God of Magic 3 Page 9

  Although the fortress walls had protected the palace from the worst of the cannon fire, it hadn’t been spared entirely, and like the grounds that surrounded it, it showed clear signs of the savagery that had taken place. The windows on the lower story had all been shattered, and there were cracks and breaks in the palace’s tawny stone facade. Urns full of flowers lay on their sides and spilled dirt from their cracked containers, broken lanterns dripped oil, and the curtain of creeping ivy that trailed up to the roof fell away in sections and sprawled over the ground like tentacles.

  The doors of the main entrance to the palace appeared to have been blown off their hinges which I assumed was from Quikk’s initial attack and not the enthusiastic charge led by Captain Drakon, though I couldn’t be sure.

  The interior of the palace might have been beautiful once, but the pirates had left their mark. Broken glass littered the floor, and the plush rug that trailed down the hall was stained with dirt, oil, and blood. Quikk’s pirates had knocked over tables, smashed vases, and torn down paintings with seemingly no other goal than to trash the place, and I heard Maruk make a small, disgusted sound in his throat as we passed a large painting that someone had taken the time to slash apart.

  Thankfully, it seemed that Quikk and his crew had at least refrained from setting anything on fire in here, which I was sure was out of personal interest. They didn’t want to burn up anything valuable accidentially that they could steal. I was glad for it because it meant that if any of Edward’s staff or Edward himself had managed to hide somewhere in the palace, they wouldn’t be trapped by the flames.

  “Keep an eye out for anyone who might still be hiding around here,” I told the others as we ran after Drakon and his crew through the desolate halls. We hadn’t gone far when someone shouted from up ahead, and I heard the clang of metal on metal.

  Up ahead was the dining hall, and a fair number of Quikk’s crew were inside, perhaps taking advantage of the meal that Edward had clearly abandoned. Already one of the human pirates had met death at the end of an orcish blade and lay slumped over the table with a knife through his skull. Blood streamed down from the wound over his slack face and discolored the bowl of creamy soup where his chin rested.

  The rest, about two dozen men in all, were locked in combat with the orcs. Quikk’s crew had come prepared, and all the men were armed with cutlasses, daggers, and more of those magical bombs like I’d found on the fortress wall. Even outnumbered, they were a formidable group, and they didn’t back down from the fight we brought. It was a scene of absolute chaos as men and orcs clashed.

  One of Drakon’s crew, an orc that had to be nearly eight and a half feet tall and looked like he could bench-press an elephant, stood paralyzed with a massive longsword crafted out of bone and edged with some creature’s fangs raised above his head to strike. As purple sparks of magic fizzled over his body, the human pirate who’d stunned him slipped back into the fray.

  With a quick look around, I reached out and placed my hand against the mighty orc’s back and used a bit of my own mana to break the enchantment. It was like pressing play on a video, and as soon as my magic counteracted the paralysis, the orc continued the downward swing of his great sword and slammed the blade into the long dining table. The table cracked beneath the blow, food splattered out, and bits of crystal and porcelain from the tableware shattered.

  The orcs around us paused for a beat, distracted, then cheered all at once. One of the orcs grabbed the human he’d been fighting and flung him onto the slope of the broken table, then hollered something in another language before he threw himself on top of the man in an elbow drop.

  Another cheer went up from the surrounding orcs as the human pirates desperately tried to rally themselves. A red-haired man with a short sword lunged at me sloppily, and I stepped back out of his range as I summoned my own mana blade. The man blinked in confusion at the sight of the magical dagger, but then he bared his teeth and came at me again, his sword aimed at my abdomen.

  I dodged and drove my mana blade into the side of his neck, which was just the easiest place for me to reach at the moment, but with a weapon like mine, where I hit didn’t really matter. The man’s mana flared up the moment the blue light of my dagger touched his skin, and it seemed to explode inside of him as he shuddered and then swayed and fell onto me and exhaled his final breath into my face. My stomach lurched at the stench of infection and blood, and I stumbled back as I let the pirate’s body fall to the floor.

