Hemlock And The Dead God's Legacy (Book 2) (24 page)

He considered that perhaps the Light Dancers had tapped into a law that only allowed them to patrol the City at night, but until he could get closer to them, this would remain an educated guess.

Julius knew that the Imperial magic had originally emanated from the now ruined Tower of Law, the remnants of which were now conspicuously on display before him.  He verified that the ley lines, though they did extend toward the ruined tower, dimmed as they neared the Lake, and became dark well before they reached the ruins.

Julius looked deeper into the City for the origin of the power feeding the lines.  He noticed several obelisks glowing along with the ley lines.  He could only see the tops of three of the obelisks, but the upper length of the fourth was visible from his vantage point.  He saw several figures grouped around the obelisk.  Most were passers-by, but one stood with its arms outstretched toward the sky.  It was not swaying awkwardly like the other figures.

“A shaman,” thought Julius.
  “Defeat the shamans or destroy those obelisks, and you defeat the Light Dancers.”

He was comfortable with his conclusion
, and he felt an eagerness to purge the Light Dancers from his City.  The people that he now walked among on the western side of the City would be his future citizens.  They were simple and lacked the manners and decorum he was used to from his old desert, but he would teach them those virtues.  The Light Dancers, on the other hand, were unwanted side effects of his father’s vision—ones that Julius yearned to eliminate.

Julius
approached the bed and reclined on the down-filled mattress, finding its pliant softness unfamiliar.  He rose and dragged a small, soiled carpet to the center of the floor and spread his bedsheet over the hard wooden planks.  He lay down there instead.  He considered that he might be giving in to a yearning for the familiar sensation of the desert floor beneath his sleeping body, but he decided to grant himself this small indulgence.  He would likely be engaged in a magical duel come the morning.  He knew that a good night’s sleep would aid his spell memory, and he was not so confident about the surety of his victory that he dismissed the value of prudent preparation for the encounter.



Dawn broke as Julius lay with eyes open, staring at the ceiling.  Sleep had not come easily to him in the unfamiliar wooden shelter.  The creaks of the wood, and the muted footsteps and murmurings of others moving within the structure had been disconcerting to him.

Though he had dozed off several times, he doubted whether he had managed more than a few hours of sleep.

“Hamiltus awaits,” he thought as he rose and donned his sword belt and golden robe.

Julius exited his room and walked purposefully toward the stairway.  He descended the stairs warily, unsure whether Hamiltus might employ treachery in advance of their agreed upon meeting.  As he reached the foyer of the inn
, a silent crowd of townspeople awaited him.  Not a word was spoken as Julius strode toward the front door where the Innkeeper stood.  The latter nodded his encouragement as Julius met his eyes and then continued walking without responding.

A chill had fallen over the City in the previous night, and the morning was crisp and clear.  Birdsong was heard in the distance as Julius walked the dusty street toward Hamiltus' keep.  The crowds that followed him seemed to be in an uncertain mood.  Children ran playfully
, but became reserved as they reached his proximity, as if some earlier, whispered warning from a parent restrained them.

Soon the keep loomed ahead of him, its cold stone looking incongruous with the simpler wooden structures in the rest of the western half of the City.  The simple, round stone structure
that was topped with crenellations seemed crude and dreary to Julius, who was used to the colorful pomp of the roving tent cities of his native desert.  But he did admire the sheer bulk of the structure, which made it clear to all that a great deal of power had been required to assemble it—and likely still resided within.

Around a hundred warriors of the sort he had encountered earlier loitered around the banded, wooden door which served as the entrance to the keep.  The door was closed.  A larger crowd had assembled in the streets flanking the keep and fell silent as they saw Julius approaching.

Julius stopped at a distance of about twenty paces and called to the keep.

"I am Julius, son of the Dead God.  Where is Hamiltus?" he said in a loud voice that all could hear.

"That's Mr. Hamiltus to you!" cried a dim-witted lout from amongst the warriors.  He was quickly hushed by his peers.

A murmur arose from the crowd as a figure appeared between the stone teeth at the top of the
keep.

"I am Hamiltus!" cried the figure
, in an aged voice that was still vigorous.  He was a tall man, somewhat stooped by age.  His large, bald head was dominated by bushy eyebrows and a wiry mustache and beard that extended well down the front of his dark robe.

"Descend so that we might
parley honorably," said Julius.

"So this is the son of a God?  Your raiment suggests that it could be so, yet here I stand looking down upon you as I might any caster from the wild come in to challenge me.  How should I reconcile that, eh?  A question made more poignant
, given the state of your supposed father's work—behold yonder tower."

"You dishonor me by standing atop that
keep, but I shall answer once in the hope of avoiding an unnecessary battle.  It is true that my father is long dead, and his plans did not bear fruit as he intended.  I was recently taken from my home and brought back here.  What was intended to be my birthright has crumbled, and what part of it yet remains I have rejected as being corrupt.  I donned his crown but days ago, then threw it down in disgust.  My City will be different than his.  Men will be free and the law will not eclipse liberty like he intended. 

Understand that I was an Emir in my old land, so your manner is an affront to me.  But I pardon it this once because I know you are ignorant, and I can imagine you might require some demonstration of my legitimacy."

Just then, movement in one of the arched windows of the keep distracted Julius.  A figure waited in the shadow and then leaned forward into the light.  Julius had seen many beautiful women in the desert—and several had been part of his harem.  But the woman who regarded him from that window redefined his standard of beauty.  Her face was perfectly oval with high cheekbones and full cheeks, which adorned her sensuous mouth and ice-blue eyes like smaller gems set around blue diamonds and a deep lustrous ruby.  A sheer, chiffon top did little to obscure her abundant breasts.  When she smiled at him, it was like a gentle wind pushing him over the edge of a cliff into an abyss of uncontrolled desire.  Even his practiced sense of desert austerity paled and soon was rendered irrelevant in the face of such a woman.

