ALL NOVEL Chapter 109: Ambush
Serune sailed the waves around the world but no land did they find. They made new friends along the way, each a strange new kind.
Whales and fish and birds and men, the new ship loves to see them all.
And one day after long years they found and made landfall.
The Sea Tree by Stelar Leafblossom
—
They halted at Rakin’s signal, but then Kole heard a mutter and felt the veil between realms split as someone drew upon the Font of Sound, but just as quickly as it appeared, he felt it vanish. Ahead Zale had spun to face the source and channeled the power of the Sound spell into her own Font of Void.
Behind him, by the caravans, he heard the cracking booms of three more Thunderwaves, firing in rapid succession.
Zale ran towards the source of the magic, while Rakin drew out his stone batons in a defensive pose, keeping himself between Amara and the unseen threat.
Ahead of them, bracketing them in a semi circle six furry dog-like figures rose from the grass.
“Gnolls!” Amara shouted, unhelpfully.
But, more helpfully she had her blasting rod drawn and followed the statement with a blast at the nearest of the six, missing narrowly
Kole sent his own blast after her, towards the source of the sound magic, striking his own target before Zale reached it. He felt it drawing on the Font of Sound once more, but it was looking at the group of them, and not Zale who was charging it.
While Kole trusted Zale, he didn’t know if she had it in her to counter a second spell, and he shoved Amara aside as he shouted, “Spell!”
Doug and Rakin leapt away themselves, but they weren’t as quick to react, and the bone-rattling explosion of sound that rang out around them send them both to their knees clutching their heads.
Before the sound robbed Kole of his hearing, he heard a battle raging behind them at the caravan. A glance as he dove showed the supply wagons had been filled with soldier ants, which were now locked in battle with their own pack of gnolls.
We have just the worst timing. He reflected
As everyone else recovered, Zale continued her charge at the Sound-attuned caster. Two warriors moved to intercept her, but she vanished into motes. They spun around looking for her, but when she didn’t immediately reappear, they broke for the rest of the group.
Kole smiled at their mistake and sent another blast at the lead one to draw their attention. His bolt hit home, causing the gnoll to take a staggering step, but they continued on with only more eagerness.
Zale reappeared behind them a moment after, and unseen by the two she’d just bypassed, decapitated the surprised caster before he could finish whatever spell he was chanting.
Rakin recovered first, even before Amara, who had only been knocked down, and he ran to meet the enclosing gnolls. Five remained, but at the shout of surprise the caster let out, two more that had not yet reached the group made their way for Zale.
Doug’s arrow took one of them in the shoulder, causing it to drop his club, and Zale pounced on the opening, downing it in a rapid flurry of slashes, even as its companion landed a clubbed blow on her armored back.
“Get that one!” Rakin shouted to Amara, gesturing to one of the gnolls that were closing in on them, separate from the two engaging from the caster. Amara got to her feet, and sent another blast at the indicated target, this time striking it square in the chest. The blast didn’t fell it, but the one Kole sent at it next did.
Rakin engaged his two targets, nimbly ducking the clumsy swings of their clubs, landing his own more deft punches as occasion permitted. Zale was locked in battle with her second foe, with Doug risking shots whenever he saw an opening.
Having seen Amara’s aim—or lack thereof—Kole coached her to wait.
“Rakin will maneuver himself behind them, then fire,” Kole said, and then took advantage of one such moment, Amara following.
Both blows stuck the same gnoll in the back, killing it, and with only one left Rakin pummeled it to submission in an all-out flurry of blows.
By the time he was done, wiping blood off his fists, Zale was coming back to the group.
“We need to go before that battle ends,” she said pointing to the still raging gnoll-on-ant battle around the wagons.
Kole couldn’t make out all her words over the ringing in his ears, but he got the gist of it, and they all ran through the plains, keeping low in the grass until the caravan was far out of sight.
“What in the Waas’ sky is going on here?” Zale asked once they were far and away.
Kole was taken aback by the mention of the deity the elves abandoned.
Catching his look, Zale asked, “What?”
“It’s nothing, I just didn’t know you followed Waas.”
“Ye don’t need to follow a god to curse in their name,” Rakin put in.
“It wasn’t a curse,” Zale defended. “It was a plea. I do worship Waas. I just don’t talk about it a lot.”
“What’s weird about that?” Doug asked.
“The elves in general, don’t like Waas,” Amara answered.
“And Zale’s mother—historically and publicly—had opinions about the gods in general, and Waas in particular,” Kole said, filling in the rest.
Zale sighed, heavily.
“She’s come around about that, even before I was born. But, I…” she paused, chewing her lip. “Have an uncle—“
Kole and Rakin groaned.
“Of course you do.”
“But this one’s more of a great uncle!” Zale amended hastily. “Mom called him uncle growing up. My grandpa was Waas’ Chosen, and he had—“
“The Sword of Igan!?” Kole questioned excitedly, cutting her off as he recalled the famous blade from his recent reading of Deckard’s Compendium of Ensouled Artifacts. The blade was an ensouled artifact created by one of Waas’ Chosen, but in creating the weapon from his soul stone, he inadvertently Bound Waas’ celestial to it as well.
The Wardens, in their constant battle to imprison Faust within the planet, didn’t have the power to spare to empower chosen as the other gods and demi-gods could. Instead, they commissioned their celestial servants to Pact with one they deemed worthy. A Pact that—apparently—connected on a soul level.
“Yeah…” Zale confirmed. “My mom called the celestial ‘Uncle Windy Pants’ as a kid.”
“Trish, the Queen of Ice, and possible killer of monarchs, called a celestial messenger of a god Uncle Windy Pants?” Kole asked, dumbfounded.
“It’s actually really in character if ye know her,” Rakin said.
“Yeah, but that’s not the point of all this. When my Willsight developed, I could see him, and he taught me about Waas as I grew up. I found her teachings to my liking.”
“Back to my original question,” Zale said, brushing aside the revelation she might be the inheritor of a weapon of legend. “What’s going on here? Mage slayer spiders kidnapping primals is one thing—a big thing, but you know, a thing—but an army of ant men, gnolls, a magic road. This is a lot.”
“Aye,” Rakin agreed. “And, I didn’t sense any Earth magic from that battle. The ants might ta used that road, but they didn’t make it—or they’re dumb, and just let those gnolls kill ‘em. The road felt a lot like that armor. Not magical, but made by earth magic.”
“So,” Kole said, counting on his fingers. “We have weird ant people, a gnoll tribe raiding the ant people, and then the spiders raiding the school. How is any of this connected?”
No one had an answer, but as often happened, speaking about the problem served to gather his thoughts.
“These strange creatures are probably from another realm,” Kole said, earning no objections as he listed what they already knew, or at least suspected. “The creatures that appeared on campus have all been loosely related to whatever environment the dungeon had created last. It seems like these creatures are using the dungeon as a vector into our realm. The dimensional membranes of pocket realms are weaker than that of the Material Realm’s, and who even knows what the dungeon is.”
“But what about the spiders?” Doug asked. “Mage slayers are from Kaltis.”
“And who made the road?” Rakin added.
“I have no idea,” Kole confessed.
“So, basically, we know nothing new,” Rakin summarized.
“Basically,” Kole confirmed.
As they spoke, they’d been walking through the empty prairie, but at some point during their conversation the grass had ended, replaced with dried craggy earth and stone.
“Guys,” Rakin said, interrupting. “Look up.”
They did and saw the dual moons gone, replaced with the floating chunks of land that filled the sky.