Rise of the Spider Goddess (2 page)

“Can we attack Nakor yet?”

“He won initiative fair and square. Don't worry, it should be our turn soon.”

The priest's eyes widened as Nakor threw the small flame at him. He ducked to one side and it flew by his head, brushing his shoulder on the way by. Then he screamed as his shoulders and hair began burning.

Nakor flinched at the sound. He hated inflicting pain, even when it was the only way to survive. He also hated wasting the flask of lamp oil, as it was his last one.

Soon, the priest fell to the ground, dead. Nakor waved his hand, and the flames died out.

“Are you sure you want to do this?” he asked the remaining men, eyeing the dead elf.

One of them stepped forward, wielding an enormous broadsword. “He's mine,” the man said viciously.

Nakor studied him, noting the leather breastplate and matching bracers on his wrist. He examined the huge blade of the man's sword, comparing it to his own narrow rapier.

I was aiming for an, “It's not the size that counts” joke here. I missed.

Nakor ducked under the first swing, shoving his own sword forward to counterattack. The blade skidded off of the leather breastplate, and the man growled.

“Uh oh,” Nakor muttered.

With a loud cry, the man pulled his sword back and lunged at Nakor.

Anticipating the move, Nakor stepped neatly to one side. The man grunted as his sword plunged into the tree Nakor had been standing in front of. He began to wrench his weapon free, when a sword blade rapped sharply across his knuckles.

Probably Nakor's sword blade, but once again, we don't want to make assumptions.

Shaking his head, Nakor gestured at the man to back away. Screaming a battle cry, the man charged.

Nakor dodged to one side, sliding the tip of his rapier up under the man's arm, a place left unguarded by the leather armor he wore. Giving a final, gurgling cry, the man tumbled to the ground.

“That's two,” Nakor commented, backing toward the tree. “I'm willing to call it even if you are.”

The remaining fighters looked at each other, then began advancing toward him.

“I was afraid of this,” he muttered.

The advancing warriors stopped in confusion. Nakor raised an eyebrow, then looked to one side. There, a second Nakor stood, sword in hand.

Raised eyebrow count: 2

“Shall we?” the new Nakor asked.

With a shrug, Nakor lunged forward, a move that was instantly imitated by his doppleganger. Unsure of what sword to parry, their target died swiftly as a pair of rapiers pierced his body.

Pynne grinned, concentrating on the fighting below. She raised her other hand, and a third Nakor appeared next to the first two. She had always disapproved of unfair fights. This “Nakor” seemed to be a decent enough fellow, and it would be sad to see him killed at twelve to one odds.

Again in his normal form, Whoo looked over to appraise the situation. Glancing up at Pynne, he pointed at the illusions and raised an eyebrow. Pynne smiled innocently.

Raised eyebrow count: 3

Carefully, Whoo pulled a two foot bow off of one shoulder. Moving with the smooth grace of experience, he slipped the string onto the bow and pulled an arrow from his quiver.

Pixies didn't hunt for food, but they still needed to know the arts of war in order to defend themselves. Whoo was an archer. He had been practicing his craft for over a decade, and was counted as the finest shot in his village. The bow he wielded was painstakingly made by his own hand, as was the arrow he placed gently against the string.

Why does the author keep interrupting the action to take an infodump?

Completely serious now, he pulled the string back and sighted along the narrow point of his arrow. Relaxing his fingers, he allowed the string to slip out of his grasp.

The three Nakors were holding the mercenaries at bay, but were unable to launch an offensive of their own. Keeping their backs to each other, they parried their opponents' attacks as well as they could.

Whoo's arrow must be taking the scenic route to its target.

Seeing an opening, one of the men raised his own sword to strike. There was a sharp jolt to his hand, and he looked in shock as his weapon flew away to land point down in the dirt. His hand bled from a small cut where Whoo's arrow had sliced his thumb in passing.

A rapier took him in the throat. It was one of Pynne's illusions, but the man didn't know that. He clutched his throat in agony, eyes widening, and fell to the ground unconscious.

