Wil Ogden - The Nightstone

Silon approached him and said, “Remember what she did for you, please. That’s all I ask.”

“Why did she do that?” Kehet said. “I would have healed.”

“Maybe,” Silon said. “But such a wound would have dropped you long enough for the other Vulak to get close and strike you with their weapons. You might heal from all those attacks too, but you’d never make it away from them. They’d just keep wounding you. In the best case, we’d have been forced to defend you until you could run again. Others would die. We lost one Unicorn; it’s tragic but not as bad as it could have been.”

“I’ll remember Chelle,” Kehet said.

Silon nodded. “Our first stop will be the Unicorn Meadows, our country. There will be Unicorns there that have fled from the Vulak incursion.”

Kehet turned to the other Unicorns present and said, “I don’t have time to run across the continent and introduce myself and rally our people. I need each of you to run to where you know the local Unicorns and have all of us meet…” He didn’t know where to have them meet. He tried to think of somewhere everyone would know.

“At the Spire, in the Meadows.” Silon finished for Kehet.

Most of the other Unicorns assumed their natural forms and darted off. A few remained with Kehet, including Silon.

The Spire was a modest tower compared to the towers of Melnith. Silon explained it as Kehet’s palace. It spiraled upward like a Unicorns horn, reaching perhaps a hundred paces into the air and gleamed pearly silver. Inside, the palace was bare other than a single dais in the center of the large main room that took up the entire ground floor. A stairway spiraled up the outside wall leading to rooms above. The walls of the palace were just translucent enough to allow the sunlight to illuminate the hall.

“There aren’t even doors,” Kehet said.

“Unicorns in their native form cannot turn doorknobs,” Silon said. “What use do we have for doors?”

“I suppose I’m the type of guy that doesn’t care to keep people out?” Kehet said.

“Keep who out?” Silon asked. “The nearest town is forty leagues from here. There’s nothing to take here and no food other than the particularly tasty varieties of grass we’ve cultivated in the Meadows.”

“Have I done anything like this before?” Kehet said.

“Not in my lifetime, but there are probably a couple dozen precedents in the last ten thousand years,” Silon said. “Pacifism is not usually the nature of Unicorns; we are a passionate race often prone to rash decisions.”

“So, what do we do now that we’re here?” Kehet said.

“You wait here, the rest of the Unicorns are spreading the word of the call. As they arrive, you greet them.” Silon said.

“Should we send scouts to Melnith, to keep apprised of the enemies’ placement, their strong points and their weaknesses?” Kehet said.

“I wouldn’t have thought of that,” Silon said. “I think you should go ask for volunteers.”

The four hundred league journey to Melnith would take a Unicorn four hours to run, so Kehet assigned the scouting missions on two day rotations. Everyone present volunteered, but Kehet only sent twenty.

He didn’t know how many days it would take to gather the Unicorns, nor did he know how long he had until the Vulak pressed the defenses of Melnith. All Kehet could do was hope that his actions would ultimately help the Abvi.

Again in possession of the Key, Pantros found himself sitting alone in the best cell in the King’s dungeon. He had three rooms and a private bath with running water. The two servants insisted on assisting him in everything he did. If he went to sit down, one would fluff a cushion and thrust it under him as he sat. When they brought him food they set his table and offered to cut his meat. He’d tried to send them away but they told him they served the King. The two guards standing by the doorway day and night ensured Pantros couldn’t even sustain an illusion of privacy. He’d spent the morning on the battlements, watching the Vulak’s progress in building their siege towers. The sight was depressing.

Without the hope of the Archmage taking and protecting the gem, the only alternative was the inevitable battle. The Vulak had backed away from the city again. Only a handful of archers could hit them at that distance, and they were saving their arrows for when targets might have tactical value. Well over a hundred demons were concealed among the enemy. Sheillene and the Sorcerers and Wizards had been striking at the foul creatures whenever one became visible.

Bryan, Marc, Tara and Thomas came down to join Pantros. “The Vulak have started moving their Siege Towers closer to the city. The Wizards are unable to keep one burning without concentrating and the flame arrows are not doing anything,” Bryan said. “The Vulak used green wood.”

Thomas said, “Mirica and a couple other Sorcerers have the power to blow them over, but that only worked twice and now the Vulak have braced them with ropes.”

“Didn’t Lucian say something about having a Wizard that would turn the tide of the battle?” Tara asked.

“He did, but he also said that Wizard might be too dangerous to expose to battle,” Thomas said. “Wizards, it seems, come with nasty side-effects, such as exploding and leveling buildings or anything else around them. If the Vulak are getting ready to attack, and it looks like they are, I do hope that Lucian’s secret weapon will be able to help us. Sheillene and the archers are on the wall and she is worried they won’t have enough arrows.”

“We don’t,” Sheillene came up behind Thomas. “I was coming down to warn you that the Vulak have started an attack. They are launching stones into the city, but the sung marble construction of all the buildings seems to be mostly undamaged. When the stones hit people, it’s bad, though. You guys should stay inside.”

“Shouldn’t you be on the wall?” Thomas asked.

“Now that the Vulak are closing, any archer can hit them.” Sheillene said with a shrug. “They have their orders. I am staying down here to keep Pantros and his gem safe.”

“You don’t think Bryan and I can handle it?” Marc asked.

“I didn’t know you would be down here,” Sheillene said. “But even so, adding my bow to your blades can only improve his odds of surviving.”

“I’m fifty feet below ground and there is only one stairwell up from here. I think we can defend that,” Pantros said. “The only real risk to me here is dying of boredom.”

“You have a neat stack of books there,” Thomas pointed to the desk in Pantros’ sitting room. “How could you be bored?”

“I don’t read Abvi,” Pantros said. “I did find an interesting picture.” He went to the desk and retrieved a book titled ‘The History of the Sword by Col. V. Venusheart’. “There’s a picture of a sword here,” He opened the book to a marked page and showed everyone the drawing of the sword on that page. “Look Familiar?”

Bryan gasped. “That’s my sword!” he said. “Well it’s the blade of my sword. My guard, hilt and pommel are just plain iron. That’s a fancy mold or carving and clearly some kind of huge gem in the pommel.”

“The Blade of the Baron?” Sheillene read. “That would be a proper translation but the dialect of the book is over twenty thousand years old. “It says the blade is of human origin, making that blade over twenty five thousand years old.”

“And not a spot of rust,” Bryan said. “I already know it’s enchanted.”

Sheillene continued to translate the text near the picture. “It says here that the sword was disassembled because the combined enchantments on the various parts made a weapon that would cut an armored horse in half. It’s also too heavy for an Abvi to carry, which explains why it was disassembled. At that time humans with potent swords would be a threat to the Abvi nation.”