The Sapphire Manticore (The Lost Ancients Book 4) Read online

  I wanted to say something else, find out what his plan was, but he was clearly focused on the terrain around us.

  I dropped back with the rest of the knights and tried calling my sword. The little bugger had never come when I called before, but Alric’s worked that way. I briefly wondered if the knights would allow the swords to come when we were attacked or if we would be left to fend for ourselves.

  I heard noises everywhere now that I knew we were being followed. A flash of sunlight through the heavy trees…was it really sun glancing off weapons? The rakasa didn’t need weapons—their teeth and claws were weapons enough. But there was no reason to think that wouldn’t stop them from adding to their abilities.

  The air felt still and dank. It could be my changed perception, but the hair on the back of my neck started rising. Something was closing on us.

  The captain felt it as well. With a raised fist he led us onto a narrow trail to the north. The trees were thicker here, pushing down on the scraggly trail. But I found I liked them being so close; I could convince myself they were trying to protect us from the abominations chasing us.

  There was magic going on. Something heavy, dark, and evil. Great, my ex-boyfriend was here too. Glorinal, or whatever he’d become, definitely went down in history as the worst ex-boyfriend ever.

  We had to stay single file to remain on the trail. While the knights’ armor might be great for protection, it didn’t handle aggressive trees very well. Being so exposed while running didn’t seem like the best plan to me. I rethought that when the trees opened up.

  Before us was a clearing, but right behind it was a lovely collection of jagged rocks. Most of them were at least fifteen feet high, the center platform looked closer to thirty. They were sharp and nasty and would make a great wall to die against.

  Okay, that wasn’t a good thought. As nice as it would be to have one side safe, it just meant the rakasa could keep throwing themselves at us until they killed us all and took what they wanted. They’d shown in every confrontation that they really didn’t care how many of their own kind they lost.

  Instead of creating a defense formation in front of the wall, the captain led us around to the far left as if we were going back into the woods. I was glad I was only a few people behind him, or I would have been even more surprised when he ducked into the rocks.

  He hadn’t really, but he’d waved his hand in front of a small pile of stones and a narrow path opened before us. The knights were too bulky with their heavy armor, so they had to go up in an awkward sideways step as the path wound to the top of the jagged rocks.

  The knights behind me pushed me forward when I tried to see exactly how this path worked. In less than a minute, we were all up top and the path had slammed shut.

  The captain had a few brief words with his men, words too low for me to hear, but the meaning was visible on their faces, if only briefly. He didn’t think we were going to survive this, but we were going down fighting.

  “This is a place of our people, one created after the Breaking. I ask that all who die here go to the land of those who died before us.” He came to Alric and me and removed our magic-blocking amulets. “Call your swords, your spells, whatever you can. We are not meant to survive this. Let you both go out fighting.”

  It was a massive relief to have the amulet off. It was as if I’d been partially holding my breath for a week and only now came up for air. Which was disturbing if I thought about it. Had I already grown that used to my newfound magic?

  What I wasn’t happy about was that the reason I was free was because the captain felt we were all going to die. Alric stretched his neck as his magic came back—since he’d had his for far longer than I’d had mine, I had to think it was really noticeable. He also held out his hand and his elaborate and often vanishing sword appeared.

  I did feel better about him being armed. Yes, we were standing with a dozen heavily armed elven knights. But seeing my favorite sneaky thief armed, both physically and magically, made me feel better than all those knights combined. For one thing, I knew he wouldn’t fight fair.

  “Call your sword.” Alric stepped closer to me, making sure we were not part of the elven knights’ formation.

  I thought about the sword, tried to imagine the weight of it in my hands. Nothing. Seriously? The silly thing had been popping up off and on this entire trip and now that I really needed it, it was nowhere to be found?

  “I’m trying.” I kept my voice low. I didn’t think whoever was following us had found us yet, but there was no way to know.

