Return To Sky Raven (Book 2) Read online

  My passive mage sight showed me that the uniformed defenders had shrunk back away from us and were up on the wagon beds, protecting the women and children. But most of it wasn’t necessary as the few vampires that were left were concentrating on staying alive against my, and especially Maya’s, onslaught. Part of my brain noticed, and my nose confirmed, that there were a number of them down to smoldering husks as Nia’s fireballs were raining down on those still hunkered in the woods. Oddly, the flames were only affecting the enemy, not the trees.

  Finally, the last four vampires decided the odds were no longer good and started to run away from us down the road. A poor decision when you consider that, while Maya’s steel crossbow bolts might not be able to kill them, they could certainly take out a knee long enough for my dark elf to reach them in person. And she did; like a badger in a henhouse, she tore into them, leaving only pieces in her wake.

  I ripped my spike out of the chest of the last vampire I was working on, exploding his ribcage outward just as Maya and Winya severed the heads of the last group on the road. The area around us was one of total carnage and blood. The fight at the academy was nothing like this; vampires are more than just bone. But again, it didn’t seem to bother me and Maya seemed genuinely thrilled.

  Maya came over to me, her shining white armor more red than white; and while I couldn’t see her face with the helm on, the sultry walk spoke volumes. “How many did you get?” she asked playfully, wiping Winya off on one of the bodies.

  “I didn’t count…eight or nine, I suppose. You?”

  She stomped on the head of a vampire that appeared might be reforming slightly. “That makes fourteen; try keep up, Magic Boy!”

  “Hey now, that last one wasn’t fair, he was already dead!”

  She just chuckled and swayed her hips even more as she walked. The warhorses had advanced up the road and were now joined by two large snow wolves that could only be Lin and Julia. Nia flew over and landed on my shoulder but didn’t remove her armor.

  “Um, guys, aren’t we forgetting something?” asked Nia.

  Maya and I looked at each other and suddenly felt rather stupid. “The caravan,” we said in unison.

  The horses stayed were they were, but both were snorting blue fire from their nostrils and prancing up and down, blue flame gushing out from under their hooves with every stomp. Apparently, they had caught the scent of vampires and didn’t like it one bit! Lin and Julia stayed as wolves and walked with us up to the still-stunned defenders who were milling about in a confused manner on and alongside the wagons. The slightly larger of the two wolves, which I took to be Lin, growled beside me as she eyed the survivors. Several of the farmer types took a few steps toward us still holding their pitchforks and rakes, whereas the uniformed, armored, and cloaked defenders seemed to shrink back even farther. Some of them were even eyeing the woods behind them, which I found very strange behavior, and Lin’s low ominous growling continued.

  Nia said quietly from my shoulder, “The girls say that the ones in front of us are human, but the ones in armor are vampires. But they don’t smell right; they don’t smell of death like the other attacking ones did.”

  “Vampires!” Maya exclaimed, readying Winya and tensing for action.

  The farmers took another step forward and hesitantly raised weapons as some of the women in the back of the wagons sobbed and covered up the faces of the few crying children who were left. An older man, whose posture spoke of many years of hard work and ordeal, stepped to the front of the group. The humans were dirty and their clothes soiled, but they did not appear particularly fearful. I eyed the old man, being familiar with his type from working for them at Foalshead, and I could see grave determination in his eyes.

  “Please, Lady Paladin, we beg you, don’t hurt our liege Mistress and friends!”

  “Huh?”

  “Maya, hold up! I have a feeling there is more to this story,” I said. Sheathing my hammer, I reached up and removed my helmet.

  “But, Alex, they’re vampires! These poor people are blood slaves; we need to save them,” Maya growled.

  “Yes, Maya, they’re vampires, and you’re a dark elf, and the twins are dragons, remember,” I sent through Winya.

  “We are not slaves, Lady Paladin! We are free farmers and working folk,” the old farmer protested, his hands out in front of him.

