Battle Mage: Dragon Mage (Tales of Alus) (18 page)

Holding onto his forearm, the girl confessed her worries, “If we are followed by more of the Dark One’s agents or even Malaketh, it will be a lot harder for someone to follow us as two humans that blend into the crowd as opposed to a mar’goyn’lya pushing his way through the town. People will confess to seeing you like this, but even in your over size human body you will be less obvious.”

He groaned, but performed the words needed to activate the amulet to change into his brown haired, human form. Smiling appreciatively at his sacrifice, Cheleya patted the muscular man’s arm when he had finished.

The battle mages appeared a little less confident that the look would keep Kel’lor from being noticed in town, but they let the matter lie. Instead, Evantus and Colbie led the way down the trail towards the Divera River and home.

Chapter 11- Stone and Gold

Malaketh had only been able to hold off the council’s decision to send a special pursuit team for a few days. He had hoped that Toban’s minions would come through and kill the girl for him before things became too messy. A tracker team had been sent out to try and follow Cheleya. Their quick research led to the belief that someone else was with her. Malaketh had known that Kel’lor had joined the girl as her protector, but the council had to find it out on their own without his help. If he had revealed that he knew too much, Malaketh had no doubt that they would turn on him believing that the master had something to do with all of it. Worse, they would be correct.

So the council pulled together a team that could use dragon magic or fly. While the first team had been trackers, they had been bound to searching the land without magic and would lose the trail only to find it later by the luck of having the two following the southern trail. The two being pursued had done little to truly mask their direction of flight. Malaketh was unsure of what they hoped to find in the south, but whatever it was he didn’t want them to succeed.

To his fortune, Malaketh was chosen to lead the team to capture the rogue dragoness and gargoyle. Mor’treya, as his only remaining student, would be joining him. The rest of the group of seven were made up of a pair of che’ther and three more mar’goyn’lya. Since there were so few humans who knew dragon magic to know how to fly, it wasn’t surprising that Malaketh was the only one. He sensed that the remainder of the team consisted of the che’ther to make sure that Cheleya wasn’t treated unfairly by the other races. Che’ther had an unusual view of those who didn’t follow the norm, and stealing artifacts of magic fell into a simple quirk of behavior for them.

It was one of the race’s characteristics that had made Malaketh’s time here so easy for him to learn their secrets.

The group had assembled on the main balcony of the school, since all had chosen to meet by flying up to the academy. With hundreds of stairs leading up for a walk, it wasn’t surprising that those who could fly would. As Malaketh prepared to briefly update his team, an eighth flyer came into view looking a little shaky in his flight. An unusual brown set of wings set him apart from the typical dragon mages, who normally chose red or black.

The man’s landing was less than graceful, though he managed to keep his feet under him. It was trickier than it looked and most rookies often fell on landing. Malaketh appraised the flyer with one eyebrow raised in question. He voiced his query to the brown haired man, clothed in even more brown, “Excuse me, who are you, sir?”

“I am Cor’Dargan. I have already talked to the council about joining the hunt for Cheleya. I will be joining you to bring back my wayward daughter,” the brown man stated without question.

Voices from behind him distracted the master momentarily as the two che’ther began muttering.

“Fa’Dargan’zer?” Fa’Elenek, the male che’ther, whispered in what Malaketh thought was awe.

“The Stone Runner?” the female, Fa’Lystheir, questioned her companion in definite awe.

The names meant nothing to Malaketh, but the fact that Cor’Dargan was Cheleya’s father did. It also meant that things would be more complicated. Having someone definitely invested in the girl would make it harder for him to eliminate her as an accident or any other way. He didn’t know if che’ther families were as close, but they had often expressed strong loyalty in those he knew.

“Cor’Dargan, is it? I don’t know why you have come. It is obvious that you can barely fly. How will you keep up with the team? I can’t have you holding us back,” Malaketh stated trying to avoid adding the che’ther. It was bad enough having Mor’treya along, but at least he could out maneuver the gargoyle since he knew her.

The man’s brown eyes didn’t even blink as he responded, “If I can not keep up then, by all means, leave me behind and I will catch up to you later. I am only hear reporting as a formality, Malaketh,” the che’ther replied avoiding any use of the man’s earned titles of master or Fa’Malaketh’zer in their language. “I will be going with or without your team and will bring the girl back to answer the charges against her.”

Malaketh tried to read the che’ther’s strength as he would with any human wizard or mage. A che’ther or mar’goyn’lya, once transformed were difficult to read, and this one was no different, though he had a sense that Cor’Dargan was more powerful than he seemed.

Putting his fake smile on his face that the creatures of Mar’kal could never see through, Malaketh replied, “As long as it is understood that we will not slow for you, then we are fine. I was about to brief the others on our target.”

Turning to the others, the dragon mage master chose his words to be quick and precise, “My former apprentices, a che’ther girl named Cheleya and a mar’goyn’lya male, Kel’lor, appear to have stolen several important pieces from the magic trove. How much power is in them and how much they know about their use is unknown, but they have them and are heading south. We can assume that they plan to sell whatever they don’t need and use what they have learned from the secret scrolls and artifacts.

“They are apprentices to dragon magic, but both have a strong grasp of other schools of magic and can not be overlooked as well trained and powerful. Cheleya in particular is an excellent student of the dragon and can fly better than most mar’goyn’lya in tighter areas between the mountain spires, so be prepared.

“Lastly, the masters have asked that we bring them back alive to stand trial, but by no means does that mean you need to hold back if they wish to fight to the death. We outnumber them, but they will most likely be desperate to remain free.

“If there are no questions, then we can proceed.”

Mor’treya raised a hand like a proper student and asked, “Why have they done this? They had seemed content to learn, master. This behavior makes no sense to me.”

