Soul of Dragons (16 page)

Perhaps that was why Lucan felt so thirsty.

If he concentrated, the hunger and the thirst went away. So did the ache in his legs. They were not real, not in this strange place, and he suspected that his mind had some control over the environment. So he concentrated, and the pain went away. 

But it was so hard to concentrate. 

He kept thinking over his mistakes.

Lucan trudged on. The ground rose, bit by bit, the walk becoming harder. He was nearing the foothills of the mountain. The mountain itself and the black city at its crown looked much closer. 

So many mistakes.

His father had been the first. Lucan had dreamed of becoming a knight, of winning fame and glory through great deeds. But Lucan's magical talent manifested, and his father insisted he become a wizard. Lucan should have refused, should have denied his father. But no one denied Lord Richard Mandragon the Dragonslayer.

Lucan hated him for it. 

A hill rose on the left, rocky and steep, dotted with dead pine trees. More hills rose ahead, the outskirts of the mountain, and the road began to climb. Lucan gathered some power, preparing a spell. The hills were a perfect place for an ambush. 

Marstan had been the second mistake. Lord Richard hired a private tutor for Lucan. Marstan, skilled and powerful and wise. Marstan, who had been a necromancer of power, a student of Malavost. Marstan, who abandoned his aged and failing body, and tried to transfer his soul into Lucan's flesh. Lucan had fought off the attack, but found himself with many of Marstan's memories and abilities. At the age of eighteen, he had been transformed into a necromancer of power, a figure of fear and loathing, and everyone he loved turned against him.

He should never have trusted Marstan.

The road became steeper. Lucan's eyes darted back and forth, watching for enemies. He had seen no sign of the reapers, or Mattias, or of anything else, since leaving the abandoned village. But he had no doubt they were out there.

Tymaen had been his greatest mistake.

Even now, thinking of her still caused him pain. They had been betrothed since the age of thirteen. She had been the first girl he had kissed, the first and only to share his bed. She refused to break their betrothal, even after Lucan began training as a wizard. 

And then Marstan tried to possess Lucan. The changes in his personality horrified her and drove her away. She had wound up marrying fat old Lord Robert Highgate, and Lucan had not seen her since. He had thought himself past this. But now, thinking of her filled him with such rage and pain that he wanted to scream. 

The road grew narrower. If the reapers planned an ambush, they would do it here.

But perhaps the bloodstaff had been his greatest mistake of all.

Lucan had sworn to fight dark magic, to make sure no one would ever suffer as he had suffered. Then he met Mazael Cravenlock, a son of the Old Demon. By all rights the Mazael should have been a monster, a blood-drenched warrior and iron-fisted tyrant worse than Amalric Galbraith and Ultorin put together. Yet somehow Mazael found balance within himself. Somehow he fought his inner darkness.

And Lucan wanted that dark power for himself. So he had secretly drawn a few vials of Mazael's blood, and used them to create his bloodstaff. It had bestowed tremendous magical strength upon Lucan, augmenting his powers. Yet it also induced fits of murderous insanity, eroding at his mind. And with the natural defenses of his mind destroyed, Malavost had taken control of him, using him to kill the Elderborn Seer and shattering the bloodstaff.

Leaving his spirit stranded here.

Fool, fool, fool. 

Maybe he was no better than Marstan. Lucan had believed himself doing good, that his use of dark power was justified. Yet it had brought him nothing but misery. Worse than misery, if he did not find a way to escape this place...

Something rattled ahead.

Lucan stopped and saw the gray shape standing atop a rocky hill. 

At first glance he thought it was a Malrag. It had the same leathery gray hide, the same black veins woven into its skin. But its eyes burned with crimson fire, and a black chain hung from its right wrist, the links driven between the bones of its arm.

The creature also had Lucan's features.

It was the same creature he had seen chained over the coals in the ruined chapel. 

“So,” said Lucan's deformed double, speaking with Lucan's voice. “You have come. Just as the master said you would.” 

“And just who,” said Lucan, “is your master?”

The double laughed. “You should know! You invited him in.” It gestured at the rocky hills and the ruined black city. “This is your kingdom, yet you invited my master in. And now he shall make it his own. He shall make you his own, fool wizard.” 

