Rend Hope (25 page)

             
"I'm finished with the appetizers, time for the main course." Sahiron announced, the mouths on his body began to open wide.  Rosalind started to feel a pull, looking around, she noticed that any loose debris was being drawn into the many mouths.  She watched dreadfully as a corpse of an unfortunate civilian was picked up and compressed brutally until it was compact enough to fit in a mouth located on Sahiron's right shoulder.

             
The stoic magi woman also noticed that the pulling power of the mouths were rapidly getting stronger.  If she didn't move in the next few seconds she would be pulled in as well.  With a curse, Rosalind grabbed the mayor, conjured up her white wings and flew as fast as she could as far as possible.

             
"Savior preserve us." David Watkins said.  He watched as the roof of City Hall, the deputies that were defending it and the poor civilians that didn't evacuate were all sucked in and consumed by Sahiron and the disturbing mouths all over his torso.  Rosalind didn't even dare look back, to look back would slow her down.  She refused to share the same fate as those other unfortunate souls.

**********

              Marie finally let out a sigh of relief, most of the civilians had managed to make it to the sheriff's office.  The ones that didn't must be dead.  That thought sent cold chills through her, but it was the truth.  They were probably caught by the ghouls Ebrim had summoned or were unfortunate enough to be caught in the battle between them and the necromancer and were killed as collateral damage.

             
The teenage girl shook her head, these were dark thoughts and she couldn't afford to have them distract her right now.  She could just imagine Rosalind scolding her, telling her to mourn after the enemy was dead.  Marie turned her attention back to the battle at hand, Markus' slime-covered flannel jacket she had stored away in a safe place during the interim.

             
The dueling sorcerers were yelling at each other at the moment, but it looks like things would be starting again.  She thought briefly about joining Markus in fighting Ebrim, but it was clear that she was not in their league.  The man had the ability to bring an army of dead onto anyone he felt was an enemy and she really didn't have anything to compete with that at the moment.  Reluctantly, the teenage magi turned and made her way to the sheriff’s department, hoping beyond hope that Markus would be able to defeat this madman.

**********

              Markus was lost in thought, trying to devise a strategy.  At the moment the green-eyed aeromancer was holding his own, but he knew that wouldn't last forever.  The spell he was weaving still needed more time, he would just have to go on the defensive for now.  Ebrim grinned suddenly, instantly putting Markus on edge.

             
"Do you want to know another perk of being a necromancer?" Ebrim asked, Markus narrowed his eyes in response.  The dark-haired man knelt down on his right knee and dug his right hand into the ground.  The dirt around his hand seemed to turn to ash and twist away in the wind.  "Your slain enemies become allies." He finished.

             
Ebrim suddenly stood, dragging out the most bloated corpse Markus had ever seen with his right hand.  The corpse stood about seven feet tall and its skin was light grey, Markus could see little bits of exposed bone from where the skin was hanging too low.  The sagging skin on its head was bald, the left eye was unnaturally small while the right eye was unnaturally large.   Both arms were massively big, its hands looked more like clubs than actual hands.  There the skin looked hardened like it was designed for breaking things.  The aeromancer spotted tiny fingers within the club-like appendages.  The torso resembled an obese man's and the left leg looked like a massive tree-trunk.  The right leg however, looked so thin that Markus was surprised that it didn't break supporting the weight of the giant monstrosity.

             
"I picked this little gem up at Havenway, after it was finally overrun in the days that passed after you left." Ebrim explained, raising his hands to the sky and staring at Markus with a mad gleam in his eye.  "I should thank you, your battle with your master killed many people.  The amount of research material I was able to gather from there was astounding!"

             
Markus felt like he had been physically hit, Ebrim had actually gathered the dead bodies in Havenway for his necromantic experiments!  To make it even worse was that he was part of the reason those folks died.  Ebrim noticed his inner conflict and laughed.

             
"How does it feel aeromancer?  To be the one that supplied me with the means to create the thing that now stands before you? That you are actually helping me usher in the age of the dead?" He gloated.  The green-eyed man felt his heart grow heavy, the thing before him was once a living breathing person with hopes and dreams of their own.  They were probably cut down from the backlash of one of his spells or Nobellus'  "How ironic that the very thing you had once defended will now be the thing that will kill you!"

