Age of the Gods: The Complete, twelve novel, fantasy series (The Blood and Brotherhood Saga) (62 page)

King Valdadore watched as someone interceded on his behalf and a great ball of sickly-looking fire smashed into the grotesque face of his adversary. He knew that fire, and knew of only one mage who commanded it. Knowing Seth was watching his back somehow made the king feel better and, as if to add insult to injury, the orc appeared to lose focus and returned to his unblessed form. His shoulder ruined, the king realized that Judilanthaliz must have fallen victim to a prior injury, and wanting to return to the fight as quickly as possible, King Valdadore crushed his foe’s head beneath his boot with a grin, and turned to stride to the healers’ tent, clearing a path through the dark army, to have his shoulder mended.

Seth looked down upon the field of battle and was able to spot several fights waging between champions on both sides. One by one Seth reached out and tilted the scales to favor his side, and one by one the enemy’s champions fell, though Seth began to feel the strain from reaching out too far with his abilities as his limbs began to tremble and sweat started to bead on his forehead. Deciding to focus his power locally, Seth took a moment to regard the progress of his own troops.

Just a few dozen yards ahead of him, Seth watched as the human counterpart of the army shifted to make way for his wolf soldiers. This simple movement gave great advantage to the defending line of troops, for as the humans shifted to either side, they lent strength to the rest of the line, working as reinforcements themselves. Also this made room for Seth’s small army to fill the gap, giving them easy access to the enemy. His wolf men and women had wanted vengeance, and though it was a gruesome sight, Seth could not help but be impressed by the effectiveness of his creations. Each of his beasts fought like a raging berserker, lunging, biting, clawing, tearing and mauling the enemy, and though the scene appeared to be utter pandemonium, Seth could see the proof of calculated precision in his troop’s attacks. As one of his wolf troops would lunge upon an attacker to bring him down, from the masses several more wolf men and women would spring atop the beast and rend it limb from limb within seconds. As the enemy was dispatched, the troops would fade back into the snarling mass to seek out the next target. So ferocious were his troops they had actually managed to surge forward into the attacking horde. The wicked enemies fell back, unwilling to plunge into the hairy beasts.

Seth surveyed the length of his kingdom's defensive line once more. It held but was thinning and falling back in several locations. He watched as Knights of Valdadore continued to wade through the enemy, carving paths of destruction, and as the decreasing numbers of mages from both sides threw fireballs back and forth, and the remnants of Valdadore’s archers continued to fire into the enemy mass. Thousands on both sides lay dead or dying, and Seth saw those with lesser injuries dragging those mortally wounded back from the battle to be tended by the healers. Trying to estimate the damage to both sides, Seth assessed that Valdadore had already lost a quarter of its troops, and the remainder was beginning to tire. The enemy had much higher losses, but even so still vastly outnumbered the defenders. Seth knew if the battle did not change drastically and soon, all would be lost. As he scanned the enemy horde a last time before renewing his attacks, he saw a drastic change coming.

The goblin raced from the back to the enemy horde blasting short notes on a small horn carved from bone. In his other hand he carried a torch. As the small green beast blew his horn, the ranks of the enemy opened for him to allow him a clear path. Seth assumed the goblin a messenger of some sort and thought to dispatch the goblin before it could relay its orders, but curiosity stayed him. Thinking it better to wait until the goblin was passing along its orders to a leader of some sort, so that Seth could slay both the messenger and whomever he reported to. Seth watched the small, green, lanky beast as it got closer, headed straight into the front lines of his own wolf troops. But before his troops were able to bring the goblin down, reaching over his shoulder the goblin thrust the torch into a pack strapped to his back and without warning a giant explosion ensued. Flames and body parts erupted from where the goblin had been as a concussive shockwave leveled troops from both armies. At their center a crater had formed in the ground, ringed by over a hundred dead from both forces. The kamikaze goblin had single handedly slaughtered nearly a tenth of Seth’s troops in a single blow, and although devastating, the loss was overshadowed by another realization.