“I doubt that,” said Lucan. What did the creature mean? Was Mattias its master? Or the Demonsouled corruption the bloodstaff had left in Lucan's body and soul? “I shall find your master and crush him.”

The creature laughed again. “You shall not. You are his. Your powers are his, your mind is his, and your flesh shall be his.” 

“Let him try,” said Lucan.

“As you wish,” said the double.

Reapers surged out of the hills. Dozens of them, racing on all four like deformed wolves. Among them were a half-dozen more deformed doubles, identical to the one standing on the hill. 

Lucan drew in his power and prepared to fight.

Every wizard, no matter how powerful, had his limits, could only draw so much magical force through his body. But here, in the strange realm of the spirit world, Lucan had no body. Did that mean his limitations were gone, as well? 

Facing dozens of reapers, he had no choice but to find out. 

Lucan summoned power, more and more, enough power to kill him a dozen times over in the material world. The power burned within him, and the reapers raced forward, a sea of black cloaks and clawed white hands. 

Lucan threw out his hands with a yell.

Power exploded from him, manifesting as a wall of psychokinetic force. It slammed into the reapers and the doubles, and threw them backwards like leaves caught in a storm. A few of the reapers slammed into the rocky hills and dissolved into smoke, while the rest struck the ground, stunned. They recovered quickly, and Lucan began casting again. He gestured, his hands hooked into claws, and his will reached out and ripped the dead pine trees from the hills. They floated into the air, dirt falling from their roots. 

Then he hurled them at the reapers. 

The trees shot forward like bolts fired from a ballista, and tore into the charging reapers. One tree plunged through three reapers, turning them to black smoke, while another smashed one of Lucan's doubles to the ground, its head crushed. The double dissolved into black slime, much like Malrag blood. 

Yet still the reapers kept coming. 

Lucan lashed out with his will, ripping boulders from the hills and flinging them like catapult stones at the reapers. Dozens died, crushed by the barrage, but still more surged forward. Gods and devils, there were hundreds of the things! Even without a body, Lucan felt himself tiring. He had to get away. No matter how many reapers and doubles he destroyed, more appeared to take their place, and would overwhelm him sooner or later...

Three reapers drove at Lucan, throwing him to the ground. His head cracked against the earth, the rough stone cutting at his palms. He struggled, trying to cast another spell through the pain, but his concentration had broken. The reapers dragged him towards the doubles, and Lucan heard the clank of black iron chains. Panic filled him – they would chain him as the double in the chapel had been chained, leave him to roast over the coals...

A droplet of blood fell from his hand and sank into the earth. 

He felt a tingle of power, and remembered how his blood had fallen upon the ground in the abandoned village, how strength had risen up to fill him.

In desperation, he lashed his palm at a jagged rock, and his blood spilled upon the ground.

The power surged into Lucan, filling into him like a river of molten iron. He threw the power into his next spell, lifting his hand. A sigil of crimson fire appeared on his fingers, pulsing with harsh light, and the reapers burst into flame when the light touched them. He scrambled to his feet, ready to fight. The nearest twenty or so reapers burned, but the sigil had not touched the others.

Lucan began another spell, intending to unleash his will as a psychokinetic burst. But the burning power poured into his mind, altering his spell. The reapers attacked, and Lucan thrust out his hands.

And instead of a psychokinetic burst, blasts of blood-colored flame erupted from Lucan's hands, turning the first wave of reapers and doubles to smoking ash. Lucan growled and attacked again and again, hurling bolts of bloody fire. The flames destroyed dozens of his foes, and soon the survivors fled in all directions, vanishing into the hills. Lucan sent blasts of flame after them, destroying more reapers, his errant attacks burning the trees to charcoal. 

“Run from me?” screamed Lucan. “I will hunt you down. I will hunt you all down! You will perish! You will die screaming...”

The power drained away, and nausea hit him, worse than before. Lucan fell to his hands and knees, retching. It was just like the bloodstaff. The bloodstaff's power had enhanced his magical prowess, and also induced fits of rage and physical sickness. Spilling his blood here, in the spirit world, had the same effect.

