The Exodus Sagas: Book I - Of Spiders And Falcons (38 page)

“Novice at best,
Lazlette
.” Dasius pointed his index, thumb, and smallest finger at the High Wizard, and compressed arcane energies into an orb of vibrating flame and light. “
Tersuun
!” the orb spun and swirled through the room in a confusing pattern, growing as large as a boulder and veering toward Aelaine. The orange flaming burst went right through the wall next to the broken windows, exploding in flame and stone. Dasius smiled for a moment, and then turned to his right, hearing arcane dialect whispered in that direction. He saw her materialize into solid form again, having just vanished from one spot to another right before the collision that should have been her demise.

“
Orhintian tinhiras
!” she waved her hand and squeezed her fist shut while pointing at the ground. Black electric shadows pulled from real shadow formed a writhing mass of crackling serpents that grew closer to the turncoat wizard Dasius. He lowered his palm facing the floor, and levitated into the air effortlessly, safely out of reach from the lunging shadows commanded by Aelaine.

Black robes whipping on his body from the abnormal breeze of a missing section of wall in his chambers, the Caberran wizard put both hands on the glowing staff and chanted, eyes fixed on his enemy. “
Julonisys afius kionias
!” three pulsing spheres of red energy, dripping with foul corrosive liquid that burned the stone floor, hovered and slowly moved toward Lady Lazlette. His concentration keeping them safe from counter attack or dispelling magicks, Dasius would have her on the run. She tried, wand pointed at the pulsing spheres of flesh melting energy, yet their slow movements could not be swayed from the force behind them, absorbing any magic directed toward them.

Aelaine stepped toward the broken wall, her only escape, and pointed two fingers at the ceiling above her opponent. “
Nivili bravool
!” and lightning arced from her fingertips through the stone above his head, chunks of stone falling in line as the bolts traced their way toward Dasius. The pulsating red orbs kept the steady follow of Aelaine, getting closer each moment. They stopped and hovered as the bald professor held up his hand, catching the lightning arc, seemingly absorbing it with little pain. “
Hilian Vahilianus
!” she whisked her black wood wand in front of her body, a clear wall of arcane force now between her and the red spheres determined to reach her.

“You know better than that now
Aelaine
. Nothing can stop
Tridian Blood Spheres
, not for long.” Dasius pushed the staff forward, concentrating on them breaking her wall. Screeching, crackling, ear piercing disintegration filled the room as the three crimson orbs began to work their way through the magical barrier. Aelaine looked behind her, at the drop from the ruined wall, and prepared to levitate into the open air. The door opened as she stepped from the edge in levitation a hundred or more feet above the ground.

“
Dasius of Caberra
, how disappointing.” Middir stepped into the ruined chamber with a look of resolve, his plain oak staff glowing blue with swirling arcane shadows. “How much did they pay you for your treachery,
old friend
?”

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The entourage was moving quickly, trying to keep pace with Captain Kendrynn Shilde and the silent bodyguard, Angeline Berren. The captain, his short dark hair and stubble contrasting his pale morning skin tone, watched the woman beside him. Kendrynn knew that speaking to this woman was a waste of time for she never spoke to anyone. He and the Vallakazz guard had many a night discussing her beauty and contemplating aloud, with much ale, what the reason for her silence could be. She even moved quietly compared to his greaves and steel plate armor clanking upon the cobblestone path they hurried down. Despite the unanswered rumors, Captain Shilde knew this woman could hold her own better than any of his men and the thirty soldiers following were also aware. Angeline was known for her prowess with a blade and some form of strange gifts that made her extremely formidable in combat. Kendrynn in his mid thirties, imagined Angeline few years younger, with fewer scars from what he had seen, at least fewer on the outside, and smiled acknowledging his interest.

