Lusam: The Dragon Mage Wars Book Three (48 page)

“There are no trees here, silly,” Kayden replied, as if Lusam were some kind of simpleton for suggesting it in the first place. Neala almost choked as he said it, and had to turn away to hide her incredible amusement at the boy’s statement.

“That’s not nice Kay!” Rebekah scolded him.

“Sorry Bekah. But, I’m right, there
are
no trees here,” he replied, still looking at Lusam as if he were slightly mad. Lusam couldn’t help smiling at the boy’s look, and took a step towards him and his big sister.

“Hold my hand, and I’ll show you,” Lusam said, offering both of them a hand each to hold. He didn’t need to hold their hands to levitate them, but he thought they might feel a little safer if they had something to hold on to. Kayden persisted with his strange look as he took Lusam’s hand, even Rebekah seemed to be looking at him a little strange now.

“Okay, don’t be afraid, you won’t fall, I promise,” Lusam said, as he lifted them two feet off the ground. Rebekah shrieked at the sudden movement, but Kayden simply giggled. Lusam gave them a moment to get used to the idea, then said, “Shall we go higher, so we can see there are no more monsters?”

“Yes! Up… up… up!” Kayden replied excitedly, but his sister only gave a half-hearted nod. Lusam had intended to check the coastline for enemy vessels before leaving Prystone anyway. The last thing they needed was to have another shipload of Empire agents following them while they travelled to Lamuria. Lusam slowly levitated them all to just below roof height, not wanting to openly show their presence if there were any enemy ships nearby. He peeked over the rooftop, towards the ocean beyond, but saw only an empty expanse of water, thankfully devoid of any Empire ships. He continued climbing, until he was high enough to see beyond the cliffs to the south, and was equally relieved to see there were no signs of Empire activity in that direction either. The streets were now far below them, but still clearly visible from their vantage point.

“There, you see, no monsters,” Lusam said, wondering if Rebekah would ever open her eyes and look.

“Look Bekah, look how high up we are!” Kayden said excitedly, tugging at his big sister’s hand so she would open her eyes. Rebekah opened one of her eyes, and squealed loudly, as she gripped Lusam’s hand even tighter than before.

“Okay, I think we better go back down now,” Lusam said, beginning to feel sorry for Rebekah.

“Aw! Not yet. Can we go up higher? Please… Please,” Kayden pleaded.

“Not right now Kayden, I don’t think your sister likes it very much,” Lusam replied.

Kayden looked at his sister for a moment—who still had her eyes tightly closed—then said, “Can we go down
really
fast then, instead?”

“You wouldn’t be trying to scare your big sister, would you?” Lusam asked, knowing exactly what he had in mind. Kayden just gave Lusam a wide toothy grin, confirming he’d just been found out, then turned his attention back to his terrified looking sister. Lusam smiled to himself, as he lowered them all back down to earth, suddenly feeling sorry for Rebekah for an entirely different reason.

“That was great!” Kayden said as soon as their feet touched the ground. “Can we do it again later, please?”

“We’ll see,” Lusam replied, instantly recognising the phase his grandmother had used on him many times, whenever she didn’t want an argument about something.

“Rebekah, are you alright?” Neala asked, concerned by her pale complexion. Rebekah nodded, and immediately swapped Lusam’s hand for Neala’s. Kayden remained exactly where he was, holding onto Lusam’s hand, and beaming his new best friend a smile.

“Boys!” Neala said under her breath and rolling her eyes.

“Can we go look for mother now?” Rebekah asked, starting to look a little more steady on her feet.

“Of course, where would you like to start?” Neala asked, knowing that Rebekah knew the village far batter than she did.

“This way,” Rebekah replied, pulling Neala behind her. Kayden remained firmly attached to Lusam, and they both followed Rebekah and Neala towards the far end of the street. Rebekah led them towards the docks, scanning the water for any signs of her father’s ship, or the remains of it. All she saw was an empty bay. She was about to leave and check her house, when she noticed the sunlight glint off something on the ground. As soon as she saw it, she knew exactly what it was: her mother’s necklace. She let go of Neala’s hand and ran towards it, tears forming in her eyes as she picked it up and cradled it in her hands.