Seth watched as the goblin exploded in a wave of fire and shrapnel, and though he saw the deaths of so many of his men, it was what he felt that overtook him. Something inside Seth snapped. It wasn’t something emotional, or mental or even physical, but somehow it encompassed all three. As his men’s lives were extinguished Seth felt awash with great power as some force surged into him, unbinding his subconscious self, tearing asunder his previously limited conscious mind and joining with his own being. It mended him anew, lending to him power like he had never felt before. This power was not like that he had siphoned from his enemies that he could shape and twist and lock away for later use. This new power was something more. Seth felt invigorated, limitless, unbound by physical restraint. For the first time in his life Seth was awash with confidence as if his very will was enough to end this battle.

But as quickly as the feeling came, its effects began to diminish. It wasn’t the same seductive power he had felt before that brought pleasure to him physically, but something more. As the overwhelming effects of the power began to fade, Seth knew that he had indeed somehow changed. Just standing upon the hill, Seth could feel his own inner aura as it pulsed with increased power. So strong it was that Seth half expected he could hear it pulsing were he in a quieter place, but that was not all that had changed. Seth could feel that his mind had altered as well, as if a type of barrier had been removed, or doors unlocked into his subconscious mind. As if to prove it, as the last initial effects of the new power finally faded, Seth realized that he had a much keener sense of those auras around him, as if now, instead of whispering to his subconscious, they screamed. Reaching out experimentally, Seth discovered he could quickly and readily grasp at those so far from him he would not have even attempted it before for fear of losing consciousness. Now it seemed an easy task, and that was when the realization took him.

Seth had created his wolf men, and through their feral understanding of the world they had worshipped him in their own way as their creator, their deity. Now many of them had perished, and with their deaths, their sparks of life given by the gods had returned to
him
, not to Ishanya. The implications were astronomical. Seth had just gained nearly fifty of his men’s life forces, and as such would live fifty times longer than an average man. His abilities had expanded exponentially, to what extent he was still unsure, but he knew he was now more powerful. As much as he wished to ponder the change, to seek inside himself to find whatever other evidence of alteration he could, now he had no time to do so.

Garret watched as the opposing army marched to meet him. He gazed unblinking at the approaching horde, waiting for the absolute last moment. As the enemy neared the first of the king’s surprises was unleashed as giant steel ballista bolts were loosed into the enemy ranks. Nearer and nearer the enemy marched and, coming within range, the call went out and thousands of arrows began to rain down upon the evil masses. Then the monstrous army charged in a mass of flesh and blackened armor, and praying to Gorandor, Garret unveiled a little surprise of his own.

With a thunderous boom Garret exploded in size, his bare flesh turning silver and becoming hard as steel. Pulling his massive sword from the scabbard strapped to his back, Garret yelled a deep resounding battle cry as he charged into the wall of puny opponents. Slashing and hacking with his immense blade, Garret chuckled as he slaughtered half a dozen foes with each swing of his great sword. Guts and blood seemed to rain around him, coating his body within moments with a slick, oozing spray of coagulating gore. Garret felt unstoppable with the power of Gorandor coursing through him, and the pleasure it brought did not excite him in the way it did other men. To him it was quite like being tickled as a child, and though he fought it, he could not help but chuckle all the while as he waded through his enemies, laying waste to them by the score. Garret had begun to believe that he was unstoppable when the first fireball hit him in the ribs.

To any normal man the blow would have incinerated him instantly. Even those in armor would have burned inside their metal shell, but Garret's flesh was like that of steel in his blessed form, and though he was not burnt, the blast hurt like hell. Even metal was susceptible to heat, and though outwardly he showed no signs of damage, he felt as if his insides had been slightly cooked by the blast, and it irritated him no end. Turning in the direction of the fireball, Garret began carving himself a new path through his foes. Within a few moments another fireball was unleashed towards him, giving Garret the bearings he needed. He waded through a regiment of orcs and trolls, casually slaying those who dared stay in range as he surged towards his target. Locating the goblin in the horde had proven easy enough, and wanting to make an example out of him, instead of slicing the pathetic green beast in two, Garret kicked the tiny mage with all his might expecting to send the beast flying well overhead of its peers. However, such was the force of the blow that the small creature more or less crumpled with the impact, squishing and tearing and sticking to his foot, like a mosquito being swatted, and left gore hanging between Garret's toes. Lesson learned, by both of them Garret presumed, he continued carving a path this way and that, occasionally harassed by a fireball-throwing mage of one race or another, whom he quickly dispatched before again resuming his macabre masterpiece.

