Angus Wells - The God Wars 01 (83 page)

 
          
Denarus
stepped a pace forward, hands thrust out into the flames. Ayliss moved to join
him, and Tereus. They spoke together in that same strange tongue that had
unlocked the doors and the flames gusted, blinding, rising high against the
roof of the chamber. Calandryll started back, arm raised against the sudden
heat, and heard Bracht gasp as it faded, Katya's sharp intake of breath.

 
          
The
flames were gone and the three Old Ones with them, only a slow drift of dust
where they had stood, settling leisurely upon the smooth surface of the floor,
its only blemish. On the pedestal, revealed clear now, lay a slender book, its
binding black, like ancient leather, the single word scribed red:
Arcanum.
It was small, an imimportant-seeming thing, save for that sense of power that
oozed from it, an aura, chilling in the heated confines of the chamber.

 
          
Calandryll
stepped toward it, reluctant now to touch the relic. And shouted as pain lanced
his chest, as though a flaming brand pressed there. He scrabbled at his shirt, seeing
the red stone burn bright, fire pulsing through it as the scent of almonds
filled his nostrils.

 
          
"Ahrd!"
he heard Bracht cry. "What is it?"

 
          
The
Kern's falchion slid swift from the sheath; Katya's saber glittered. Calandryll
moaned, fastening desperate hands on the leather thong that held the burning
stone about his neck, snapping the cord to cast the talisman clear, across the
chamber.

 
          
Where
it landed the air shimmered. Inchoate dread gripped him: thinking it likely
already useless, he drew his sword.

 
          
And
saw the shimmering solidify, the scent of magic fading. And recognized the
familiar face that beamed across the pedestal toward him, ablaze with triumph,
a hand poised upon the book.

 
          
"My
thanks," said Varent-Rhythamun, "You served me well."

 
          
Bracht
moved swift as a striking serpent, yelling a curse as he sprang forward,
falchion cutting at the wizard s head. Varent-Rhythamun raised an almost
negligent hand, gripping the blade as easily might a naan catch a falling
feather. Katya attacked on his left and he blocked her blade, too, smiling as
both froze, paralyzed by his magic. Calandryll stepped toward him, more cautious,
and he laughed, flicking out his hands so that Kem and warrior woman both were
flung aside.

 
          
"You
cannot touch me," he said mildly, contempt on his aquiline features.
"Think you that mere blades may harm such as I am? No—my power is greater
than you know. And greater still, ere long."

           
Calandryll drove the straightsword
at the mocking face: felt it halted and himself hurled back, clouded round with
the dust that was the Old Ones. Stone struck his head and his vision blurred.

 
          
"Dera
damn your soul!" he groaned helplessly as he saw the mage pick up the
Arcanum, long-fingered hands caressing the binding, adoring as a lover's touch.

 
          
"Dera?"
Varent-Rhythamun shook his head, chuckling: a malign sound. "That weak
mewling goddess cannot touch me now. No more than you three fools! Now I have
this, I have all—I have the key that will unlock Tham and return my master to
his kingdom."

 
          
"You
are mad," Calandryll cried, struggling to rise: finding that he could not,
pressed down by Varent’s
magic.
"You'd visit chaos on the
world!"

 
          
“I’d
return my master to his own," the mage retorted, “and stand at his right
hand when that day comes Oh you poor, sad fools! How well you played my game—
without your aid I might never have gained this chamber, never passed the
magicks of Denarus and the rest."

           
“The stone," Calandryll
gasped. "You used the stone!"

           
“Aided by that power I sensed in
you," Varent- Rhythamun agreed. "Aye—the stone is a focus for my
sortilege. I could not approach here myself, but you, you faithful hounds, you
brought it here
_;
and once here I needed only employ my arts, knowing
the Guardians departed. He took up the Arcanum, folding it in his black-robed
arms, teeth bared in awful smile. "And now I take it—to find Tharn's
tomb—whilst you remain here. Farewell, my friends."