  Winya disappeared into Maya’s armor as she stomped angrily and ripped off her own helmet. Clipping it to her belt and throwing her hands in the air, she faced me. “That’s it! I’ve been called a paladin, twice; my life is over!” She glared at me. “Just so you know, I blame you for this.” Normally, most people would take it as a complement, but for those who have actually had to deal with paladins, it’s the worst insult you could imagine.

  The farmers now looked confused beyond redemption, and I heard some muttering in the back, “A dark elf paladin? Who ever heard of such a thing? Why, I never thought I’d see the day!” Maya must have heard it, too, as she growled loud enough to make the giant wolf next to her cringe.

  The older farmer looked at us and then back to his group and shrugged. “So you’re not paladins?”

  “No!” shouted Maya, rounding on him in disgust. “What in the world gave you that idea?”

  He pointed at us. “Um, well, you’re both in white armor with white weapons, riding flaming white horses with white wolves as pets?”

  She whacked the side of my arm with her armored fist hard enough for me to register the impact; to everyone else it must have sounded like a ballistae bolt hitting a gong as they all jumped. “You thought of everything else, but you didn’t realize what we look like? Someone get me a pail of paint!”

  The farmer was still confused. “Then why save us?”

  Maya re-centered on him, still exasperated. “Because we’re good people and that’s what we do. Now, more importantly, do you really trust them?” She pointed at the vampires behind them.

  All of the farmers nodded. “We have trusted them with our lives since we were born, and our fathers, grandfathers and great-grandfathers before them, and they trust us with theirs.”

  Maya looked at me and I knew what she was contemplating, but I nodded to her, and I think Winya helped out a bit as well. She sighed, and I detected a small portion of disappointment as she turned back to them. “Fine then, I’ll take your word that everything is alright. I hope you all get where you’re going safely from here.”

  We had turned to leave and return to our mounts when one of the shrouded vampires stepped in front of the humans. “Please wait!” We stopped and faced the female voice. The figure pulled back her hood in a regal motion, revealing a pale, blonde woman who looked to be in her early forties. She was neither tall nor short, but she carried herself like nobility, and she had icy blue eyes and a voice that seemed trained for authority.

  “Please, could I ask for a moment of your time to explain our situation?”

  I looked at her curiously and nodded for her to continue. The whole situation was actually pretty intriguing. Vampires living in harmony with humans?

  “First, let me express our sincere gratitude for your timely aid and introduce myself. I am Belrothe Honalde of the noble Honalde family; we have claimed these lands as our own for over a thousand years.” She paused as if unsure how to continue. “I am also, as you have noticed, a vampire and leader of our vampire clan. Several centuries ago, the forbearers of these farmers lost their homes in an undead attack and we struck a deal with them that we still honor to this day.” She gestured at the farm folk and several of them smiled and nodded. “We would protect them and their families from the undead, bandits and other threats in exchange for blood. I can see the contempt in your eyes, young elf. Yes, we are vampires, but most of us didn’t have a choice in the matter, and like the living, we still remember the life we had before we ‘transitioned’. We still long for and enjoy the company of our loved ones, so in that sense, we are not that different.” She paused to take a deep breat
h before continuing, “Believe it or not, vampires who were good people - such as you claim to be - before being turned, don’t automatically become evil. Rather, it is the isolation from family and friends and the hatred that society bears them in general that drives them to apathy or madness. This arraignment we have with these farmers - they let us drink from them without fear of us turning or killing them - is a chore many of them find pleasurable. In return, we patrol the valley at night, keeping them safe, and they protect us when we sleep in the daylight hours. I consider them family retainers, not slaves or serfs; that from a nobler time when a liege lord owed as much to his or her retainers as they did to the noble house. All of my liegemen and staff feel the same way.” I saw several of the farmers nodding at her words, and from the respectful way they looked at her, I was convinced.

  “Then what are you doing out here?” I asked.