For over an hour Garret waded through the invading army unimpeded, wreaking havoc as he went to and fro, raining gore in all directions. It wasn’t until he had stomped far into the black mass when the enemy gave him a surprise of its own. As Garret hacked and slashed through a regiment of goblins, three oversized trolls came rushing through their comrades. Normal trolls were larger than a man by a third in most cases, but these three were near Garret's equal, having doubled in size themselves. Garret watched the trio come, absently slaying those around him, sizing up his opponents. The trolls were identical to their smaller counterparts with a thick, blue, leathery hide that resembled a wrinkly part of his own anatomy. They had very blocky features, all solid muscles with thick arms that ended in thick hands and thick legs that ended in thick feet. Unlike orcs, they didn’t have massive, sharp teeth or claws, just a lot of bulk. These three brandished giant hammers in their hands, and wrapped over their shoulder and around their chest and back, each carried a large length of chain. Garret too noticed that around their waists, massive spikes hung in a row. Garret was thankful for his steel skin.

The trolls closed the distance as Garret made a sport of spraying them with gore from those he slaughtered, which seemed to anger them quite nicely. The first troll rushed him head on, thinking to pound Garret with his great hammer. Garret, seeing a mistake in the troll's logic, stepped into the blow, letting the hammer’s head careen over his shoulder where the wooden handle, with a loud splintering sound, shattered upon his collarbone. Disarmed, the troll growled and tackled Garret, but having grown up wrestling with his twin, Garret used the beast's momentum against itself and sent it rolling across the slick path of gore where it toppled over, crushing a handful of goblins beneath it. Turning to face the other two trolls, Garret found himself outwitted.

As Garret turned, the two remaining giant trolls rushed past him to either side, holding between them one of the massive chains. Caught off guard, Garret attempted to duck the chain, but unable to react in time, the massive links caught under his chin, craning his head back and pulling him over backwards to land with a crunch among the mass of carnage beneath his feet. He lost his sword in the fall. Garret struggled to regain his feet as the trolls kicked and battered him, but finding no purchase on the slippery ground, again and again the trolls battered him down. Garret struggled on in vain for moments, until at last, feigning an attempt to rise again, Garret kicked the legs out from one of the trolls. Rolling upon the beast, he used its body as leverage to get to his feet once again, as the other troll rushed in to tackle him. As it neared, for no reason apparent to Garret, with a pop and a shimmer all three trolls shrank back to their normal size. Seizing his advantage, Garret stooped to regain his blade and summarily cleaved all three opponents in two, spilling their entrails and black blood onto the ground in steaming piles. Crisis averted, Garret resumed his course through the blackened mass of the grotesque army, cleaving and chuckling as he went.

Garret had slaughtered an entire regiment of orcs when, hearing several horn blasts, he watched as a single goblin cleared a path through the midst of its peers, sprinting with a torch in hand and a trail of smoke behind him. Curious Garret watched the goblin head directly into his brother's pack of beast soldiers. Assured the little green guy would make a tasty meal to one of Seth’s troops, Garret began swinging his mighty blade again just as an explosion shook the ground. His skin, like metal, carried the reverberations into his skull where his ears began ringing annoyingly. Looking to see what was amiss as shouts arose, Garret discovered the damage the little devil had achieved. And worse, looking to the rear of the enemies’ troops, he could see dozens more similarly-laden goblins tooting their horns as they too began to sprint through the lines that opened like hallways before them. Knowing the soldiers on the defensive line would not withstand such an assault, Garret raced towards the nearest torch-bearing goblin when suddenly the slimy beast vanished into a pile of ash and exploded among his own troops. This explosion came followed by a rapid succession of several more, each causing his ears to ring louder and louder. Oh how Garret hated goblins.