  I had barely regained my balance when there was a sharp whistle overhead, and a fireball the size of a grapefruit whizzed inches away from the top of my head before it slammed into the chest of another of the human pirates.

  I whirled around to see Emeline standing on top of a table across the room. Her veins were lit up with the fiery orange of her mana as she prepared to cast another spell, and she moved almost like a dancer as she sent out another fireball. When I caught her eye, I gave her a thumbs-up, and she waved.

  On my left, Aerin swung her axe in a gleaming arc that connected with one of the pirate’s ribs, and he collapsed with a spluttering choke. Behind her, Lavinia had resorted largely to smacking the pirates around her with her bow when they got too close for her to line up a shot, but she attacked with such verve that I was sure the hits were just as effective as her arrows.

  A cloud of rainbow-hued smoke to my right gave an indication of Lena’s location and the pirates who’d been unfortunate enough to get too close to the multicolored vapor staggered back with heaving coughs as tears streamed down their grimy faces. Maruk, the lower half of his face protected by one of Lena’s scarves, was waiting to take advantage of our opponents’ incapacitation and drove his shield into the chest of one of the pirates with such force that the man’s ribs cracked and his chest caved in like a broken eggshell.

  I moved forward and pushed my dagger between the remaining pirate’s shoulder blades, and he convulsed as the mana exploded within his body and he finally crumpled to the floor. It wasn’t until after I pulled my knife out of his back and turned to face the next opponent that I realized there were no more human pirates left alive in the dining room.

  Drakon and the rest of his crew had started up what I guessed was some sort of victory chant though I couldn’t understand the words. A few of them salvaged what they could of the abandoned meal and threw back goblets of wine and tore chunks of meat away from the suckling pig. The orcs laughed and cheered and hit each other on the back as they took a moment to revel in our victory, but I knew we didn’t have time to celebrate just yet. We still needed to find Edward, and now that the chaos of the battle had ended, I noticed something else, as well.

  Quikk’s ship had been fairly large, and I would have expected a larger crew than just these men here and the three that we’d killed in the city. I didn’t know what Quikk himself looked like, but none of the dead pirates around us now seemed to have the trappings of a captain. I was willing to bet the fight wasn’t over just yet.

  “We need to go,” I said, though I practically had to shout to be heard above Drakon’s crew. Still, when I spoke, the orc captain turned to me with his eyebrows raised. “I don’t think this is all of them.”

  “Didn’t draw enough blood yet, eh?” Drakon asked with a broad grin. “Ha, I like you.” He turned to Maruk and wagged his finger. “See how eager your friend is to kill? That’s how a warrior behaves.”

  Maruk rolled his eyes, but before he or I could correct Drakon about my bloodlust, the orc captain cracked his knuckles.

  “You’re right, though, there are more, I know these men,” he said sagely. “Captain’s not here, and he’s probably got another couple dozen or so with him wherever he is.”

  As per Aerin’s promise, we let Drakon and his crew keep the loot from the dead pirates in exchange for sparing the city and helping us find Edward. Given that all they had on them were battered old swords and a few coins, I figured it was a fair trade, but I noticed the way Aerin chewed her lip whenever on
e of the orcs pocketed a bit of gold and wondered if she regretted having made that offer.

  “Don’t worry,” I whispered to her as we waited for the orc pirates to finish taking what they wanted from the dead. “Yvaine will pay us well, and we still have that bounty for the scrolls from the ogre’s keep.”

  “I know, I know,” she replied.

  When Drakon and his crew had taken all the weapons and valuables from Quikk’s men, we regrouped in the main hall where Rezo greeted us. He had decided to wait outside once the orcs had moved on to harvesting trophies of ears and teeth, and he still looked a bit pale.

  “I’ve only been here once before,” he said, “but I remember that Edward had a safe room hidden behind a panel in his library. Assuming the pirates didn’t get to him first, I’m sure that’s where he would be.”

  “Great,” I replied, “we’ll look there first. Do you know how to get to the library from here?”