  Belrothe’s face grew stony and her eyes angry. “Two nights ago, there was a raid on the villages under our protection. Many of our farmers and their families, over a hundred souls, were kidnapped and taken away, some of them by the very rogue vampires that you fought here. One of my human workers, a tracker by trade, followed their trail during daylight and discovered they were being held at a large cave a few hours travel back in that direction.” She motioned up the road in the direction the wagons had come from. “Last evening, we left with these three wagons for transport, three drivers, and a dozen of my staff and journeyed to the cave to retrieve our people.”

  “It sounds like you thought you were just going to waltz in there, scoop them up, and leave,” Maya said dubiously.

  The blonde vampire’s face clouded with more than a little embarrassment. “Yes, well, attribute that to an old woman’s hubris, I’m afraid,” she sighed. “Something you may not understand is that the older a vampire gets, the more power and force of will they exhibit over lesser, or newer if you prefer the term, vampires.

  ‘So a 500-year-old vamp can order a 100-year-old around?” Nia chimed in, curious.

  “In most cases, yes, little one; that is exactly the situation. And I am a very old vampire, I believed I would be able to do just as you suggest - walk in and order the miscreants to release my people and be on our way, with no bloodshed.”

  “So what happened?” Nia followed up, her wings buzzing with tension.

  “When we arrived, I was relieved to find out that our hundred or so villagers were still alive, but I was also appalled to also find out there were more than 300 vampires milling about in the cave. We’ve never had more than twenty-five living in this entire region at one time before! I asserted my authority and began ordering the prisoners released and my staff helped them out of the cave and onto the wagons. We had gotten twenty or so freed and outside when there was a commotion from farther back in the cavern. A vampire called Kotoch appeared with a large entourage of bully boys and countermanded my order.

  At first, I was not concerned and I challenged his order. Kotoch is a mere 250-year-old street thug who fashions himself nobility, and I should have been able to cow him easily, but that was not the case. He was wearing one of the six Amulets of Tepestra; instantly, any influence over the group that I had vanished! It was fortunate that one of my staff near the entrance recognized what was happening and signaled the wagons to flee with the few people we had already loaded. They took off in full flight and my staff and I sought to delay pursuit by fighting a delaying action at the cave entrance. Ultimately, they were too many and we were forced to flee as well. I lost six of my personal liegemen in that fight; good men and dear friends, all of them.”

  I was surprised to actually see tears beginning to seep down Belrothe’s face. Finally, she nodded to herself to pull it together and continued, “We caught up to the wagons about ten miles back. We had hoped that they had not the stomach for more conflict, but we were wrong, and they had an ambush set up here. If you had not happened along, we would have all perished.”

  “Couldn’t you have just ordered these vampires to stand down, or was this Kotoch among them?” I asked.

  “No, he is unfortunately not here among the dead. The power of the amulet allows him to anoint small groups of his followers as special disciples and gives them immunity to further compulsion; this war party was one of those groups.”

  “So what exactly is this Amulet of Tepestra?” I questioned.

  “Young knight, among all the undead - skeletons, zombies, wights, and ghouls - only vampires retain the intelligence and personality traits that they had when they were living. Because of this, we are a fractious, independent lot who don’t follow orders particularly well unless very closely supervised, compelled or well-trained.” She indicated the armored vampires behind the farmers with an affectionate wave of the hand. “And the older we get, the less likely we are to appreciate orders from someone like the Lifebane. His first attempts at persuading vampires to rally to his banner were disasters, and he couldn’t be in multiple places at once to personally compel them, so he created the Amulets of Tepestra using demon magic. The evil one finds a few particularly greedy or evil low level vampires that are fanatically loyal to him and gives them one of the Amulets.”

  “And they do what, exactly?”

  “Essentially, they add a thousand years or so to the force of will the holder can use to compel other vampires. So a 400-year-old suddenly has the power of someone who has seen 1400 years. I was not aware that the Lifebane had gifted any vampire in this region with one of these perversions until tonight.