Cold air blew in her hair, refreshing her thoughts. Angeline turned the corner to the right, heading onto the main eastern merchant road known as Candelabra Street. No Gwenneth, but she sensed plenty of adversaries on the wind, their tight streamlined thoughts of killing on the breeze. Only those trained to listen and feel in such a manner would even have an inclination as to something out of the ordinary. Looking down the road the silent guardian noticed nothing askew at the gate and she knew then that they had not passed through. Her shortcut through backstreets had placed the city guard and herself far ahead of the High Wizards daughter and Angeline turned and stared at the captain. Her eyes met his for a moment or three, the men stopping abruptly behind them. Her arm reached out and pointed to the two jewelry stores and up to their balconies and rooftops of the flats above, then to the Red Robe Tavern. She drew her blade and marched toward the house of ale and spirits without a word.

“You heard her men! Ten of you to the southern side with Angeline, the rest with me to the northern side of the street. Give me a thorough search of the second and thirds above Ollfir’s and Bransken’s. Let’s move!” the men split up, never questioning their captain, and scrambled up alley stairs and walkways between the old stone buildings of the packed eastern edge of Vallakazz. The captain of the city guard drew his broad sword, put his shield to the ready, his purple cape blowing behind him, and followed his men straight ahead. Kendrynn saw bolts, half a dozen quick streaks of shadow from the roof top above the jeweler’s fine business. “Take cover! “ too late as three of his men dropped clutching their chests. His remaining men, shields up and blades drawn, rushed to conceal themselves at the side of the building and the front, backs against the walls and windows. More ammunition fired from the balconies, this time aimed at the captain, four bolts lodging in his round steel shield and several more glancing off as he knelt behind it. “Up the stairs, rooftops, now!”

Angeline raced up the stairs that led to the second story of the tavern, leading her men to the top of building. She ducked and dodged with her shoulders and hips in unison as a hail of crossbow bolts flashed her direction. Taking cover from the railings and beams for a second, then darting and diving forward to a wooden scaffold on the balcony, she avoided every deadly shot. Concentrating on the air at her feet, she lifted with amazing speed from the second floor balcony to the stone slatted roof, face to face with five masked archers all reloading as fast as humanly possible. The men charged behind her on foot, now reaching the balcony, and the sounds of blade on shield rang through the city streets below along with shouts and screams of the citizens in the busy district who found themselves in the midst of morning battle. Knowing the second floor had the soldiers occupied with swordwork, Angeline stepped forward on the roof alone, staring at the stone slats, thinking of frost and ice from the clouds in the distance. Crisp sounds of popping and freezing echoed faintly from the roof as the archers aimed at the silent woman. Five bolts fired at her chest, the first two she avoided by turning sideways, whisking past her into the adjacent building’s wall. The third and fourth cut in half with a single cross cut of her bastard sword, and the fifth skimmed her hairline on the left side of her head and drew blood from her ear. Each man drew his saber, two of them producing off hand daggers as well. The slick rooftop did its work, two men falling to a knee and holding on for their lives, surprised by the change in footing. Another charged halfway to her and slid off the slanted rooftop, falling thirty feet to the ground with a muffled yell and a bone breaking impact on the cobblestone street below. Angeline Berren walked slowly and cautiously forward, blade out toward the four remaining White Spider assassins.

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The small tea table flew at the cursed swordsman, hurled end over end by the young mercenary in front of him, as did a chair from the one behind him. He ducked under them both, the furniture crashing together and falling atop a guest’s morning sausage and tea. The patrons scattered to the corners and kitchen of the Silverwand Tavern, one moment entranced by the upstart commotion from the Red Robe Tavern across the street, the next they were in the middle of a breakfast brawl that came from nowhere, right beside them.

Kendari drew Shiver, keeping his off hand free in the cramped little room of tables and chairs afly at him. Patrons scattering from outside in, city guard covering themselves from archers on rooftops, and guests inside were trying to get out. Two sabers loosed from scabbards to his front, and another was chair flung over his shoulder from behind, missing by inches from the hulking assassin placed by the rear exit of the Silverwand Tavern. The Nadderi elf found himself in another tight place, outnumbered as usual. He hopped onto one of the small tea tables, screams of attack and war issuing from Vallakazians all around the building as the doors opened and closed, Kendari knew it was a matter of few moments before city guard took charge of this building also. His silent boots leapt from one table to another and somersaulted over the young swordsmen clad in black, landing behind them. His face and black spiral vein markings now apparent from the cloak falling back off his face, the elf grinned his pointy eared smile at the masked youths. “Why do you all wear
black
, if you work for the
White
Spider?”

