In Pursuit Of Wisdom (Book 1) (37 page)

“Yeah, they were too proud to brew some sea-tea.”  She smirked, flashing Niku a half smile.  “They’ll live.”

“I suppose you’re quite right.  I imagine I’ll need to try a calming spell or use a healing scroll if they’re going to be any use to the crew coming into port.”  He was smiling and shaking his head as well.

“Speaking of port, how soon till we reach the city?”  The sound of her whetstone on the blade of her
long sword made a crisp
shrrrick
with each stroke.

Niku stood up.  “Let me cast a farsight spell and have look toward the approaching shore.”  He reached into a robe and pulled forth a small leaf, and began a chant, drawing specific runes in the air.  A hole opened up in the air, like a tunnel, only the image at the end of the tunnel was much farther away than the human eye could see.  Much farther away than even a sailor’s looking glass could pick up.  Rhee stood up, her blue eyes wide.

“One of the more useful spells I’ve seen from you mages,” she teased.  Niku smiled and looked through the tunnel toward the distant port of Ilbindale that they were sailing toward.

As they watched, they saw something quite strange.  There were dozens of large ships tied to various docks, and dozens more anchored in the harbor, waiting for a dock to open up.  One by one, these immense vessels began to shake, and slowly sink in an unnatural way.  They seemed to vibrate, and for no apparent reason, began to fall straight into the sea, as if a rope tied to the bottom and center of each hull was methodically pulling them down under still waters.

“Niku!  The harbor!  What the hell is that?”  Rhee was leaning forward, as if she was about to try and jump through the tunnel that Niku had opened.

“I’m not sure.  But something very odd is going on at Ilbindale.  That port will not be passable; our ship will bottom out on the pile of boats that are sinking as we speak.”  He continued to stare at the spectacle.  “What is that?”

He focused his spell like a sailor’s looking glass, drawing in the image of the wharf.  Pairs of hands were slowly breaking the surface of the water, rising up from the sea to clutch the banks by the docks.  Men and women were methodically pulling themselves out of the water.

Niku dialed his farsight spell in even closer, frowning.  Rhee, standing at his shoulder, sucked in her breath.  “Those aren’t survivors,” she said ominously.

The mage shouted for the captain and began yelling at the seasick warriors to pull themselves together.  “Captain!  Turn east.  We cannot make port in Ilbindale.  We will drop anchor somewhere off the coast and row ashore.”  The captain took one look through the tunnel and soon began barking orders to the small crew.

As the tunnel began to fade, returning to night sky, Rhee turned to Niku.  “What were those?”

Niku already had his book of Clerical Myths out and was skimming quickly.  “I’m not quite sure, but as you saw, they weren’t struggling to climb out of the water like they were drowning.  Those bodies were being raised.”

“What do you mean?”

Niku looked up from his book, paler than usual.  “I mean I think we’ve found our first evidence of True Clerics.”

~Malenec~

Malenec was pleased—tired but pleased.  His prayers to sink all the boats within the harbor or anchored just off the port were answered, and in the dead of night he raised two hundred new undead warriors from a watery grave, as they slinked through the shadows around the outskirts of the city to join Malenec’s existing force a league away in the wood surrounding the city.  In this manner, more than fifty boats of all sizes were quietly sunk in the dead of night.  As the crewman slept aboard their ships, they woke with a start to
salt water pouring into their cabins.  The shouts that rang out were sparse; most died before ever reaching the top deck.  Not a single torch was lit.  The city slumbered on while boat after boat sank, with a rising water level the only sign of the massive amount of ships plugging up the harbor sea bottom.   In the morning, Ilbindale woke to an empty port.

Though exhausted, Malenec continued on as the grey light of dawn slowly spread from the East.  He prayed for invisibility, and stood quietly by the docks as the morning workers began to show up.  He also continued to pray fervently for no panic in city, only confusion and curiosity.