  “Do what you did before.” Alric was watching the forest around us, his stance mimicking that of the knights even though I knew he’d deny it if I called him on it. He didn’t think highly of them, nor they of him, but most likely they all started out with the same training. He just went a different direction with it.

  “I didn’t do anything before. The thing was there on the ground.” I looked around—maybe it preferred popping up on the ground. I’d have to ask Alric if he trained his to appear in his hand. Nope, no sword.

  The knights were braced now, a formation they clearly knew, meant to defend this rock for as long as possible.

  “How close are we to your enclave? Couldn’t they send someone out?” I knew they had said the elven leaders wouldn’t do it before, but wouldn’t that be better than letting everyone out here die? I personally thought so.

  From the scowl on Alric’s face, he agreed. “Logical people would believe so. My people have not always been logical. They will not send anyone else.” He’d pitched his voice loud enough for the surrounding elves to hear. Only the captain shot him a dirty look.

  I nodded and tried to think about my sword again. I felt a pull of magic and a sword came flying toward me. A rusty, pocked, slightly bent sword trailing a stream of dirt and plant life. I dodged, but it dropped at my feet.

  Alric arched an eyebrow but said nothing.

  Okay, so instead of whatever inside of me called the spirit sword, I’d reached out with my magic and called a sword. One lost in an ancient fight of some sort in this forest, and probably had been badly made to begin with.

  “Defend yourselves as well as you can, for they are now upon us.” The captain didn’t look to see if anyone was out of place.

  There hadn’t been a change below us that I could tell, but then I’d been mostly focusing on finding the sword. I spared another glance to the mangled one at my feet. I seriously doubted it could be used to cut butter let alone a rakasa.

  I’d have to try to use my magic. For however long that worked. At least the spell I was best at involved flinging things away.

  The noise the captain had heard, and I hadn’t, was now easily heard even by me. The weird thing was, it definitely sounded like booted feet, and I’d never seen a rakasa wearing shoes, let alone boots.

  Had the syclarions who pinned us down before come back? I took a deep breath and readied my go-away spell, or as I liked to call it—to myself only—my satyr-flying spell. It had a different, long, and painful name officially, but I was focusing on learning the spells, not their names.

  The trail that had hindered us worked the same for people approaching us. Or it should have. A syclarion appeared first, battered and bloody, but walking on his own as he came down the trail and stopped in front of us. He had no weapons that I could see and was joined by at least fifteen of his compatriots. At first I thought it was odd that the first one had his arms behind him, and then I realized they all did.

  The rakasa didn’t need the trail and thirty of them flowed out from around the trees to surround their prisoners, the syclarions. The syclarions dropped to their knees, but by the strain showing on their faces, it wasn’t by choice. The good thing was that I didn’t see Glorinal anywhere.

  I’d liked this rock grouping before and the fact that the rakasa couldn’t come up out of the ground anywhere near us was a plus.

  “We negotiate. Not eat you.” One of the rakasa stepped forward. “We give
you your enemies and you give us emerald dragon and the girl.” He had a disturbing way of clicking his teeth after certain words. One of which was “girl”.

  The look on the face of the syclarion closest to us told me one thing: the mayor didn’t know we’d found the emerald dragon. But he would if any of these syclarions lived to get back to Kenithworth. There was now a new resolve on the main syclarion’s face, who was the leader if I read his clothing correctly. He was resigned to his fate when they marched in. He was re-thinking that now.

  “We don’t negotiate with your kind. Or theirs,” the elven captain said. “Why would we want syclarion prisoners anyway?”

  “We will show you.” The spokes- rakasa leapt onto the back of the syclarion kneeling closest to him. The syclarion tried to pull away, but it was too late. The rakasa chewed through his throat.

  I looked away at what I feared was going to be a blood bath, but stopped when I felt a heavy spell hit the clearing in front of us. None of the rakasa chanted or appeared to be spell casting, but I had no doubt it was coming from them or one of their hidden companions. Aside from a small amount dripping down the syclarion’s neck, there was no blood.