  Rezo nodded, then with a nervous glance to the horde of orcs behind me, turned and began to lead the way down the desolate halls. There were signs at least that Quikk’s crew had been through here, vandalism, smoldering sections of carpet, and a few bodies of unfortunate guards, but we saw no more living men as Rezo took us through the palace. As we came to the top of a staircase, Rezo turned back to me.

  “The library is through those doors,” he said quietly.

  Before I could respond, there was a loud crash from behind the library doors, as though something incredibly heavy had fallen over. At once, a chorus of angry shouts started up, though they were silenced just as quickly a moment later by a commanding voice.

  Behind me, Drakon made a low, growling sound in his throat. “That’s Quikk.”

  He started to move forward, and wary that the orcs were about to lead another charge, I held up my hand to signal for them to wait. Drakon paused and regarded me with a curious look, but if my boldness offended him, he was at least willing to hear me out.

  “They may have captives,” I said quietly. “Edward, the others. We need to be careful that we don’t accidentally attack them.”

  Drakon smirked as though he found my concerns trivial, but he didn’t argue. He gestured toward the doors. “Lead the way.”

  With my guild, Rezo, and about three dozen orcs behind me, I started for the door. Under different circumstances, I might have tried to maintain the element of surprise a bit longer, might have gone for a stealthier approach, but that wasn’t really necessary here. As crude as Drakon’s charge and slaughter method was, he and his crew had the sheer power they needed to make it effective. I considered trying to stun Quikk and his crew with an illusion when we entered, but I realized there wasn’t much I could make the pirates see that was liable to surprise them more than the sudden appearance of our ragtag group and Drakon’s crew.

  I could hear the pirates speaking quietly to one another through the door though even this close it was difficult to make out what they were saying. With a last look back the others to ensure that they were ready, I pushed on the handle.

  The door shifted half an inch, then stopped.

  The voices inside cut off abruptly.

  “It’s blocked,” I whispered.

  Drakon grinned and gestured with a jerk of his head to one of his crew, a mountain of a man with biceps thicker around than my whole body and tusks that curved up to his cheekbones. I couldn’t tell if it was red warpaint that he’d smeared over his face or just blood that he hadn’t bothered to wipe off. He was the one who had wanted to take the dead men’s teeth, and the strap that held his massive sword at his back was decorated with the fangs of innumerable creatures.

  “No way is blocked for Sulla,” Drakon told me with a wink.

  “Who’s there?” someone called from the other side of the door just as Sulla slammed one enormous shoulder against it. The doors shook violently, and someone inside began to protest, but Sulla barely paused before he drove his shoulder into the doors again.

  The doors swung inward, and there was a creak followed by a scream and a terrible crash as the bookcase that had been blocking the doors fell forward onto the pirate that had been standing before it. Books scattered out onto the carpeted floor as the rest of Quikk’s crew scrambled out of the way.

  Just as Drakon had predicted, there were close to two dozen more pirates in the library, including Quikk himself, who was easy to pick out among the rest of his crew due to his long, embroidered coat and wide hat. All were armed with swords, and a few had what appeared to be muskets, though they were somewhat different in design from those I knew from Earth. I wondered briefly if they used some kind of magic to operate instead of gunpowder.

  Between the pirates, tied to a chair, was a man who could only be Edward. He had made it as far as the library, it seemed, but hadn’t been able to escape to his safe room before Quikk caught up to him. He looked to be a few years older than Yvaine, but he shared her pale complexion and dark hair. A purple bruise bloomed on his cheekbone, and he had a bloody nose but otherwise appeared more or less unharmed. It wasn’t difficult to guess why, or why Quikk and his men had bothered to restrain him rather than kill him outright.

  Yvaine had told us that the ring she’d sent us to retrieve was a valuable family heirloom and that she didn’t trust Edward to safeguard it. Obviously, Quikk and his crew knew of the ring’s value, but they must not have been able to find it as easily as they’d hoped when they’d ransacked the palace. We must have burst in on them trying to get Edward to tell them where he’d hidden it, and whether he guessed we were the rescue party or simply assumed that we’d also come to steal the ring, Quikk must have known that we’d need Edward alive, too. After the heartbeat in which the man took in our group, he moved behind Edward and pressed the blade of his sword to the nobleman’s throat.

