellow of rage. It had been close, damned close.

Simon finished locking the gate,
pushing the last bolt downward into the housing buried beneath the
archway. He picked up his staff, wiped off his forehead and moved
back into the yard.

A trembling in the grass made him
jump as Kronk and the other earthen erupted from the ground a few
feet away.

“
It worked, master!” the
earthen said with relief.

The wizard slipped Mortis de Draconis
over his shoulder and smiled weakly.