  The murdered syclarion didn’t even have a chance to die properly before the rakasa jumped off his back and the corpse shambled to his feet.

  A syclarion zombie. Now I knew for certain that Glorinal was somewhere in the woods around us. Somewhere that he could have line of sight for his spells, but where we couldn’t see him. I doubted the rakasa had found another powerful necromancer besides him. His creation of a zombie troll a few months ago came with an added bonus spell that slowed everyone within its range for easier killing. I swung my hand about a bit, but I seemed to be moving fine. The quick glare the captain shot me at my movements indicated he was fine too.

  This time Glorinal didn’t have time for the bonus—or perhaps the strength. I’d really been hoping that whatever the rakasa did to him had zapped him of all zombie-making abilities, but clearly that didn’t happen.

  The rakasa bowed and pointed to the new zombie. His head was twisted oddly, but since he was so newly dead, he didn’t look too unnatural. Except for the jerky flailing about and the white film creeping across his eyes. The point was clear. If we didn’t hand over the emerald dragon—and me—they were going to create a small army of zombie syclarions to come after us.

  “What spell is this? No one can create a true zombie, certainly not a rakasa.” The captain had flinched at the attack on the syclarion but didn’t react otherwise. I did like the way he spat out the word rakasa like a swear word.

  I wasn’t close enough to the captain to tell him who was really behind it. Alric silently slipped forward to stand next to him. His voice was low, but I knew what he was saying.

  The captain reacted pretty much as expected. It couldn’t be easy to be told a mostly dead, magic-wielding necromancer, who was also a member of the Dark—the group who had betrayed the rest of the elves a thousand years ago—was alive. And, that he’d been captured by the rakasa—the elves’ ancient and also thought to be dead enemies—and was creating zombies. Pretty much the entire elven pantheon of nightmares was coming to life right before his eyes. If he needed a reason to encourage his people to hide behind the safety of their enclave for another thousand years, this was it. Provided we survived.

  The snarl the captain shot me a moment later indicated Alric had also mentioned my connection with Glorinal.

  There was no way I could have known Glorinal was going to turn out like this. I gave the captain a wince and a shrug, but he looked away. Maybe he’d heard rumors about my abysmal taste in boyfriends. He certainly didn’t approve of my current one.

  “Need answer.” The spokes-rakasa said as he leaned forward and sliced through the rope holding the hands of the newly made zombie.

  “We do not negotiate.” The captain gave the slightest pause but stood even straighter. “The relic belongs to the elven people—the true elven people. The female is our prisoner and as such is under our sworn protection.”

  I let out my breath at that. I’d much rather take my chances trapped here with these heavily armed elven knights than whatever horrible plan Glorinal and his new cronies had for me. Up until that second, I wasn’t sure I would be given the choice. Honor is one thing, but facing fifteen potential zombies was another.

  The other knights didn’t show any reaction. Their captain’s word was law. He said die protecting the emerald dragon and myself, and they’d die doing that.

  “We know you are out there, bastard of the Dark. Show yourself.” The captain freed his sword. It was for show at this point. The rakasa and syclarions were over thirty feet below us. But I think he knew he looked pretty deadly standing on top of a rugged rock holding his sword in his hand. His hair was blond like Alric’s natural color, but longer. There hadn’t been a breeze before—I think the knight made it appear just to add drama by lifting his hair behind him.

  There was no response except for a few groans coming from the newly made zombie. And the syclarions nearest to him trying to get away without actually rising to their feet.

  “He’s a coward.” Alric didn’t impinge upon the captain’s fierce stance, but he did step forward a bit. Like the captain, he held his sword high. “I know of Glorinal. He’s a vile, weak, useless excuse for an elf whom even the other Dark would disavow. He hasn’t the guts to show his face in front of true elves.” There was a serious load of nasty snark in Alric’s voice. An elitist snobbery that I’d never heard before but was impressed by nonetheless. He was pure elven high lord, even as he stood there in dusty, worn, black leathers.