 
          
The air shimmered again where he stood, and once more the
familiar—hated!—scent hung on the air. And he was gone, the Arcanum with him.

 
          
“Dera
damn him,” Calandryll moaned. "And me for a fool. Uh, goddess—what have we
done?"

 
          
"Loosed
madness on the world," said Katya, bitterly rising painfully to retrieve
her sword. "We are pawns in his game."

 
          
Bracht
climbed to his feet, taking up the falchion, his face grim, blue eyes cold with
rage.

 
          
The
Old Ones said the road remains a while " he grunted. "Do we take it,
or die here?"

 
          
“To
what end?" Calandryll shook his head, voice sour with chagrin. “He has the
book—you heard what he intends What matter whether we die here or in a world
gone down in chaos?"

 
          
"The
Arcanum leads to Tharn's tomb," Bracht said, and likely that is no
place easy of finding—he must go to there before he may raise the Mad
God."

 
          
Katya
turned to fix him with her eyes, hope flickering behind the stormy grey. “Think
you that we might still halt him?”

           
"I'd sooner die attempting that
than rot here," Bracht answered.

           
“Dare we hope as much?” Calandryll
climbed up, sheathed his dropped blade.

           
"I saw him take the
stone," said Bracht. "Did you not say, Katya, that your talisman is a
pointer to that fell mate?"

 
          
"Aye,"
she said, "it is."

 
          
"Then
we have hope," said the Kern, fierce. "And a battle to fight if we've
the heart to attempt it."

 
          
She
nodded: "I stand with you, Bracht."

 
          
"And
I," said Calandryll, his comrades' determination infusing him, resolution
burning afresh. "To the ends of the world."

 
          
"Likely
we shall see them before this is done," said Bracht, smiling now,
ferocious. "Come!"

 
          
They
took the stairs at a run, careless of the rubble that filled the city as they
raced into a new-dawned morning, toward the dolmen standing lonely in the
meadow, hurling themselves into its darkness.

 
          
Into
the pursuit of Rhythamun.

 
          
THE END, OF THE FIRST BOOK.

 
 
Angus Wells was born in a small
village in Kent,
 
England. He moved to
London
in the 1960s, where he
 
worked as a publicist and later as a
science
 
fiction and fantasy editor. In the
mid-1970s Wells left
 
publishing to write full-time,
contributing to a
 
number of successful action-adventure
 
series, including
Raven:
Swordmistress of Chaos,
 
published pseudonymously. In 1986
Wells relocated to
 
Nottingham
with his two dogs, a schnauzer and
 
a Yorkshire terrier, to write
The
Books of the Kingdoms.
 
He is currently at work on the
second book
 
of
The Godwars
trilogy,
Dark
Magic.

 
 
          
THE
GODWARS

 
          
In the time of the beginning, when
the First Gods
 
created all things, they brought forth
two children. Tham
 
and Balatur. lesser gods, to walk upon
the new world.
 
But Balatur was arrogant. Tham was
consumed
 
with madness, and the First Gods were
forced to condemn
 
them both to an eternal, deathlike
sleep,
 
lest they destroy creation.

 
          
Now
a mysterious wizard seeks to awaken the mad Tharn and unleash his terrifying
power into the world. If he succeeds, the god's insane fury could nip apart the
fabric of existence and give the diabolical ' mapcjan what he seeks most of
all: the scepter of 'domination over the forces of chaos.

 
          
Only the young scholar Calandryll has
the knowledge
 
and skill to stop the evil wizard's
plan. Accompanied by a
 
cynical mercenary, protected by an
enigmatic magic.

 
          
he must journey across a war-torn
countryside,
 
facing terror and treachery both real
and magical, to find
 
the ancient book whose incantations can
bring the
 
evil god back to life—and destroy it
forever.

 
          
FORBIDDEN

 
          
MAGIC

 
          
Forbidden Magic
is the
thrilling beginning of
 
The Godwars.
an epic adventure of
heroism and sorcery
 
by one of the most exciting new writers
of fantasy today.