             
The bloated ghoul's giant right eye swiveled, moving until it was looking right at Markus.  It opened its mouth, letting out a pitiful unsettling moan.  After a few moments the moan ceased, replaced by an actual word.

             
"Mark...us...?" The bloated ghoul said, although its voice was distorted by necromancy, Markus recognized it instantly.  All the color drained from the aeromancer's face.

             
"Erik?" He asked tentatively, Erik was one of his good buddies back in Havenway.  He was the closest thing to an older brother he had ever had.  Erik had shown him how to at least hold his alcohol well enough so that he wouldn't embarass himself.  He also taught him how to hunt without sorcery and the wonders of smores when he was a kid.  Erik was a known treasure hunter back then and some of Markus' favorite times as a child were when they were out rummaging through junkyards and ruins, trying to find something of major worth.

             
"Why Markus?  Why did you kill me..." The bloated ghoul wailed.  The blonde-haired man felt all the guilt he had kept at bay for years suddenly hit him like a tidal wave.  He had killed Erik on accident that night in Havenway, when he had gotten too reckless with his spells in an effort to stop Nobellus.

             
"You know this ghoul Markus?" Ebrim asked, genuinely surprised.  His shock quickly turned into excitement.  "Oh this just keeps getting better and better for you my friend."

Chapter 22

2213 A.D.             

West Gate, Havenway.

             
"Welcome to Havenway, what do you think?" Erik asked the little boy with short blonde hair and bright green eyes.  The kid must have been only five or six, he had found him in a very small house, covered in dirt and dressed in little more than rags.  Erik spotted him during a scavenging mission and when he had tried to enter the kid's house the brat had blasted him with a strong force of wind and knocked him on his ass. 

             
It was rare to find a child surviving out in the wasteland, it was even rarer that the child had the gift of sorcery.  It took some coaxing, but with the aid of his last chocolate bar he was able to get the kid to follow him back to Havenway, the city he called home.  The kid took in the sights with his large green eyes, the cobblestone roads, the sidewalks, the buildings that didn't look rundown.

             
"It's clean." The kid replied, he hadn't said much during their trip back, only telling him that his name was Markus.  He was a scrawny boy, whose green eyes almost seemed to glow.  Although he was just a little kid, and spoke with a toddler's voice, Erik could tell there was a maturity about the child that was almost unnatural.

             
"Yep.  This city has been doing quite well for itself, thanks mostly to Nobellus.  He's a powerful magi who's kept this city safe since before I was born."  Erik informed him, the boy looked up at him with a curious gaze.

             
"Magi?" Markus asked, catching him off-guard.  The thought hadn't even crossed the fifteen year old's mind.  Markus might not even know what he really was.

             
"That's right.  They are people who have the gift of sorcery." Erik answered.

             
"Sorcery?" The little boy questioned, Erik bit his lip, he wasn't too good at explaining things.

             
"That thing you did where you knocked me to the ground when I first tried to enter your house." The teenager explained, recognition dawned in Markus' face.

             
"Oh!" The toddler exclaimed as realization dawned on his face, "So this Nobellus is really strong?" Erik smiled and nodded.

             
"Very.  And I think he'd be willing to teach you how to use your sorcery better, wouldn't that be great?" The teenager asked grinning at the little boy, who smiled back, the smile however seemed subdued.

             
"Yeah..." Markus answered half-heartedly, Erik's grin disappeared as he noticed the boy's somber expression.

             
"Something wrong?" The fifteen year old inquired, Markus didn't answer right away, casting wary looks at the civilians.

             
"They're not gonna like me when they see I have sorcery, others didn't." The boy commented sadly.  "Others said that I would only cause bad things to happen to them." Erik saw the boy's shoulders slump and his head droop.  Tears were forming at the rims of his eyes.  The teenager usually thought of little kids as annoying, but watching this six-year old try very hard to keep from crying and releasing all the built-up pain he was feeling wrenched at his heart.

             
He knelt down in front of Markus so that he was eye-level with him, he placed his hands on his shoulders and looked the kid in the eye. 