“What is it, Rebekah?” Neala asked quietly by her side.

“Mother’s necklace,” she whispered, as tears ran down her cheek.

“May I see it, please?” Neala asked. Rebekah hesitated a moment, then offered her it without saying a word. Neala inspected the necklace, and immediately had her fears confirmed. It had been broken, and it wasn’t a flimsy construction either. Whatever had happened to her mother, had involved some kind of physical contact, which would suggest she hadn’t made it out of here before the initial attack. Neala handed back the necklace to Rebekah, and noticed her tears.

“Don’t worry, Rebekah, I’m sure your mother only accidentally dropped the necklace here, before she ran away,” Neala said, knowing full well that her words were little more than a kind-hearted lie. “Shall we go check your house?” she asked, offering Rebekah her hand. Rebekah nodded, and slowly they headed back towards the village streets. A few minutes later they arrived at what was once Rebekah and Kayden’s house. All that remained now, was a burnt out shell. Lusam scanned the inside of the house using his mage-sight, and thankfully found no signs that anyone perished in the fire.

“There’s nobody inside,” Lusam said out loud, then wished he hadn’t when both Rebekah and Kayden started crying.

“It’s okay,” Neala said, hugging them both tightly. “It’s good news that she wasn’t here when the fire started. That means she could have run away and hidden somewhere else. Come on, let’s go find Alexia and Renn, shall we? I think they might have found you a horse that you can ride on.” Neala knew it wasn’t much of a diversion, but it seemed to lift their mood a little, as they headed off to meet up with the others at the paddock.

Ten minutes later they arrived at the large paddock. There was no sign of Renn or Alexia, so Lusam guessed they must be with the horses at the far side of the small hill. Lusam noticed that they had already placed four saddles on the ground, along with two bags of food taken from the smokehouse. Lusam’s stomach reminded him loudly that he hadn’t eaten breakfast yet, as soon as he thought about the tasty food within the bags. There didn’t seem any point taking food back out of the bags. Not when the smokehouse was only a few hundred paces away, so he informed the others that he would go fetch them some breakfast, and headed off in the direction of the smokehouse. On his way there he met Alexia coming the other way.

“I thought you were with Renn,” Lusam said.

“I offered to help him, but he was confident he could handle the horses by himself, so I went to explore a bit,” Alexia replied.

“Yeah, I got the same speech from him yesterday,” Lusam laughed. “Have you eaten yet?”

“Yes, thanks. We both had something to eat at the smokehouse earlier, while we filled a couple of bags for the trip.”

“Yeah, I saw the two bags of food back there, but I didn’t see any point taking food back out of them for our breakfast—not when the smokehouse is so near,” Lusam said, then he began to explain what had happened back in the village when they had visited the docks and the children’s burnt out house. Alexia looked very concerned for Rebekah and Kayden, and rushed off to meet up with them as soon as Lusam had finished telling her the story.

It wasn’t long before Lusam had gathered enough food for their breakfast, and headed back to the paddock to share it out. When he arrived, he noticed Rebekah and Kayden playing together, pretending to ride two of the horse saddles on the ground. Lusam gave each of them some food, then went to join Neala and Alexia at the fence. He handed Neala a share of the food, and then noticed what they were staring at. At the bottom end of the field, Renn was attempting to corner one of the horses, so he could get a rope around its neck. The horse kept rearing up at him, and on two occasions it almost caught him with its front hooves.

“It doesn’t look like it wants to be caught,” Neala said, in-between mouthfuls of food.