  “Not another step,” Quikk warned softly, “or I swear to you, I’ll kill him.”

  Chapter 7

  I felt the others shift nervously behind me, but Quikk’s hand was steady as he held his sword beneath Edward’s jaw. Even in the dim light of the library, I could see the beads of sweat that tracked down the nobleman’s face and mingled with the blood that was drying over his broken nose and split lip. Tears of fear and utter panic welled up at the corners of Edward’s gray eyes, and his throat worked against the hard metal edge of the pirate captain’s sword as he fought the urge to swallow.

  My mind raced. We were only a few feet away, but I was sure that Quikk would slit Edward’s throat before any of us could take so much as a step forward. Trying to rush the pirates wasn’t an option. The same went for magic. Quikk had no way of knowing I was a manipulator, but that didn’t exactly work in my favor in this instance. Whatever sort of magical attack he thought I could launch, he’d kill Edward before I could finish casting it. Where did that leave us?

  Quikk was just trying to buy time, I knew that. He knew as well as we did that he and his remaining men would stand no chance against me and my guild and Drakon and his crew once a fight broke out. Right now, he was probably trying to think his way through this temporary stalemate just like I was, trying to figure out a way to escape with his life if not the ring he’d come for originally.

  On my left, Lavinia still had her bow raised with an arrow aimed at Quikk, and I got an idea. At this range, the archer’s arrow could be faster than Quikk’s hand, but only if he didn’t expect it. Of course, at the moment, that was exactly what he expected. I needed to convince him somehow that we intended to cooperate and still signal to Lavinia when to shoot.

  I raised my hands in a show of compliance, and I saw Drakon stiffen out of the corner of my eye. Silently, I prayed that the orc captain could trust me long enough to wait a few seconds longer.

  “Alright,” I said quietly. I didn’t take my eyes off Quikk, and he watched me with the same unwavering intensity. “We can talk about this.” I chose my next words carefully as I addressed the woman on my right. “Lavinia, let’s not do anything hasty.” I glanced over to the ranger,
then slowly moved my left hand to her shoulder as though I was going to force her to lower her bow.

  “Don’t move.” Quikk tensed at the movement and bared his teeth. “Don’t talk, just put your weapons down.”

  I took a deep breath as I summoned my mana and channeled it through my left hand which still rested on Lavinia’s shoulder. The magic tingled as it coursed down my arm, like the prickle of blood returning after the limb had fallen asleep. I knew that Lavinia would feel it, too, and I knew she would recognize the feeling from the few times that I had used my magic to augment her weapons before. I just hoped she understood that it meant I wanted her to shoot Quikk.

  “I said,” Quikk growled, “put your weapons dow--” The final word was cut off as Lavinia’s mana-infused arrow pierced his skull directly between his eyes, and the pirate captain fell. With that, the tense deadlock ended, and all hell broke loose.

  Drakon and his crew surged forward, and the remaining men of Quikk’s crew scrambled to meet them. As the ring of swords and shouts of men filled the air, I rushed forward to Edward.

  “Who the hell are you?” he asked breathlessly as I began to cut away his bindings with Quikk’s sword.

  “My name is Gabriel,” I answered. “Your cousin Yvaine hired my guild to get a ring from you. Looks like we got here just in time.”

  “I’m certainly glad you weren’t delayed along the way,” the man replied shakily.

  “Can you fight?” I asked as I cast a glance at the battle raging around us.

  “What?” Edward looked aghast.

  “I’ll take that as a no, then,” I replied, but I handed him Quikk’s sword, anyway. Better that he wasn’t completely defenseless. “Stay back.”

  Just then, I heard the report of a musket across the room and turned as a flash of green light exploded from the barrel of another pirate’s gun.