Hemlock And The Dead God's Legacy (Book 2) (23 page)

Hemlock looked around the vale.  It was still beautiful, but some of its ethereal quality had diminished.  Still, she felt more comfortable.

“Well, we might as well get on with it,” she said.

The four who remained walked around the shore of the lake toward the cave.

“I saw something unusual last night,” said Tored.

“What?” said Hemlock, worried that he might have seen the strange festival thrown by the
Ishawn witches.

“I woke a few hours before dawn and saw a shimmering light coming from the outside of the camp.  I feared some mischief was afoot and made to wake you, but the light disappeared,” said Tored.

“Could you have been dreaming?”

“Maybe, but I don’t think so.  My first thought was that DuLoc was going to appear again, but I think the light was different.  The strangest part is I felt hatred emanating from the light in those few moments before it blinked out.”

“Hatred?  That’s odd, since outside of dealing with Acron Gallus, I’ve felt mostly peace since we reached this vale.”

“As have I.  I can’t explain it, but something about it concerns me.  It felt like it was coming for me.  I can’t say why.  I just had that feeling.”

“Great.  Just what we need: another ghost bent on our destruction.”

Tored grunted the way he did when he had nothing more to say.  Hemlock let the matter drop, but felt it
settle into the back of her mind, joining the many other concerns that had staked their claim there.

Chapter Ten

              Merit sat in his chamber, content to do nothing for a while.  The confrontation with Jalis was over and he and his friends were safe.  Gwineval had told Merit that he had scryed with Hemlock, and that she was nearing the completion of her mission in the Witch Crags.  For the first time in recent days, Merit was able to relax.

             
It didn’t take long for his curiosity about the secret book in his possession to resurface.  He wished he could read more quickly, but the voices in his head were a near constant distraction.  At least they had been quiet today.

             
The City has many secrets.  Perhaps I’ll yet discover my story in these old, dusty pages
.



Julius walked toward the City, choking down the sense of disbelief that still permeated his thoughts concerning its ruined condition.

“I must be very observant now
—my life depends on it,” he said to himself.

He was conscious of the contrast between his fine
silk robe and golden sword compared to the worn and dirty apparel worn by the people he saw—and he anticipated the effect this contrast would have.

A mob of dirty children was the first to shadow him as he approached a group of hovels at the outskirts of the City.
He continued to walk along a dusty road, and soon he attracted the attention of some adults.  They paused their labors to watch in disbelief as he strode by looking clean, and bearing a shimmering gold blade.

As he reached the first crude buildings,
some elders rose from thatched chairs to get a better look at him. In a matter of minutes, a small throng was following him as he walked toward the center of the City.

Some people approached him and asked questions. He ignored them. He was looking for some sign of organization or power. So far he had seen none.

Then a group of four thugs with heavy iron weapons caught his attention. They were dressed in lush animal skins and their noses and ears were pierced and adorned with bone jewelry. Two of the group left hurriedly while the other two made a poor attempt at falling in with the crowd without being noticed.

Julius
approached the two fighters, who, realizing his intent, stood their ground.  The crowd parted as Julius stopped before them.

“Who is your lord?  I would speak with him,” said Julius.

“You don’t ask to see him—he asks to see you, if it suits him,” responded the larger of the two thugs.

“I am…Julius.  I have returned to the City
to restore it to glory.  Tell your master that I would speak with him.”

Julius spotted a large building nearby, and saw a brightly colored sign hanging out front with a slab of meat and a mug of ale depicted on it.

“I will wait in yonder building for his response,” Julius continued.

The two men shrugged and made off.

“We’ll see,” commented the larger one over his shoulder.

Julius walked toward the building he had seen, as hunger assailed him for the first time since he had left his desert.

As he neared the building, another small crowd of people had gathered on the covered porch and watched his approach.

Some ruined buildings on the adjacent street caught his attention.  They had collapsed
, and their rafters and joists had been snapped and broken.  Their walls had fallen inward.