Moments later, another man stumbled to the ground. There he moaned and clutched his thigh, from which another of Whoo's arrows protruded.

“Seven left,” Nakor observed.

“No problem,” commented the double on his left.

Raising their swords, they prepared for the next assault.

From a nearby doorway, Galadrion watched the last rays of the sun as they faded from view. Careful to avoid stepping into that light, she waited as the last of the sun's light disappeared, spreading a gentle darkness across the land.

Galadrion's name was totally not stolen from
Lord of the Rings
. Really! It's 100% original, just like the rest of this book!

Sprinting, Galadrion raced toward the sound of fighting in the distance. Seeing the struggling figures ahead, she slowed to a walk.

One of the combatants turned, hearing her approach. His eyes widened as he studied the woman who stood before him. Galadrion was an attractive woman. She was tall for a woman, with long brown hair. She was dressed in a black leather vest over a white shirt, and black trousers. A leather-bound sword handle jutted over one shoulder.

Puffing out his chest, the man raised a hand, signalling her to halt. “I'm sorry m'lady,” he said in an official sounding voice, “we need you to stay clear of the area.”

Galadrion didn't reply. She simply reached out and grabbed the man by his neck. There was a snapping sound as her fingers tightened, and she hurled the lifeless body into a nearby tree.

A few of the remaining fighters spun to face this new attack. Galadrion watched impassively as one of them slashed at her neck. At the last moment, she raised an arm and caught the blade in one hand.

“Run,” she whispered. Wrenching the sword away, she grabbed the handle in her other hand. With a slight flexing of her muscles, she snapped the blade.

The man's eyes widened, and he turned to flee. His companion watched in disgust.

“Coward,” he muttered, raising his own sword.

Galadrion shook her head sadly as she drew her own weapon. Wielding the graceful, curved scimitar with both hands, she waited.

The man brought his sword down in a powerful overhead blow, which Galadrion parried effortlessly. Before her opponent could react, she sliced deep into his side, severing the iron links of his mail armor.

The fleeing man stumbled to the ground, an arrow in his calf.

Galadrion looked in surprise, wondering where the arrow had come from. Turning toward Nakor, she allowed herself a slight smile.

There was only one man left standing, and he was panicking. The three Nakors in front of him smiled in amusement.

Giving a silent prayer, the man lunged at one of the images before him. It gave no resistance, and vanished as his sword touched it. Stumbling, the man turned and looked at the two remaining figures, both with rapiers ready.

Slightly more confident now, he thrust his sword at the image directly in front of him.

Shifting his weight, Nakor allowed the thrust to pass harmlessly by, at the same time extending his own sword. The man tried desperately to stop, but was unable to halt his forward momentum. His face twisted into an expression of pain as he impaled himself on Nakor's waiting blade.

The other illusion vanished as Nakor withdrew his sword from the body. Kneeling down, he wiped the blade clean on the dead man's shirt.

With a sigh, he looked to the west, where the sky was fading into darkness. It had been such a beautiful sunset.

Connecting the end back to the beginning like this can be a useful and effective technique…unless your beginning was really, really boring.

Galadrion walked over to Nakor as he finished cleaning his rapier. “Are you okay?” she asked.

“Yes.”

She nodded curtly, then turned and walked to the unconscious man who had been stabbed by Nakor's illusionary double. She bent over and grabbed him by his cloak. Standing effortlessly, she tossed him over her shoulder like a sack of potatoes.

“What are you doing?” Nakor called out.

Galadrion stopped for a moment. “I'm a vampire,” she replied without turning. “You don't want to know.”

Nakor watched her walk away. Then he turned around. His spell was starting to wear off, but he could still make out the dimly glowing forms of Whoo and Pynne. “Thank you, whoever you are,” he said to the two shapes.

Whoo hesitated briefly, then allowed himself to become visible. Pynne followed suit a moment later, and was the first to speak.

“Interesting friends you have,” she said with a wry smile.

“Yeah,” Whoo added, “I'm sorry I had to shoot them.”

Nakor grinned. Pixies were distantly related to elves, as could be seen by their pointed ears and narrow features. Their language was an offshoot of elvish.

