Battle Mage: Dragon Mage (Tales of Alus) (62 page)

He tossed a few scraps towards the raven though
there was more than enough left here to feed it. Its
comrades had already started withdrawing now that even
their great appetites had been sated. His own hunger
was as well now from a less morbid version of dinner.

The task before him had to be a return to Castle
Trea and to find out if any of the others had made it back
to warn the king. Having eaten, the man found his
strength returning quickly. Dante began picking his way
through the masses of dead. It was a disheartening
experience. He found many a friend lying broken and
often picked over by the scavengers. The body of General
Batist was found near the rear of the battle surrounded
by his personal guard.

Dante shook his head. The man had refused to flee though his command was being torn apart before
him. Dante considered such an act foolish. The General
should have retreated to the castle to warn the king.
There was nothing to be gained by losing such an
important man. His pride had caused the superb soldier
to die which was a shame since Batist had been a
renowned strategist and tactician. In the face of such a
loss, Dante guessed that he had been unwilling to admit
defeat.

Picking up his pace as he finally was clear of the
main killing field, Dante rushed as quickly as he could
manage. The castle was nearly twenty miles south. If he
could get there soon enough, the soldier could prepare
the king for what his troops would be facing.

Walking all day, eventually Dante spotted smoke
ahead of him. A dark flash and the soft rustle of wings,
alerted him to the raven's presence again. It had followed him this far oddly enough. Perhaps it was still certain of Dante's death and had chosen him as its future meal, he
thought wryly. But as the bird soared on ahead towards
the smoke, Dante realized that the bird would have
something else to feed on first.

The bird had disappeared long ago, but Dante
knew that the creature would be waiting ahead for him
though he had no reason for such odd behavior. The
warrior followed the road as best he could and before
long he found the source of the smoke.

A small village, through which the
Certen army
had passed only a day ago, was now a smoking ruin. As
he entered the outskirts of the town, Dante could smell
the death before him even as he had on the battlefield.
Animals and scavenger birds were here as well. Most
scattered at the approach of the man. The brazen raven
appeared before him in the road and turned to him with a
cry.

"So nice of you to wait," he mumbled
sarcastically.

As he searched the village for any survivors,
Dante began to wonder about something else. The
invaders’ identity was entirely unknown to him. They had appeared out of virtually nowhere. Those that had alerted
the king had not known from where they had come
either. More than five hundred strong, a true army of odd
creatures the likes of which had never been known to
this region of the Taltan continent, if they had ever
existed anywhere in all of the world of Alus, and they had
just appeared out of nowhere to attack and destroy.

Armies of man they knew. There were even
dwarves rumored to be a true separate race up in the
north, though he had never seen one. The myths of a race
of gargoyles and the existence of dragons had made their
way to Certe from North Continent as well. The source of
old wives' tales to be told to naughty young children or
around the campfire to try and spook the rawest of
recruits, but now these aberrations were here. This
slaughter was no wives’ tale.

Dante could find no survivors left alive and so he
proceeded south to warn the king, even as the man
continued to ask the unanswerable questions.

The raven continued to follow but revealed
nothing to him.

Voran: The Night Guardian

Chapter 1- Guardian

The city, never fully asleep, always imbued with its own sound, quiets momentarily and only the sound of the wind whistling through metal and brick ways stands out. A sliver of the moon gives light in places, but doesn’t penetrate the alleys where monsters prey on the innocent. Stories of wild dogs and coyotes made the news, but it was often a different predator that would not come into the light that was most dangerous.

A woman’s voice cries out weakly.

A green bulb changes and the sounds of nearby cars drown out another sound, the sound of flesh tearing and blood dripping to the ground where it escapes the mouth of the predator.

The woman’s voice continues to call for help, but her strength is fading and her sounds seem to go unheard. The creature continues to draw out her blood, feasting. It has done this before, though he is still young and new to the feeding to sate his hunger. The predator that was once a man is now merely a vessel of desire for the only food that will stop his hunger, if only for awhile. The woman’s head lolls to the side, her energy spent as her life begins to fade.

The scuff from the roof top above draws the predator’s attention, though human ears could not have heard the faint sounds from nearly thirty feet away. The creature no longer needs to hunt, but he will not leave a witness to his deed. Still dripping blood from his chin, the creature leaps high upon the near wall and bounds from it across the alley to the far wall. A third leap brings it to the lip of the building and the creature searches for the source of the sound.

Night vision picking out heat sources, the creature quickly finds the man. The voyeur is calm. The murder and the monster which created it bring no fear or seemingly any emotion from the man. The creature should have wondered at such a thing, but its bloodlust clouded judgment. The man must die, it thinks and no other option presents itself.

Leaping forward to attack, the predator’s claws search for the man’s throat. It will rip the life from his body, or so it thinks, but as its claws slice the air before its target, the man moves with amazing speed side stepping the killing blow.

The predator feels pain from the side of its chest.

Glancing down, the creature sees blood dripping and bands of flesh and cloth swaying as it turns to face the man. Confusion etches it features. The mouth opens revealing extended incisors. The eyes are all white save its irises. Ears, nearly pointed, are oversized and acute of hearing. It hears the man’s heartbeat thrumming steadily.