Julius became curious.  He turned to one of the dirty children and asked him what had happened to the building.

“The demon got it,” said the child.

People began to shout around him, and Julius heard many of their comments:

“She-devil came last night.”

“Four people killed.”

“Nobody knows why.”

“Light
Dancers are to blame.”

“Can you kill the demon for us?”

He was intrigued, but did not wish to create more of a spectacle since the crowd around him continued to swell.

He reached the worn steps of the building, and appreciated the aroma of food wafting from the
open windows.

He climbed the stairs,
excusing himself as he pushed through the crowd on the porch.

He felt people’s hands on him, and had a passing concern for his fine
golden robe being handled by so many dirty hands.  But when he lifted his arm to see whether it was soiled, it shimmered back just as perfectly as when he had first donned it.

The people around him murmured amongst themselves as he walked through the lobby of the building
. He spotted tables where the few who were more hungry than curious were dining.

Julius seated himself and caught the eye of a plump waitress in a tight cotton halter top and
food-stained apron.  She smiled and approached him, only to be shouldered aside by a middle-aged man wearing an obsequious smile.

“Welcome to the Ale and Rib.  I am
Portroy, owner and proprietor.  How can I help you?” said the Innkeeper.

“Bring me a plate of food
, please,” said Julius.  Reaching for his desert belt, he realized he had forgotten he had no money.  He was about to stand and leave when his hand brushed the pocket of his robe.  He felt something hard and heavy there.  Reaching inside, he felt six large coins that he was certain had not been there before.  He withdrew one from the pocket and placed it on the table.  It was polished gold and reflected the rafters above him.  But it was the face on the coin that startled Julius.  It was a proud face with a wide forehead, generous nose and a prominent jaw line.  The eyes were cruel and appraising.

“Father,” Julius thought to himself as he slid the coin toward the innkeeper.

“This should cover it,” Julius said to the man.

The crowd went silent as the stunned innkeeper held the coin before him.

“An Imperial gold mark!  This will buy your food and lodging here for the next month.  Shall I arrange for that?” said the innkeeper in a hopeful voice.

“Yes,” said Julius, “although I doubt I’ll be here that long.  My purpose here will surely direct me elsewhere very soon.”

“And what is your purpose, if you don’t mind me askin’?” said the innkeeper.

Julius stood and addressed the assembled crowd, which had swelled to encompass the entire first floor of the Inn and the better part of the street outside.

“I am the son of the empire, returned to set things right.  But fear not.  My vision of the City is not the same as my Father’s.  We will have laws, but we will also have moderation.  Men and women will know freedom.”

Murmurs and whispers of surprise were heard throughout the crowd.  Julius looked over those assembled
, in the hopes of noticing someone of stature, but instead he saw nothing but clothes and faces that were etched by hard work and poverty.

The buxom waitress had brought out his food, but just as he was about to sit, a small commotion broke out near the entrance to the Inn.

The ruffians he had sent off had returned in force.  A full score of them pushed their way through the crowd toward him.

Julius turned and sat.  He started to eat the meat and
soup that had been brought for him. It was bland, but satisfying.  He sensed the warriors behind him, and one stepped so close to him that he smelled the man’s odor over the aroma of the food.

“Away,” he muttered to himself, concentrating on a spell of repulsion that he bound to the word as he said it.

Julius heard the wood-soled sandals of the men scratching along the floor as their leader was suddenly pushed back twenty feet into the crowd, carrying the others with him.

“It would have been forty feet in my
desert,” he thought ruefully, “but that is a thought from another life.” He focused his attention back on his soup.

“You’ve made your point, Golden One,” cried a ruffian from behind him
. “We meant no disrespect.  We came to tell ye that his highness, the great wizard, Hamiltus, the exalted one, has agreed to see you tomorrow.  You will come at dawn to the stone building near the lake.  If you can’t find it, ask around.”

Julius
swallowed some broth, and then nodded once without turning.  He resumed eating as he heard the warriors exiting the Inn.

“Hamiltus will teach him a thing or two,” cried one of the warriors loudly as they neared the door.