One lunge high, one came low and to the left, Kendari parried the attacks, yet the blonde haired assassin on the left withdrew his blade at the last second, and attacked high with a flash of his wrist. The elven killer barely got Shiver up in time, his crosspiece catching the blade in high parry above his face, and the boy pressed, placing two hands on the grip. “Amazing,
one
of you was trained how to feint.” his sarcasm and ego forcing the smile to remain, despite the other mercenary preparing to run him through from his rigidly held position. Kendari turned his body left, but the blade right, metal edges sliding across one another and his into the young assassins face, cutting him from nose through ear, burning the flesh with searing heat slowly and deep as his scream ripped through the mask. He did not like dirty swordplay, but the men here were reckless, tired, and strong. He realized that they would do anything to kill him here. The second assassin cut again at the Nadderi’s chest, was parried downward, and attacked again a little higher with an angled slash toward the neck, Shiver met the blade halfway, beat the saber blade down quickly, and turned cross the mans chest and back again. Two sizzling gashes through the neck and shoulder dropped the assassin to his knees holding his burned and bleeding wounds. The cursed elf drew his other longsword, grip reversed, from his right hip, turning to the right, steps in small perfect circles keeping pace with his enemy’s attacks and his own. Despite the boy’s horrid facial wound, he took no chances with the trained youth and plunged his left hand edge into the exposed back of the crouching blonde haired assassin with downward force and a deadly reverse grip killing the boy instantly while he kept stare with the third agent.

Puddles of blood at his feet, the third assassin, unarmed but standing a foot taller than the elf and nearly doubling his weight, stepped forward. He looked at the Nadderi with hate in his dark eyes, older, the telltale facial hair and wrinkles by those hating eyes told Kendari that this man was a veteran. A table hit him in the enchanted crossed bracers, shattering from the impact and knocking the elf back a foot. Covering his front with forearms and blades, he had nowhere to go but forward. A chair this time, at his abdomen, Kendari sidestepped the hurled wooden projectile and deflected it with his blades. The beast of a human man picked up another chair, stepping forward to put his body with his strength, hoping to knock the elf down with the force of the throw. The swordsman stepped up on the table in front of him, leaping into the air, barely over the chair that whisked through the tavern, and planted the tip of his off hand sword into the collarbone of his massive attacker and down through his chest. Leaving the weapon lodged in him, Kendari turned, having landed behind the man, spinning on his heels and cut Shiver’s edge through the ribs and up under the arm. Blood sprayed and seared with the heat from the enchanted weapon and the elf kicked his lower back forcing the dying hulk down face first into the floor. He drew Shiver up in the air, placed two hands on the hilt, turned it downward and plunged the blade through the assassin, wood planking of the floor splintering as the blade pierced it. Kendari removed his other longsword from the mans shoulder, wiping the blades clean off on the dead mans cloak. He looked up, seeing frightened stares from the few that remained cramped in the kitchen, and nodded a deep bow, pulled up his hood and made out the rear door to the northern side of Candelabra street.

He heard the city guards battling above him, heard explosions faintly in the distance of the academy, yet he kept moving. Through shadows the buildings produced in the low morning sun, he silently and quickly made for the northern gate. His face and description obviously known by too many here in Vallakazz, Kendari made for the city walls and the open wilderness. Staying here, he thought, would only prove troublesome to what he wanted to attain. Taking it in the night, away from a hundred active prying eyes armed with blades would be much easier. He went to meet with the trolls of Salah-Cam and instruct them on the changes to the plan. He supposedly had plenty of allies waiting on the wooded trails, just not allies that could be easily entered into a civilized city such as this. He had enough to handle the White Spider as they made with or without the books or the scroll. They would return, or surely try, to Valhirst in the east. If the highborne elven woman and her friends made it out with it, all the better. Whichever the case, Kendari would be there waiting. All he had to do was get out of the city, in broad daylight, unnoticed.