Tartarus Beckons, Edmund Batara [bts book recommendations .TXT] 📗

darker side of magical learning. Pure evil, when openly displayed, left no doubt as to its essence, but when cloaked or suppressed, could misleadingly appear as dark power.

“There’s an evil taint in it, sire. But just a tinge. Then again, arriving at a conclusion about energy which was purposely hid is impossible when the source is as formidable as that one,” replied Kobu. “I could only hope treachery and other dangers do not rear their ugly heads.”

“Well, we just need to make sure of that, shouldn’t we? Keep an extremely vigilant eye on that one for me, Kobu. We need him, but not to the extent that I would hesitate in ending Alal’s existence if it comes to that,” answered Tyler emphatically.

The strange journey through Labiru’s passageway was uneventful. But the sides of the corridor shone with an unearthly light, a phenomenon which resulted in Tyndur’s repeated warnings not to touch the walls. It took the party roughly ten minutes to traverse the pathway, a trip made ridiculously tiresome with the einherjar’s continually shouted advice not to touch the stinking walls! and variations of the theme. At least, the einherjar had the sense not to use vulgar words considering that there were ladies present. So, it was with some relief when they finally emerged into a small mesa overlooking the valley where the temple was located.

But for Tyler, two things impressed themselves on his mind as soon as the mage stepped from the exit of the portal and into the open air. One was the sight of a vast host in the valley below, right in front of a huge, weathered stone structure. The second was a feeble magical message which echoed through the ether and clearly meant for him alone. Tyler recognized the greatly weakened and pain-streaked voice as that of Dionysus.

“Havard! Zeus damn you! Where are you? Why won’t you answer?” the gasping and aching voice of the deity weakly shouted. He must have been doing it for a while as a slight rasp could be heard in the tone, observed the mage instinctively.

“I am here, Dio. The Dokkalfr Mountains somehow blocked other magic. What’s wrong?” replied Tyler as an immensely strong sense of dread shot through his body. He suddenly felt weak and empty.

“The Titans! They’ve attacked Maljen Forest! Rumpr is… dead. Gullen unconscious and seriously wounded. I am greatly injured. We couldn’t stop them. Typhoeus, Echidna, and others I didn’t recognize. They’ve taken Eira.”

Chapter Nineteen

Great House Anari

Tyler’s knees buckled, and the mage involuntarily found himself kneeling on the ground. The pain as the flesh and bone smashed against the dragon armor didn’t register. His mind was a swirling mess of confusion, horror, and distress. He could dimly feel the sudden coldness in his bones. The mage was oblivious to anything else as the words of Dionysus kept repeating themselves in his mind.

Eira. Rumpr.

But the mage’s sudden collapse happened so quickly that it caught everyone by surprise. Tyndur and Kobu immediately exchanged concerned glances. The rest of the company rushed to the stricken mage, and even Asag momentarily stopped observing the waiting host below them. The two dokkalfr looked on with worry. The mage might have been their enemy back at the ruins, but Tyler did save their lives and allowed them to survive a seemingly hopeless situation.

As the company gathered around the mage, Tyndur spoke first, leaving Kobu to keep his eyes on the waiting enemy below them.

“What’s wrong, lad? That was a terrible, distressing aura you just released.”

The rest of the companions had the experience and good sense to keep a reasonable distance from the mage, allowing him the needed space to breathe. There, kneeling in a circle of persons he considered friends and comrades, Tyler finally found the strength to look up to Tyndur, a pitiful rictus of pain and desperation marking his face.

“It’s Eira. The Titans took her. Rumpr is dead. Dionysus is gravely injured, and even Gullen is in the same state,” he quietly muttered, every word a dreadfully painful effort on his part. The rest of the group had already met Gullen in her human guise back in the outskirts of Maljen Forest, but they didn’t know that she was one of the few true, ancient dragonlike entities which had moved to Adar at the beginning of the Great Migration.

Tyndur stared at the mage, a much different man from the usually confident person he had come to know. He knew that Tyler’s present condition – emotionally defeated, with the familiar bright spark of certainty gone from his eyes – was a massive shock to everyone. The waiting dokkalfr enemy didn’t matter to the einherjar. All he cared about was how lost his friend appeared. Despite himself, and all the self-control he has assiduously cultivated throughout the millennia, Tyndur felt a wave of blinding anger uncontrollably surge within himself. A righteous and overwhelming fury combined with his hate against the gods for allowing such a thing to happen finally broke like a violent flood upon whatever restraints he had, demolishing them like a bunch of twigs before a raging storm of wind and rain.

Unfortunately, the einherjar’s incredible fury, deafeningly expressed by an enraged shout against the heavens themselves, also called attention to their arrival. Kobu looked at Tyndur with alarm as he noticed that dokkalfr army had visibly stirred. Habrok and Astrid still stood stupefied where they were, deep sadness on their faces replacing the initial shock. With some uneasiness, the exile noticed that Alal the Akkadian had a bizarre smile on his face when the warrior noticed that the enemy finally discovered the presence of the newly arrived group.

Kobu was also stunned by what Tyler said and felt the pain of the mage. He had seen and experienced it before countless times. And the exile knew it would take some time before Tyler would be able to get some sense back into his dazed mind. He hoped anger would rise in the mage, not despondency. It was one of the many lessons he had learned through his