  There was a commotion off to the right side behind a mass of dense bushes. I’d seen the control the rakasa had over their elven monster creation, so I was honestly surprised when Glorinal crawled out of the shrubs alone.

  He was drooling and the hate in his uneven eyes as he looked up at Alric was almost a living thing. He still was on all fours but his clawed hands dug into the ground with each shuffle forward.

  “Die.” Glorinal’s voice was so raw and guttural it made my own throat hurt. It might not have been just from his continued degradation into whatever he was turning into but also by his hatred of Alric. That hatred didn’t slow down his magic though.

  I felt the spell as it left his lips and tried to move to help Alric. The spell Glorinal sent was fast and immediately dropped Alric to one knee.

  Alric’s head fell forward, his hair covering his face, and his sword dropped to the dirt.

  I started to run forward, but the captain shook me off.

  Alric shook, and I moved toward him anyway. Before I got in two steps, Alric threw his hair back out of his face, grabbed his sword, and jumped to his feet. His shaking had been laughing but there wasn’t any humor there.

  “Is that all you have, my impotent little maggot? I know schoolchildren who have more spell finesse than that. Oh, wait. They’re elven schoolchildren. Real elves.”

  Glorinal’s face, already horribly mutated by whatever the rakasa had done to him, went red and splotchy, and a screeching came from what was left of his throat.

  He let loose another spell, but this one was aimed at me.

  CHAPTER FOUR

  I’d felt Glorinal’s spells before he became whatever he was now. Back all those months ago when he was only a crazed necromancer with delusions of world domination. Whatever he cast now was both weaker and stronger than before. Weaker, in that I wasn’t fried on the spot. Stronger, in that I felt the hatred mixed with a sick desire coming from within the spell.

  The emotions in the spell almost made me throw up.

  The spell itself didn’t do anything. I grimaced as his spell of flame tried to engulf me. I raised my left hand in an automatic blocking position and was pleasantly surprised to see my sword had decided to show up.

  That did mean I needed to cast my flying satyr spell with my right hand. I grinned as I clenched my sword and sent all my pent up fear and ann
oyance from the last few weeks into the creature down below me.

  I did a very good job, too. The spell actually felt powerful as it left me, as if my magic hated having been locked up.

  Unfortunately, I failed to take angles into account. As in, I was thirty feet above my target and I was pushing him away from me at great force. Had we been on the same level, Glorinal probably would have flown all the way back to Kenithworth. As we were currently arranged, I shoved him so far into the ground I didn’t know if even the rakasa could get him back out.

  I pulled back, belatedly realizing the problem. However, the spell had a mind of its own and seemed to be fueled by my anger and my odd sword. I felt as if the dirt, rocks, and debris flowed through me via the spell as I shoved Glorinal still further down into the ground.

  Then I almost cut off Alric’s hand when he shook me out of it.

  Judging by the looks of the knights around us, the entire event had only taken seconds—just enough time for Alric to run to me. It had felt far longer.

  I started shaking, dropped to my knees, and this time I did throw up.

  Once I finished, Alric helped me to my feet. The knights all seemed to be a bit further away from me than before. None of them were looking my way, at least not directly. Except the captain.

  “What did you do?” A brief flash of something that looked like fear hit his face, but it was gone too fast to be sure.

  Alric was still holding me up and I gave the captain a shaky smile. “Miscalculated, apparently.”

  He didn’t smile back.

  “Sorry that I shoved him into the ground before you two could duke it out.” I was starting to get a magic backlash headache, and judging from the pain behind my eyes, this one might take me down. I was not about to get into a pissing match with an honor-neurotic knight.

  “You will pay,” the lead rakasa said. Again, this was not their leader who still hadn’t appeared. I really figured that once I smashed his favorite pet into pebbles he’d come out.