The first worker looked at the harbor in stunned silence, scratching his unruly beard.  He turned to a co-worker.  “Stephen?  Where are the boats?”  The swollen water from the harbor was slopping over the docks, toward their feet.

“They be sunk.  Look!  I see some wood floating there.”

“Was it a storm last night?  Winters comin’, but this makes no sense.”

More workers began to gather, staring over the edge into the water.  Soon more and more showed up.  “We better tell Lord Bingham.  He’ll know what to do.”

“Blast Bingham!  The noble’s worthless.  He’s not going to know a thing.  Piss on him.  If those ships be sunk, there’s gold and other stuff down there!  Ain’t deep, either.  I say we dive for it.  Keep all you find, boys!”  With that, he dove into the frigid water.  Soon shouts rose up and others joined him.

Treasure hunting.  Of course.
  Uttering silent thanks to his god, Malenec stole away, content for the moment that there would not be a rush to leave the city.  If anything, there would be a rush to
stay
inside the city, looking for gold and silver beneath the harbor.  Kuth-Cergor really did know what he was doing.  Tomorrow, after rest, Malenec looked forward to beginning the next phase of his plan that he knew would eventually yield him an entire city of undead warriors…all loyal to him.

~Niku~

“Cliffs, rocks, and more cliffs,” said Rhee, looking at Niku.  We can row off the edge of the map before we find a beach or a shore of any sort here on Urthrax.”

Niku smiled.  He figured as much.  From his study of the Ancient homeland of the True Clerics, he knew that there were very few ports, and only one tiny inlet at the southernmost point of the circular continent.  He held his hands up to signal the four warriors to put down their oars.  They had come about as close to cliffs as they dared, not wanting the waves to drive them into the rocks.  He stood up carefully in the small boat.  “We will drop an anchor here.  Put your packs on.”

Without further warning, Niku began to cast a masterful levitation spell, carrying the five of them up out of the now steady boat out above the water, higher and higher as they approached the nearest cliff.  Soon they reached the top, which opened into a series of rolling hills.  In the distance, toward the west, they could make out the smoke and other telltale signs of a large city: Ilbindale.  Pockets of trees and some sparse vegetation covered the ground between them and the eastern edge of the city.

“We will rest here today, having sailed and rowed all night.  Dawn will soon break behind us.  For now we should be undetected by these cliffs and around these large stones.  Tonight, after food, rest, and some further study, we’ll head into Ilbindale.  We need to find out what those things were rising from the sea.”

~Malenec~

As night fell a day after Malenec plugged up the port, the sky over Ilbindale went through a particularly beautiful
transformation.  Cerulean blue yielded to orange hues, and the few clouds that evening seemed pink in the fading light.  Sharp eyes could see a green flash at sunset over the water, followed by the gradual deepening of rich indigo tones that slowly darkened past violet and finally into clear black.  Most every star could be seen, and the moon was the thinnest of slivers in the cold, night sky.

Malenec pulled a thick, velvety cowl up over his head as he approached a small home on the outskirts o
f Ilbindale, near one of the main roads leading to and from the city.  With him was one undead warrior who was covered head-to-toe in black, save for a finger on each hand.

“Kuth-Cergor, tonight the town you promised me shall begin to see your power.  Let the wall of this home provide no more of an impediment to your servant than if I was to walk through air itself.”

Believing that the wall was nothing more than gossamer, Malenec stepped through, followed by his zombie.  The wall had become an illusion to him.

At first, the inhabitants did not realize that two figures had walked through a wall and into their home.  They were eating, and it looked like there were seven people in the house – at least there were seven in that main room. 
A good first haul.

Whispering a silent prayer for silence and immobilization, he saw the look of a young woman, perhaps fourteen or fifteen, look up and see the Cleric and his servant staring at them from the other room.  Her eyes grew large as she stared into the folds of Malenec’s hood, unable to see his face in the shadows, but knowing that someone unexpected was staring at her and her family.  She dropped her utensil and started to scream, but it never came, a look of terror frozen on her face.