             
"They just don't know you yet Markus.  You have the ability to do great things.  All you have to do is show them." Erik said to the toddler.  Markus sniffed loudly and clenched his eyes tight to keep the tears from falling.  He was young, he knew that, but for his entire short life.  People had glared at him like he was some sort of diseased animal.  They would have mad looks on their faces and used him to keep the other bad people away, yet he could tell, they never once thought of him as one of them.  He was just being used by them, like one of his toys.

             
Despite the boy's efforts a single tear escaped his right eye and traveled down his right cheek.  Erik saw this and tried to reassure the kid.

             
"Hey come on, big boys don't cry.  You're a big boy right?"  The teenager asked gently, Markus sniffed again and rubbed his eyes with his tiny right fist.

             
"Y-yea." The toddler hiccuped, Erik smiled again.

             
"Just you wait, these people will look up to you, they will see you as a hero." The fifteen year old said.

             
"Hero?" The blonde-haired boy questioned.

             
"A good guy, someone people love and admire because he fights to defend them." Erik explained.

             
"I like that." Markus said, the tiniest of smiles gracing his little face. 

             
"Good." Erik stood back up and took Markus' right hand with his left.  "Now let’s go get something to eat, chocolate isn't a healthy diet." The teenager replied.

             
"But it tasted so good." The little kid pouted and Erik laughed.

**********

Present Day, 2235 A.D.

Midas Ci
ty, Southern District.
             

The memory rose unbidden in Markus' mind.  Hearing Erik's voice in his mind was bringing it all back to him.  Happy memories that were now tinged with bitterness.  After all in his desperate attempt to defeat his former master he had accidentally killed Erik. 

              The hideous bloated ghoul in front of him had Erik's voice.  Looking at it and not seeing the tall solidly-built man with hair the color of dirt and the first friend he ever made struck Markus to the core of his very soul.  He was the reason Erik was now an ugly undead puppet of a madman, it was his fault.

             
It was all his fault.

             
The ghoul opened its mouth wide and let out a high-pitched scream, the force of it so strong that the aeromancer had to brace himself.  With a speed that belied its size, the massive ghoul leapt into the air.  It landed right in front of Markus who only had time to inhale sharply in surprise before the ghoul used its right arm to smash into the left side of his face.

             
Markus was knocked into the air, landing hard on his right side in an alley about forty meters away from his original spot.  He was barely back on his feet when the massive ghoul landed with a loud crash in front of him, five meters away.

             
"Was death my payment for believing in you Markus?" It spoke, its voice was distorted, but there was no mistaking Erik's voice for the blonde-haired man.  "Is that the gratitude I get for finding you in that miserable shack of a house all those years ago and giving you a better life?"

             
"Erik..." Markus started to reply, but found he couldn't find the words.  Apologies would be meaningless and lying was out of the question.  What should he say?  What could he say?

             
"Look at what you've done to me!  Look at the monstrosity I've become because of you!" The massive ghoul roared, leaping forward and burying it's left fist in Markus' stomach.  The self-proclaimed ordinary magi grunted loudly, expelling a small amount of blood from his mouth as he was rocketed backwards.  He slammed hard into the side of a rather large building, his impact actually indenting himself into the wall.  Markus hung there, stuck in his own indent, arms and legs outstretched and head drooping.  The bloated ghoul was dashing toward him even now.

             
"This isn't how I wanted things to turn out for you Erik..." Markus finally managed to say.  The ghoul was about twenty meters away and quickly closing the distance.

             
"Your recklessness destroyed a city that stood for decades! Tens of thousands were slain!  Did you wish for vengeance so much that you sacrificed the people you were supposed to protect!?" The bloated ghoul shouted back, slamming its right fist right into Markus' torso.  The aeromancer was knocked through the wall and into the interior of the building.  This time when he landed however he managed to stay on his feet.

             
Markus took a quick glance around.  The building he was in was one of the larger ones.  The current room was circular shaped.  All sorts of Books were placed in shelves that were scattered all over the large room.  He was at the library then, the lorekeeper was nowhere in sight, probably evacuated with the rest of the civilians when the shit hit the fan.

             
The sound of the bloated ghoul stepping through the hole it just made dragged Markus from his thoughts.  It's freakishly large eye swiveling to look at him.