It looks at the man more closely. Reason begins to override bloodlust and the creature notes four ivory claws dripping with his blood. Virtually gleaming white even in the wane moonlight, the claws extend unnaturally from the man’s right hand. There is a glint of steel from the man’s side. A sword rests upon his hip where the moon catches the metal hilt revealing the blade still sheathed.

Arrogance in the predator’s strengths, well beyond human now, convince it to attack again. It is a mistake. The clawed hand swipes across its chest tearing through bone and flesh alike. A back swing, as the predator stumbles back in shock, removes the head at the neck.

The heart is bared. It thumps, even as the body falls to its knees. The man calmly stabs the claws through a black diseased looking heart. Pierced, the heart stops and begins to burn. As the man steps back withdrawing his claws, the torso catches flame and soon the whole body is afire.

Knowing the creature is dead, the man steps to the edge of the building above the site of the kill. With a vampire’s corpse behind him, the man knows that the story may not be over. He jumps over the edge, but instead of injuring himself thirty feet below; the man seems to slow his fall. At half the speed he should be falling, the man touches down without harm.

He checks the woman and finds a ragged pulse. Taking a dagger from another sheath, the man cuts his hand and places it over the wound in the woman’s neck. His blood enters her wound. With a cry of pain, the woman wrenches her body from the pavement with a quick jolt. The wound seems to burn, though not the way of the vampire. The torn skin cauterizes and heals as if there has been no attack.

Falling back towards the alleyway floor, the woman fades back towards unconsciousness. The man catches the woman as she collapses backward. Checking her pulse again, he finds her heart strengthening. Apparently out of danger, the man pulls out his cell phone.

“
Marek,” he states, “there’s a little clean up for you.”

It is not long before they come. The man, with his claws now hidden, waits for them on the roof. The vampire’s head sits on a furnace cap near the body’s remains. Burned near to ash, there is little left of the body and even much of its clothes are reduced to char. The man had found a wallet mostly intact. As the quartet leaps onto the building from the darkness, the man’s wallet is thrown to the leader.

“Recognize him?” the first man asks before the others can barely slow themselves in front of the ash.

“Leonard Newton? No, I can’t say that I do,” the man’s English holds the trace of something eastern European, but it is only slight. Years of practice have removed much of it since the two had met so long ago.

The monster slayer points to the head. “Someone in your clan may recognize him. He seems only recently changed, maybe someone didn’t finish a kill? You know your people can call me so we can avoid this sort of thing, Marek?”

“Of course they do, Nicholas,” he pauses, “if that is the name you still go by today.”

The man addressed as Nicholas smiles a half hearted glance in recognition of the attempted joke. “It is for now, yes.” Quickly returning to the matter at hand, he adds, “Do you think we have someone new moving into the territory? Maybe he’s just some loaner wandering in off the train or something?”

Marek
shakes his head as he offers the wallet as evidence. “Chicago. He lives less than half a mile from here. If there’s someone new converting people, my crew hasn’t brought them to my attention.”

Nodding in answer, Nicholas responds, “Alert them to keep watch. We can’t afford to have someone creating feral spawn and leaving them to cause a mess we can’t hide. We’ve worked too long to keep your people out of the media to have some careless vampire exposing us now.”

The others nod.

A moment’s thought brings a new question from the vampire slayer. “How is your stores of the blood holding up?”

“The clan should be fine with what we have for a month.”

“Good. I part with it to avoid this sort of thing.

“Did you bring a car or just fly over? There’s a woman down below that can be brought to a hospital.”

Marek
nods. “Of course, we did. You said there was clean up. Jake parked a street north just in case. We can get her and the remains removed. I assume that you treated her in time?”

Sniffing in mock arrogance, Nick replies, “Don’t I always?”

A slight chuckle from the group precedes Marek’s friendly retort, “Well, you are getting older, voran. If you were just a human, you would be dust, so it’s understandable that you might start to forget things.”

“Humph, you better hope that I don’t get so old that I forget we’re friends, you silly old bat. I still remember the day I decided to spare the scrawny yearling hiding from its sire. As long as I am around, we can maintain the peace. If I were getting too old, we’d have to find someone else willing to prolong it.”

Marek sighs, “You are entirely too serious, my friend. We know your mentor still lives and she’s centuries older than you. Must you always head for the doom and gloom when we talk?

“Come, Nicholas, the night is still young and beautiful. Smile and join us later for a run across the rooftops. We can even keep an eye out for more trouble, peace keeper. That way you can even feel that you’re making a serious attempt at remaining serious,” the man finishes with a chuckle.

“Running with this lot will make me old before my time. You and your clan can play without me this time. Just make sure the woman gets to a hospital and make sure her memory is properly adjusted. There’s no sense sending the poor woman to an asylum on top of this.”

The quartet laughs. “You’re almost showing a sense of humor, my friend, but we will accept your refusal this time. Soon we must get you out here with us. It’s fun. You might actually like fun.”

Again the others laugh, but Nick is already cinching his long jacket tighter with his belt. It is getting colder even as winter was supposed to be relinquishing its hold. Some years Chicago just refused to let spring come and then it would skip to the heat of summer.

With a last parting farewell, the man, known as a
voran, moves off into the darkness.