“Kill them,” he said to his undead servant.  Silently the fiend walked up to each person.  It reached up and extended a hand, showing one yellowish, misshapen fingernail.  The pad of the finger beneath the nail had a bulbous growth that seemed to have a milky-white substance oozing from it, which showed up clearly against the black gloves that covered most of the hand.

As it came to the first person, it scratched a cheek.  It moved to the next and took the same finger and scratched an arm.  Around the room every person at the table was scratched once in some form.  Finally the zombie returned to stand next to Malenec.

“Excellent, Genovieve.”  He didn’t bother to look at the zombie when he spoke.  “Kuth-Cergor, let them move once again so that I may see them die, but I pray that their deaths be silent.”  He didn’t bother to close his eyes for this prayer, either.

Immediately, the bodies unfroze and began falling out of their chairs and onto the ground.  The one girl was screaming, but not a sound came from her mouth.  One of the men was convulsing on the ground, clawing at his cheek where he had been scratched, but his thrashing was silent.  He kicked the table and plates and cups fell silently to the floor.  Not a sound came from the entire spectacle.

In less than one minute, there were seven dead bodies on the ground.  Malenec now began the most important prayer in his night of soul-reaping, his voice growing more fervent with each word.  “And now Kuth-Cergor, I pray that you deliver their souls to me, bind them up forever within me, that I might own their will to command them according to your will.  Raise their flesh, not to the living, but make them undead, that their bodies may obey my wishes until all that remains is ash.”

At first it began with a twitch from a body.  Then a jerky movement.  Eyelids popped open.  There was a now-familiar rush as seven souls came to take up residence in Malenec.  Not in a manner that conflicted with Malenec’s own soul; that wasn’t the case when forming an undead spirit.  Furthermore, the victim’s soul was not heavy, and it did not ‘fight back’.  It simply found a spot inside Malenec and was bound to the Dark Cleric whose prayer had been answered.  So long as
Malenec lived, there would be no rest for these souls, and the undead bodies could not resist his commanding will. 
If I deem that they run into a fire pit, even the ash will be loyal to me. 
Malenec smiled as seven bodies, including two young children, stood before him.  The bodies would now enter a perpetual state of decay from the zombie scratches, making them all just as lethal.

His final prayer in the house was a pragmatic one.  “My God, if my work here tonight pleases you, I pray that you would transform their clothing—shroud your new servants in black, just as Genovieve here wears, that they may pass unseen this night to join your growing family as I continue your work in other houses.”

The Dark Cleric bowed his head and watched as the boots, pants, shirts—all garments being worn by the new seven undead were now black.  Black hoods, black shirts, black pants, black boots, black gloves.  There was no exposed flesh anywhere…except for one diseased finger on each hand.

“Join your family in the woods just outside the city.”  Malenec then turned to his servant Genevieve.  “Come.  We will try our luck in other parts of the city tonight.”

By dawn the next morning, Malenec had more than three hundred new souls at his command. 
Better than I could have hoped
for the first night.

~Niku~

“Bah!  Ain’t no mages worth a spit left in
Ilbindale.  No chance of gettin’ the damn port back open anytime soon, neither, if you ask me.”  A sharp-eyed man in a wool hat and sheepskins had joined Niku and the four warriors by a small fireplace in the corner of a tavern called
The Ale’s Tale.
  Locals called it the
Tale. 
Niku and his group found the place and decided to stay a few nights to see if the common room was full of any information.  It did not take long to hear this sailor grumbling to invite him over for conversation.

“Orin—that is your name, right?”  The man in the cap nodded, alternately rubbing his hands by the fire to keep them warm and tipping his rather large mug toward his mouth.  “Orin, who runs Ilbindale?  Surely there is a plan to re-open the port soon, with winter fast approaching.”