  “What do you plan to do now?”

  Belrothe looked like she had just swallowed sour wine; she threw up her hands in disgust and helplessness. Somehow, this seemed like an emotion she didn’t wear well or often. “There is little we can do; we lack the numbers to make another run at a rescue and after midnight tonight, it will be too late anyway. Kotach will become the dark elves’ problem, not mine,” she said, nodding at my fiancé.

  “What do you mean by that? What are they planning?” Maya demanded.

  The old vampire continued sadly, “We know they are planning to drain every human in captivity at midnight tonight at a special ceremony where all 300 of the vampires will be anointed as disciples. Then, as directed by the Lifebane himself through the conduit of the Amulet, all 300 plus will make their way to the dark elf lands and slaughter every man, woman, and child in their path until they reach the Capital itself. There they are to slide through the siege lines and wreck havoc among the populace until the resistance collapses.” While that encouraging bit of news sank in, Belrothe allowed her eyes to wander over our group, our armaments, horses, pixie, and fierce-looking wolves. With a sly smile, she pretended to be deep in thought and, tapping her chin, she commented, “If only there was some way to prevent that all from happening…”

  I couldn’t help but start to like her; but she was no doubt a master manipulator from way back, and I do mean waaay back.

  One of the women farm folk jumped out of the nearest wagon and practically threw herself to the ground in front of us. She brought herself to a kneeling position and begged us, crying, “Please, please, can you help us? My husband and two sisters are still in the cavern; they are all the family I have! You can’t know what it was like waiting to die down in that cave at the hands of those monsters!”

  I looked up, and most of the other farmers had gotten down out of the wagons and were on their knees as well, pleading with their eyes and voices, but not approaching closer.

  Maya sent me a worried feeling through Winya’s link, “We need to do something about this. I don’t think my conscience can handle it, all those people dying at the hands of the undead without a fighting chance. Not to mention, I have doubts my people in the dark elf capital can fend off an undead siege and a vampire force of this size.”

  “Agreed. We have to do what we can for the captives, plus this might be a way to open up trade with the farmers to supply food to the fortress,” I said. “But I’m not sure what we would have to offer
them in trade.”

  Out of the blue, Rosa conveniently popped into the conversation. “Yes, about that; your parents opened up the vault, and it would seem that the fortress is very well off, like enough-to-buy-three-kingdoms well off.”

  “Well, Sky Raven was guarding the only trade route between the human lands and the old dwarven empire; we had a lot of traffic,” said Winya.

  Maya nodded to me, giving me the go-ahead to do the trade. We turned back to the baffled vampire. “We have decided that we will help you.”

  Her face registered surprise, followed by extreme relief and gratitude. “I don’t see how you decided that as I never saw your lips move, but please consider me in your debt.” And she bowed courteously.

  I held up my hand. “With your pardon, Lady, we do have one request.”

  She eyed us cautiously. “And what is that?” As she was talking, the old farmer and one of her liegemen moved up to stand alongside her.

  “That you open up trade with Sky Raven Fortress.” I think we shocked a few more years out of all three of them, as their mouths dropped open, and they looked repeatedly at each of us as if we were about to say it was all a joke at their expense.

  “The fortress is open again?” Belrothe stammered. “No one’s been in there since Queen Rialla died; many of my people are the descendants of the last civilians to work there. How is this possible? Moreover, who are you people?”

  I thought about doing a full introduction but, instead, decided on a more simple approach. “The Nova have returned.” I wasn’t really prepared for her reaction, though. With a gasp, Belrothe’s eyes grew very large and she looked like she was about to faint as she searched our faces for confirmation.

  I nodded, and her eyes darted quickly between Maya and me before she intoned in a hushed whisper, ‘The Child of Light and the Child of Darkness!” She swept into a very deep formal bow and, seeing that, all of her people did the same. Standing back upright, she reassumed her mantle of authority. “And what type of trade does the citadel require?” she said shakily.