Hamiltus had been speaking, but Julius realized that he hadn't been paying attention.

"…tried and failed.  They're buried behind the keep.  You can check the graves if you are of a mind.  Will you be the seventh?" Hamiltus concluded.

Julius tried to compose himself as he continued to stare at the woman.  The full shock of the preceding moments was still sinking in.  Nothing mattered to him any longer but the affections of the woman who had so enraptured him. 

"Why don't you respond?  Has fear stilled your tongue at this pivotal hour?  If so, then you may turn and honorably return to wherever you came from.  I will not begrudge you a mistake in judgment, should you see the light of reason now," said the wizard.

Julius found his tongue and spoke as he continued to stare at the woman, who had withdrawn into the shadows coyly, but still met his gaze
. "I have beheld a treasure in your keep that has unmanned me.  I apologize for my behavior, but I do not ask for forgiveness.  This woman who now regards me—what is her name?  Is she your daughter, perhaps?  If so, then we should not be exchanging harsh words, for I will one day greet you as my father rather than my adversary."

The old wizard started to laugh, and then his mirth graduated to a hysterical, shrill cackle that enraged Julius.  But Julius held his tongue as Hamiltus composed himself.

"So, you've beheld the treasure of the City, have you?  Beware!  None have yet satisfied her, and her previous suitors are also buried out behind the keep because they were unable to temper their unrequited passions!  You had better turn and leave, young man.  You have one final chance.  Otherwise I will turn and descend the stairs to the street, where, if you are lucky, I will drive you from the City like a chastened cur!  If your luck fails, then you shall join the six others in the cold ground behind my keep!"

Julius was unperturbed by the wizard's words
. "Descend then, and let us duel.  But you must promise me that you will not force me to kill you once I have demonstrated my skill.  The young lady might never forgive me for that."

"You've got spirit and may just be the son of a God
. Truth be told, I welcome the challenge.  Let's see whether the Dead God's scion is worthy of his faded legacy."

Hamiltus disappeared from view, and, more troubling for Julius, so did his daughter.  Her disappearance returned his focus to the impending duel with Hamiltus, and he cursed himself
for his lack of concentration.  He quickly recalled each of the spells he had planned for the battle, practicing portions of their familiar incantations under his breath as he did so.

The door of the keep flew open with a crash, scattering the warriors and townspeople who were still in the vicinity.

A great cloud of smoke belched out of the door, and after a few seconds, it cleared, revealing the figure of the old wizard standing on the ground in front of the keep as the door closed behind him.  Hamiltus opened his robes and held an object before him.  The crowd gasped when they saw it, and Julius cringed as it invoked a painful memory.  It was a wooden shafted wand with a glass orb at its head, within which boiled a fiery molten mass.

Julius immediately knew it was the sibling of the crown he had rejected.

"How can the wizard use it?" he wondered.  In the fleeting moment before he realized that Hamiltus was casting a spell, Julius felt something unusual, being in close proximity to the artifact,  he felt his own magical power was slightly amplified, as if in defiance of the Imperial magic emanating from the wand.  A sliver of doubt invaded his heretofore unshakable air of confidence.

"Only a God's magic could defeat the son of a God," whispered
the unfamiliar voice of doubt in his mind.

Julius stood in the face of the incoming spell and cast his own protection spell in response. Magical energy sizzled around him as a
purple field sprung from his hands and surrounded his body. The energy of the magic field had a distinctive smell, and it partially obscured his vision. He had expected the impact of a magical bolt from the wizard, but instead he saw another blue magical field beyond his own, about midway between him and Hamiltus. Julius noticed the movement of large fish within the distant magical field.  Fish were as alien to him as large bodies of water, but he had heard enough tales of both to identify them.

"Is the old wizard mocking me with th
is embellishment?" he wondered.

He decided to counter Hamiltus' arrogance with a spell that had felled the few desert
shaman that had dared to duel him in his past. Balls of fire and molten lava streamed from his hands and blasted into Hamiltus' blue field. Moments later, a terrible, hot steam burned Julius and he cursed loudly.

As the steam cleared
, Julius saw that the predatory fish still swam across the face of Hamiltus' magical field, and they seemed to be closer than before. He took a step backwards, but realized there were fish swimming all across his field of vision—not just in front of him. He glanced backward and his fears were confirmed: the field extended all around him, and was slowly constricting.

He scanned his memory for a suitable
counter-spell as he saw that Hamiltus was continuing to strengthen his magical field.

A spell that he had once used to buttress a wooden gate crossed his mind, but it was more a sp
ell of binding than one that exerted its own force. The grinning fish swam threateningly as he considered whether the field would kill him if it succeeded in surrounding him.

He considered boosting the
field himself to see if it would pop or implode, but knew that the result might stun him, wound him, or worse.

Then the solution hit him. He would have to teleport out of the field. He cast a detection spell to see if the field would repel magical transmutation. There was a weak thread of defense
against that type of spell woven into the magic field, but Julius knew he could defeat it. Teleportation was a powerful and complicated spell. Julius knew that a normal casting would take him too long, and Hamiltus might have time to take countermeasures. So Julius decided to attempt a risky snap-cast of the spell. It was a technique that had saved his life in the desert—but it had also killed his best friend. His pride, and the memory of the beautiful woman he had seen, convinced him he had to try it.

He dropped his defensive field and spun quickly in place as he pulled his arms to his side
s. Particles of light flashed before his eyes, and there was a blinding flash and a deafening rumble. In the next instant, he hit the sandy ground hard, which knocked the wind out of him. His vision and the sounds around him were clear, and the assembled crowd gasped as they noticed him.