Malaketh nodded keeping his face blank of emotion as he stated, “That is what the masters want us to capture them to find out. They also don’t want these artifacts loose in the world, so both are the keys to the mission.”

His answer didn’t appear satisfying enough to the gargoyle, but the man knew that his student best operated in a world of yes and no answers. It was the shades of gray that kept all her race and the che’ther confused by human nature. Malaketh assumed that was just one of the reasons why the emperor had never bothered to finish off the backward races hiding in their mountain city.

“If there are no meaningful questions, then we had better move. Every moment they flee further from us and will be harder to catch once they find the cities of man.”

Without further interruptions, Malaketh led the eight in a leap over the balcony rail. The master spread his crimson wings calling them into existence as he let gravity speed his fall a moment and used the momentum to propel him forward as his wings thrust away from the academy.

The che’ther magicians took flight similarly as the mar’goyn’lya used their natural wings to thrust into the air. Only Cor’Dargan seemed uncomfortable with the quick take off and the brown dragon quickly fell behind in flight. As Malaketh had said, they would not wait for the che’ther if he couldn’t keep up. It was his job to catch the criminals and her father would likely make that harder, especially if his attempt to bring them back alive was to look real.

Noting Elenek pointing at the ground for Lystheir to look behind them, the master spotted Cor’Dargan land looking uncomfortable in the process once again. Already the father had fallen behind and Malaketh smiled thankfully. He could leave the che’ther behind without looking like he had anything to hide, since the brown dragon couldn’t keep up as he said.

He watched as the brown dragon knelt a moment calling his magic to him. A moment later the che’ther burst forward seeming to glide along the ground. His legs barely moved as the ground thrust him forward at great velocity. The dragon’s speed on the ground quickly caught him up with the flying mages much to the master’s frustration.

Malaketh began to worry. This was no novice magician he watched from above. While Cor’Dargan was barely a flyer, he had certainly mastered much of the magic of the earth. Frowning slightly without getting caught by the others, the man began to work on other scenarios that might be required to remove the father from the equation.

Cor’Dargan and the flight covered Cheleya’s path of the first night in a mere hour. While Malaketh led them on without stopping to search, the brown dragon paused feeling the land and searching for clues. This whole thing seemed odd to him.

His daughter had a disagreement with Sorqesta and in the same night had gone to the academy to steal from the masters. There was no logic in it, but all signs pointed to it being true.

They had come to his dwelling asking questions to see if Cheleya had returned home that night, but they had assured the masters that she had not. When he asked questions, there were few answers. The girl had stolen and left some proof that she had made off with artifacts hidden by the masters for the world’s protection. Many of these magic items were too dangerous to be allowed to be used, he had been told.

His former life at the academy as a mere egg let him know some of the things they guarded and they worried him too, but still this behavior did not seem like his daughter. He knew less of Kel’lor, but had met the mar’goyn’lya and never saw anything beyond loyalty to his daughter and Mar’kal in him. Still, an individual hid many things inside that were often never made known to the world, at least not until it was too late.

There was the sign of a crag dog sniffing around the site and some gold and glass littered the ground as little more than dust. The che’ther used his power to gather up the evidence into one of several flasks that he had brought along. In time, he could use his magic to see if this was part of an item that she was said to have stolen.

Cor’Dargan had searched the base of the academy and found perplexing evidence in the first day of discovery of the break in and subsequent disappearance of Cheleya and Kel’lor. He had also checked with the gargoyle’s family and in his eyrie. Kel’lor had taken a pack of food that evening and flown off towards the academy, he had been told, though none of those that had seen him fly away had known the reason. Supplies for a long escape? Cor’Dargan wasn’t anymore sure than those he had asked.

Gathering his power for land running, the che’ther considered returning to his true form. He could run along the path about as fast as a land dragon as he could using his magic, but as a human his magic could propel him all day with little exertion. Cor’Dargan hadn’t run as a che’ther for any real distance in years. Farming brought few needs to run and the dragon had become complacent and out of shape. He
was strong in earth magic from his use of spells to farm like no one else in Mar’kal, however, so he chose to remain in the human form that his wife hated so much.

He would find Cheleya and either save her or kill her himself if need be. Needing answers to all his questions, the Stone Runner sped along the base of the canyon.

The bridge to Televal was of some interest to Cheleya as the six walked across a construction mostly made of wood. Several stone pylons braced the bridge from beneath, but the actual platform stretching over two hundred feet was made of wood beams and thick sheets of wood. There were obvious pins and chains also that were connected to it running along the structure back to Staron’s side of the river.

When Cheleya asked Orlerin and the others about the significance of the strangely built bridge, the mages looked at one another deciding if it was something they should explain to an outsider. Evantus shrugged and said simply, “The bridge is made to be broken apart in case an enemy force should ever arrive.” He pointed to a stone tower guarding the bridge set about forty feet back and up a rise. “The guards here are in charge of destroying the bridge using the chains to pull the pieces into the river. Only the stones will remain, but even those have chains to pull them down if it comes to that.”

Orlerin nodded but added, “The rivers are the first defense against our enemies since most of our country is bordered by either the Divera or Spinera River. The capitol city, Estaria and Carais the second biggest are both along the river, but they’re walled cities built to the east and west of the rivers. When the Cataclysm hit, it shifted the rivers exposing both cities, but their large walls and towers have proven sturdier than the rivers in the past.”

“Staron may have less people and land, but it has some natural defenses that have helped the country last for thousands of years, even when war has been prevalent,” the often quiet, Tilana stated from beside the mage. Her dark hair and hood nearly hid the woman’s face, but Cheleya could hear from her lips easy enough.