The Spear of Heaven (2)
Radi relays her tale of the acquisition of a Fire Jewel of Karnac and how it led her to Melioach, the dragon with the all-seeing eyes.
Radi stirred more wood into the dying embers after her dinner of wild hare and wilder rice. To her right, the massive skull of a world-rending legend breathed slowly and with nary a sound for a creature his size. Reaching into her bag, she pulled out a stoppered ornate bottle and opened it with some effort.
“Melioach, are the legends true regarding your ability to change shape? I have a vintage of a brandy a century old and I am in a merry mood, that I might even share it with the likes of you.”
The skull of the dragon made a deep and abiding huff and focused its six luminous eyes on the towering woman. “On my own world or in realms of great magic, I could indeed take on the shape of anything I desired. A lamp, a basket, a hot tub… Alas, your world’s magic is weak and unstable. Its quivering energies are barely able to sustain one such as my august self. I can barely change my shape here, except to grow more statuesque in combat. Then I shrink back to my mere forest-covering size.”
Melioach snuffed from one nostril and a puff of green flame emerged slowly moved through the air and settling on the embers and the green wood placed there. Within seconds the flames changed from green to red with the instantly dried wood doubling the size of the fire.
“Mighty Melioach, you asked how I came of this fabulous flame gem of Karnac?” Radi kicked the nigh-invulnerable canister at her feet.
Melioach shifted ever so slightly. “Even my all-seeing eyes, in their prime, could not penetrate the mystic miasma which covered the Dominion of Karnac.”
Radi took a swig of her brandy and the smoky stink of it filled her mouth and nose. “Yes, crafty bastards, you don’t want to know how that fog is made. I have traveled the length and breadth of this world and been fortunate or unfortunate depending on who tells the tale, to set foot on alien shores. No matter where I’ve been, few places frightened me like the City-state Mageocracy of the Dominion of Karnac.”
“Before landing here and becoming comfortable resting on the bones of the Lich Lords, I considered stopping there first. Its mystic fog prevented me from having any idea of what lie beneath it. I was reluctant to risk my brand new body in a potentially rich source of magical energy with an unknown civilization of magi.
“Having made that decision, I spent the next two ages, sending spies to visit and learning about the mages of Karnac. It was the wisest thing I could have done. Do go on.”
“I knew when I set out to acquire my birthright, I would end up crossing paths with the Dominion. Their influence stretches as far south as my families lands, and they have even taken to sending envoys to our door to discuss a variety of potential alliances.
“Each was refused, politely but firmly. The envoys would then display some feat of magic beyond our understanding as if to let us know our place. They’d leave and words of their feats undermined the legend of the strongest mages and warriors in the Southern Lands. We soon stopped allowing their visits to the kingdom at all. They stopped coming and began visiting lands to the East and West.
“While no alliances are known, no one can know if they succumbed out of fear until they present their face at a declaration of war. I decided it was time to make a diplomatic call on the Dominion as the Shining Lands Warmaster. I would present a face of fearlessness and martial magic.
“I had another agenda. Locating the Wandering Seer, Finrinny. Rarely did they leave their mountain fastness considering interaction with more mortal species undermined their objectivity.
Finrinny was known as a Seer who had survived the last two ages with temporal memories intact. My family’s agents, who lived in Karnac, moved slowly revealing the city’s secrets over decades. When we learned of Finrinny, We had to reach him.
My retinue traveled first by horse, then by riverboat and eventually to a ship which would make the two year journey around the hostile sands of the Long Coast, through the Nanoseri Island chains, where man and giant amphibians live in a symbiotic relationship and once around the Southern Storm Cape our arrival in the outer lands of the Dominion was not only expected, it was greeted with a monstrosity of a bygone Age, a fire colossus.
The machine appeared out of the morning fog, apparently standing there before we arrived. As we pulled into port, the machine came to life, crimson lines crossing its body armor. The Fire jewel in the center of its chest filled with fire mana and its eyes shot forth a beam capable baking a man in a second from the inside out. The ships hulls where struck instantly caught figure. Containers of water exploded like bombs on every one of the ships.
I jumped to the shore and deflected the beams coming from its eyes with my cold-fire blades. Then it surprised me with its speed and power. Before I could recover myself from blocking its beams and the fog created when my swords and its beam made contact, I was dodging its massive fist.
The icy fog obscured my vision but didn’t seem to impede the Colossus from trying to engage me in combat. Only years training in the dark warned me at the last second. The blow would have taken my head off.
Deflected by the force shield of my crossed swords, I was knocked back on to my ship and into my crew. Seeing me knocked back, both ship’s gunners opened fire on the giant. The forward cannon fired well aimed fifty caliber rounds. Single shot but powerful enough to tear through the hull of most local aircraft. The rear cannon was an ice ballista, whose spears of flash-generated ice shrapnel normally reduce ships and crews to mewling messes.
Neither had any long term effect.
The forward advance of the colossus was halted, a temporary measure. Already it braced itself against the technological onslaught and began to move forward again. The forward part of my flagship was already aflame and our third ship had crew jumping into the bay to escape the ship catching on fire.
The Council knew we were coming. Only they had the clout to clear the piers of significant ships. Only they would create an automaton capable of defeating me. I would have to win past this thing to make my audience with the Council.
They thought a legend will stop me. Prevent me from explaining what I need from them. They thought it will kill me and send my mother a message to convince her to captulate.
This burning god of metal and magic was designed to send a message: It appeared the good people of The Dominion of Karnac, indeed harbored a considerable grudge against my family.
I intended to disappoint the Council and arrive before sunset…
The Spear of Heaven © Thaddeus Howze 2014, All Rights Reserved