“So you were the ones playing games with me?” Nakor asked, switching to their language.

The two pixies looked at each other, and both started giggling. Pynne was the first to speak. “You have a human accent,” she complained.

The elf-with-a-human-accent thing is actually a deliberate character trait, not a lazy author screw-up.

“I'm Whoo, that's Pynne,” the other pixie added.

“You're Nakor, I assume?” Pynne asked.

He grinned. Still speaking in the pixie tongue, he said “That's correct.”

Nakor looked around the rapidly darkening woods. “Why don't we continue this discussion at my home?” he asked.

Pynne and Whoo glanced at each other, and shrugged.

“Sure,” Pynne decided.

“There's a ruined castle about a quarter of a mile in that direction, by the river. I'll meet you there in a few minutes, okay?”

“What are you going to be doing?” demanded Whoo.

Nakor glanced around at the corpses who littered the ground. “I have to clean up my forest,” he answered. I also have to check on a friend, he added silently.

The diminutive pair looked at each other and vanished. Nakor could faintly make out their laughter as they flew toward his home.

* * *

Galadrion trembled. The unconscious man lay in a crumpled heap a few feet away, where she had dropped him. She had been a vampire for twenty six years. For twenty six years she had tried desperately to fight the urges, the overwhelming instincts within herself. For twenty six years, she had failed.

Galadrion is TRAGIC and DARK and TORMENTED!

It had been many days since she tasted fresh blood. She slammed her fist into a tree, hating what she was about to do. Bark splintered around her fist, falling unnoticed to the earth. It was a curse, she thought angrily, running her tongue across the pointed tips of her two elongated teeth.

TRAGIC and DARK and TORMENTED and also CURSED!

She walked back to the fallen man. His forehead was bleeding slightly from when Galadrion had dropped him. She stared, fascinated, at the red drops that gradually ran down the side of his face to drip onto the earth. With a trembling hand, Galadrion reached out and wiped the small cut with her finger.

Galadrion seemed dazed as she stared at the red stain on the tip of her index finger. She studied it for a moment, turning her hand slightly. She could feel her willpower beginning to fail. Screaming silently at herself, she brought her finger up to her mouth and licked the blood.

As the coppery taste hit her tongue, Galadrion finally lost control. She grabbed the body and slammed him viciously into a tree. Shoving his head to one side, she sunk her teeth into his neck and began to drink.

A few minutes later, she tossed the body to one side. She knew that in a few days, the man would awaken a vampire, just as she herself had awoke all those years ago.

It had been the day after her nineteenth birthday. Her husband had come home after a long hunting trip, bringing a stranger with him. He had been pale and sick, and spent the next few days in bed.

The stranger had helped around the house, making himself useful in whatever way he could. The day after he arrived, he walked up behind Galadrion while she prepared lunch. Without warning, he pinned her arms at her side and sank his teeth into her neck.

“This is
not
making yourself useful!”

Devin, her husband, stumbled into the kitchen upon hearing her scream.

“No!” he protested, grabbing the stranger by the shoulder. “You promised not to take her!”

“Fool,” the stranger hissed, dropping Galadrion to the ground. “I give you immortality, and you dare to question my actions?”

The stranger is also a habitual puppy-kicker, just in case his EVILNESS is too subtle.

Devin pulled a hunting knife from his belt and lunged at the stranger.

He laughed as the knife danced harmlessly off of his skin. His hand shot out and grasped Devin by the throat. Lifting him off of the ground, the stranger carried him out of the house.

A few minutes later, he returned.

Let's review the timeline. Devin and the stranger arrive at home. Devin, “spent the next few days in bed.” But the stranger attacked Galadrion “the day after he arrived,” at which point Devin went and got himself killed right out of the story. Um…

“Let this be a lesson to you,” he said, kneeling down before the barely conscious Galadrion. “Never challenge another vampire before you have tasted your first blood. Until that time, you are still vulnerable.”

The stranger's cruel smile was the last thing Galadrion saw as she lost consciousness.