             
"What's the matter Markus?  Is the guilt crushing you?  It's only a small fraction of the suffering I've endured." Erik's undead form informed him.  Markus glared at him.

             
"Nobellus had killed our friends Erik!  He murdered families! Mothers! Fathers! Sons! Daughters!  He just killed them all in cold blood!" The aeromancer shouted back.  "I'm sorry, I couldn't let that slide, I couldn't just let Nobellus walk away after that!  They deserved better!"

             
"What about me Markus?  What about my wife? My children?  Didn't they deserve better than to be killed by someone they trusted?" Ghoul-Erik demanded, Markus' shoulders slagged slightly.

             
"...Yes, they did, every single day the guilt threatens to overwhelm me." The green-eyed magi admitted.  "I'm doing what I can to atone for my sins, I know it won't bring you or your family back, but I will find Nobellus and I will KILL him.  He will regret the day he turned his back on us." The blonde-haired aeromancer vowed. 

             
"Bold words, but judging by your wording it's safe to say Nobellus is still alive correct?"  Ghoul-Erik took a few steps toward the young man.  "That means you failed Markus.  You sacrificed your friends in a gamble to defeat the strongest magi I've ever known and you failed miserably!  What makes you think you'll succeed this time?"  Markus stood up straight, glaring defiantly at the man who had rescued him from obscurity as a child.

             
"I'm a different man than I was back then." The aeromancer told the ghoul.  The giant right eye of the undead monstrosity narrowed.

             
"Are you now?" Ghoul-Erik responded, "We'll just have to see about that!"  The undead monstrosity lunged forward, raising its right hand in the air in preparation to hit Markus once more. 

             
The aeromancer was ready for him this time, the initial shock of hearing his old friend's voice had worn off.  He made a flicking motion with his right hand, sending out a swift thin blade of air that sliced Ghoul-Erik's right arm off cleanly at the elbow.  Dark fluid began spurting out of the stump and the bloated ghoul stumbled in its charge.  The severed club-like limb fell right into Markus' hands.

             
Gripping the club-like appendage with both hands, Markus swung it like a baseball bat at the ghoul.  It smashed into the right side of Ghoul-Erik's face, causing the oversized right eye to compress and squirting some more dark fluid from it.  The undead creature howled in outrage as the blow was strong enough to knock it into the air.  It crashed back into the ground on Markus' right, sliding across the floor on its left side and knocking down a few bookshelves in the process.  The giant right eye was now bloody and it was glaring daggers at the aeromancer.

             
Markus released his hold on the severed club-arm, but it never touched the ground.  Using his sorcery, he shot the club-arm like a missile towards the bloated ghoul.  It struck the hideous creature in its chest, sending it sliding further away from the aeromancer.  Enraged, the giant ghoul propped itself up with its remaining left arm.

             
"Damn you Markus!" Ghoul-Erik shouted in its distorted voice, opening it's jaw wide and spewing forth some orange-colored bile at the blonde-haired aeromancer.  Markus extended his left hand, deflecting the bile away from his body with a cushion of air.  The bile flowed past him to hit the wall behind him, dissolving it in mere seconds.

             
"You were the first friend I ever had Erik..." Markus said, a pained expression on his face.  Something hard slammed into Ghoul-Erik's back, slamming him face-first into the ground hard enough to form a crater.  Looking behind it with its over-sized eye, the ghoul saw its own severed club-arm there, Markus had used his sorcery on it once more.  It had only taken its eyes off of it for just a moment though.  When was he ever this fast?  "...I'll always be thankful for that." The aeromancer finished, thrusting his right hand forward.

             
The bloated ghoul was hit by what felt like an invisible truck, its giant eye was smashed from the initial impact and it screamed in torment.  The force of Markus' spell sent the ghoul sailing back until it hit the wall behind it, bounced off of it, then finally landed on the ground with a wet thud.  Ghoul-Erik covered its ruined right eye with its left hand, muttering curses at Markus the whole time.  The blonde-haired man noticed a necromantic glyph on the back of the ghoul's head as it thrashed in pain.  The glyph was growing brightly as the magic energy within it began repairing the damaged ghoul.