Julius continued to eat.  When he had finished, he summoned the Innkeeper.

“I want the room with the best view of the City,” said Julius.

The Innkeeper nodded and took him up three flights of stairs to a small hall.  Next he led Julius through a doorway into a cramped space with a large window.

Julius walked to the window and looked out.  He looked east over several buildings
and could see the base of the ruined Tower of Law.  A system of crude fencing and barriers had been erected around it.  A four story stone keep stood within the fences near the ruins.  The keep was prominent, since few of the buildings near it exceeded two stories.

“Is that the home of Hamiltus?” he asked the Innkeeper, who had lingered well past the point of necessity.

“Yes.  Watch out for him.  He is a powerful sorcerer and is quick to anger.”

Julius looked past the ruins of the tower
, which stretched from beyond the barriers to the shore of the lake in the city center.  On the other side of the lake, the finer neighborhoods were deserted.  The buildings all looked burned out and charred, and deep red lines were present along many of the streets and some of the buildings.

“Why is the other half of the City deserted?” asked Julius.

“Light Dancers overran it.  Our magic is weak now.  Even Hamiltus doesn’t dare cross the barrier.”

“What are Light Dancers?”

“You don’t know?  Where are you from?”

Julius looked at the man evenly until he responded.

“The Light Dancers use the old magic.  See those lines?  Those are ley lines for Imperial magic.  The Light Dancers paint the lines with blood so they can see ‘em in daylight.  When they walk those lines, they get power somehow.  They get strong, tough, and crazy.  Hamiltus removed all of the ley lines on this side of the Lake, so we’re safe here.  When our magic strengthens, we’ll fight back and re-take the areas we’ve lost recently.  Trouble is, the Light Dancers have their own shamans that can re-make them ley lines.  We fight back and forth as our magic waxes and wanes.  We can never seem to get rid of them.”

“I see.  And their shaman—will they parley?”

“Parley?  You mean talk?  They do talk after a fashion, but they talk crazy.  That line magic does something to them.  They can’t stand the sun and live for the night.  Just look over there tonight and you’ll see ‘em.  You might talk with them, but I can’t see the point.  They’re not really like us.  They’re more like animals or something.”

Jul
ius grunted an acknowledgement. “This Hamiltus: will he reason with me?”
              “It depends.  You have power, so I think he’ll talk with you.  But watch out for him.  He killed the last wizards that came to the City.  He’ll probably demand that you bow to him and pledge your loyalty to him.”

“I won’t do that,” said Julius.

“Then you’d better be ready to fight,” said the Innkeeper.

Julius reached in his pocket and withdrew another gold coin.  He tossed it to the Innkeeper.

“Leave me,” Julius said.

He
sat in his room alone for several hours.  His mind was mostly clear—only occasionally a thought or memory of his homeland crept into his awareness, only to be quashed as an expression of weakness.

The shadows in the room grew longer and Julius rose and returned to the window.  He looked at the eastern part of the City and saw that a few figures were shuffling about on the streets.  Faint, interlocking, glowing lines were visible along the dusty thoroughfares, and the people on the streets seemed to be walking along the lines.

After some inspection, Julius noticed that there were multiple ley lines within each glowing traceline.  He recognized their structure from the brief moment he had worn his father’s crown in the mountains.  There was an inner line that was the widest and the brightest.  This was the energy ley line which carried magical mana to enforce the magical law and feed energy to those attuned to this law.  Woven around the energy line was a thinner, arced line within which was embedded dense runic language describing the behaviors allowed by the magic.  Two jagged lines surrounded the inner lines.  These were also filled with dense runes that ran along their length, describing the behaviors explicitly excluded by the magic.

Julius was disgusted by what he saw.  More and more figures emerged into the dusk as the ley lines brightened.  Many of them crawle
d until they reached the lines, at which point they burst upright as they wallowed in the magical emanations.

“They must have discovered a way to siphon the magical energy,” Julius thought.  “But why at night?”