Lucan got his feet and flinched.

Mattias leaned against one of the smoking trees, arms folded over his chest. 

“That,” he said, “was quite a show. I didn't think you had it in you, really.”

“It's the bloodstaff,” said Lucan, “isn't it?”

“I see no staff in your hands,” said Mattias.

“When Malavost broke the bloodstaff,” said Lucan, “its power had to go somewhere. So it went into me. And when I spill blood upon the earth, some of that power is released.”

Mattias lifted an eyebrow. “Almost correct.”

“Almost?”

“You omitted one important detail,” said Mattias, straightening up. “A price must always be paid for power. And this is the spirit world, not the material world. It's not really blood you're spilling upon the ground. You are instead feeding pieces of yourself, your spirit, to the Demonsouled power trapped within you.” He grinned. “You are letting that power consume you, piece by piece.” 

Lucan felt a chill. Using the bloodstaff had sickened him and damaged the defenses of his mind, allowing Malavost to defeat him. If the staff's power was still trapped within him...what would it do to him if he continued to use it?

But he might not have any choice. The reapers would have slain him, had he not used the dark power in the earth. Or done worse than kill him, if those chains were any indication. And they had attacked in greater numbers than before. If such an attack came again, Lucan would have to use the Demonsouled power to survive. 

Either the reapers would overwhelm him, or the dark power would consume him.

“There's no way out,” muttered Lucan.

“Oh, but there is,” said Mattias, gesturing at the black city. “And you're closer to it than you ever have been.”

“A way out?” said Lucan. “Before, you told me I would find answers there, though I might not like them. What sort of way out?”

“Why, a way to return to your physical body,” said Mattias. “A way to escape this place, before the reapers take you.”

“That double spoke of its master,” said Lucan. “Did it mean you?”

Mattias laughed. “I told you, boy, that I did nothing. You brought yourself here. And you summoned the reapers and the doubles and...other things.”

“They're manifestations,” said Lucan. “Creations of the corruption I pulled into myself.”

“Correct,” said Mattias. He grinned. “You created them, and they hate you for it. So they will never stop hunting you. Your escape – your only escape – is to return to your physical body. And to do that, you must reach the heart of the black city.”

“How do I know you're even telling the truth?” said Lucan.

“Such unwarranted hostility,” said Mattias. “And I have offered you nothing but aid. Have you figured out who I am, yet?”

“I have a suspicion,” said Lucan. “You are one of the spirit creatures I have bound in the past, now returned for revenge.”

“No,” said Mattias with a smile, “quite wrong. Like you, I have a body of flesh. One in rather better condition than yours right now, as it happens.”

“Then you are a mortal wizard,” said Lucan.

“Am I? Well, I have been called such,” said Mattias, “very often. Whether or not I am actually mortal...I have not lived long enough to find out. And I have lived a very long time.”

Lucan frowned. That ruled out another theory – he had wondered if Mattias was perhaps an echo of Marstan's memories. “Then you are an old enemy of mine, or perhaps of Marstan's.”

“An enemy?” said Mattias. “That is hurtful. I have been nothing but helpful. And I was reasonably fond of Marstan. He was a most useful tool. But I assure you. We have never met in the flesh, you and I.” 

“Then have I heard of you?” said Lucan. 

For a moment Mattias said nothing, a hint of red fire glimmering in his eyes.

“Oh, yes,” he said, voice soft, “you know of me. You have known of me your entire life, I think.” 

A suspicion rose in Lucan's mind. “Do I know any of your family?”

“I suggest you make haste,” said Mattias. “The reapers will not stop their hunt. They owe the torment of their existence to you, and they are most eager to repay.” 

Lucan heard the rattle of falling rock and spun. One of the rocks damaged by his fire blasts tumbled down the side of the hill, breaking into pieces as it fell.

And when he turned around, as he expected, Mattias was gone. 

Lucan shook his head. So he knew one of Mattias's family? That hardly narrowed it down. 

But he did have a suspicion.

Lucan pushed aside the thought. Later. Mattias's advice had been sound. He had to keep moving, and he started up the hill road again.

He wondered when the reapers would find him next, and what he would do when they did.