“Don’t worry, he said he knew what he was doing,” Alexia replied, cringing as he narrowly missed being injured for a third time. Eventually he abandoned that particular horse, and attempted a similar manoeuvre on one of the others, with similar results. This time one of the other horses came up behind him, and lifted him clean off his feet with its nose, sending him crashing to the ground a few feet away. He landed with a loud thud, flat on his back and Lusam burst out laughing at him.

“It’s not funny, he might get hurt,” Neala scolded him, but not without giggling herself a little first. Alexia was in hysterics by the time Renn managed to get to his feet.

“Lusam, can’t you help him?” Neala asked, not taking her eyes off Renn, who was now up, and chasing another horse around the field, trying to get a rope around its neck.

“I suppose I could… but he told me:
as long as he showed the horse who was the boss, he only needed patience to tame it.
I think by the looks of that, he needs a little longer to convince those horses he’s the boss,” Lusam replied chuckling.

Alexia managed to stop laughing just long enough to ask, “What could Lusam do anyway?”

“He can talk to the animals. Well, not exactly talk to them, but he could, I’m sure, convince those horses to calm down before Renn gets hurt,” Neala replied scowling at Lusam, who was now bent almost double, laughing at Renn’s attempts to catch the horse. A moment later Renn managed to finally get the rope around one of the horses’ necks, but not before he also managed to get his leg caught in the other end of the rope. The horse reared back, dragging him clean off his feet, then half-galloped across the field, dragging him along behind it. Alexia and Lusam howled with laughter, but Neala didn’t see the funny side of it, as he bounced along the field behind the horse.

“Do something!” she shouted at Lusam. He could barely see the horses through his tears of laughter, but he managed to project a calming thought towards them, then coaxed them towards the fence where they were standing. Even Neala began to see the funny side of it, as Renn was slowly dragged the length of the field in their direction, unable to release his own leg from the rope. Lusam waited until the horses were almost to the fence, then magically severed the rope to free Renn. Six horses were now neatly lined up against the fence, completely ignoring Renn as he tried to remove the remains of the rope from his leg.

“You certainly have a lot of patience Renn… but I’m not sure you quite convinced them that you were the boss,” Lusam said with a straight face. Alexia and Neala almost fell over laughing at his statement, and even Lusam couldn’t hold out against the incredulous look on Renn’s face.

By the time they all finished laughing at him, Renn had already begun saddling one of the horses without saying a single word. Lusam couldn’t decide whether he was angry, or simply embarrassed by the prank. But having felt the flat part of Renn’s blade once before on his backside, he decided to give him a wide berth this time, just in case. Eventually he stopped what he was doing, and turned towards Lusam with a puzzled look on his face.

“How did you do that?… No, wait… I don’t even want to know,” Renn said shaking his head and attempting to brush off some of the mud—and other, less pleasant substances from his clothing—which elicited another round of raucous laughter from the others. Eventually everyone calmed down enough to saddle their own horses, and it was time to leave Prystone behind. Rebekah had chosen to ride with Alexia, and Kayden had asked to ride with Lusam.

They barely made it to the edge of the village, before Kayden was asking Lusam if they could fly to Lamuria instead. ‘
It’s going to be a long trip,
’ Lusam thought to himself, as the others began laughing at
his
predicament this time.

Zedd and Cole spent the first night within Coldmont’s walls. It had been late in the day, and far too late to begin their long decent of the mountain. They had refrained from speaking openly about any of their earlier transgressions, fearing that Lord Zelroth had ways of monitoring not only the strange book room, but also Coldmont as a whole. It had been a shock to Zedd when Lord Zelroth had revealed that they were actually inside the fabled home of the ancient Guardians themselves. He had, of course, read the various history books pertaining to its existence, but as far as he was aware, its precise location still remained a mystery to almost everyone else in the world.

Early the next morning they had begun their long decent of the mountain. They had discussed their route in detail whilst still in Coldmont, and decided not to return directly to Stelgad. Instead they would avoid the strange fog covered valley by descending in a more easterly direction. Once they reached the first town or village, they would procure themselves horses and supplies by whatever means necessary, then head directly to Lamuria.