Lightnings Daughter, Mary Herbert [year 7 reading list .TXT] 📗

Her shriek filled the small room. Somewhere in the shreds of her consciousness a tiny spark of self-survival remained and guided her hand to the door latch. The gorthling reached his clawed hand for the oil lamp on the table. Instantly he flung the lamp at the woman as she wrenched the door open with a desperate heave and fled screaming down the corridor.

The oil lamp smashed against the wooden door, its oil bursting into flames on the wood and running in fiery rivulets down to the floor. The gorthling curled his lips in malicious glee, then he turned his eyes to Branth.

The clansman had not moved. His face was racked in fear and pain; his hand and lower arm were in bloody shreds. Stil he could not force himself to move against the horror of the gorthling.

The creature stopped growing the moment he burst out of the cage, and now he crouched like a big cat on the table, clutching Branth's arm. "Where did you learn your spell, Sorcerer?" the gorthling rasped.

Branth shook violently at the sound of the dry, vicious voice. He gasped an answer and pointed to the book on the table.

The gorthling looked. "The Book of Matrah? No wonder you failed." He cackled. "Who are you?"

The sorcerer forced himself to answer, "Lord. . . Branth of Clan Geldring."

"A clansman. You would be. Only clansmen have ever called for my kind." He sank his claws deeper into Branth's arm. "Where are we?"

Branth whimpered. "A palace. In Pra Desh."

"You are not in your own land. Why is that, little chieftain?”

"I was exiled."

"Oh ho!" the gorthling sneered. "Your people have banished you. How sad. Perhaps I shal change that. It might be interesting to visit your clans." He laughed, the sound as bitter and raw as acid.

The creature's laugh was more than Branth could bear. He col apsed to his knees, sobbing and shrieking for mercy.

"Mercy!" the gorthling screeched. "I know nothing of mercy. But I know that you, little chieftain, are mine!"

Without warning, the creature sprang for Branth's face. The man fell over backward onto the stone floor, gibbering in terror and clawing at the thing on his head. The beast clung with grim determination.

Smoke swirled about them, and the gorthling's eyes blazed in the light of the fire.

The gorthling's body began to pulse again with a lurid red glow. The being forced Branth's mouth open. The Geldring shrieked one last time in despair before he fell deathly still. Inch by inch the gorthling worked his way into Branth's mouth. The creature looked out once from between the chieftain's teeth and chuckled with satisfaction, then the man's mouth snapped shut and the gorthling disappeared from sight.

The room was quiet except for the crackle of the fire on the burning door. The fire had spread across the floor and now touched the pile of straw on Branth's pallet. The flames leaped higher. Smoke swirled out into the corridor.

Within Branth's body, the gorthling began his metamorphosis. Swiftly the creature melded his form into the sorcerer's body, joining his life to Branth's heart, muscle, and bone in a symbiosis that could be broken only by death. Once the union was complete, the gorthling had total control of the man's body and brain.

In the process, Branth's soul was destroyed. The gorthling stripped his victim's mind of all thoughts, memories, and dreams and inserted his own cunning and intel igence. As Branth's brain was emptied, the gorthling retained a very superficial knowledge of the chief’s memories and emotions.

One emotion in particular caught the gorthling's interest: hatred. There was a vestige of a very powerful hatred and resentment for one particular magic-wielder. Unfortunately, the gorthling could not clearly understand the jumbled human memory. Perhaps in time he would learn the identity of that magic-wielder. For now the gorthling had other things to think about.

Branth's body flinched and jerked upright. The gorthling opened his eyes. Branth's normal arrogant gaze was gone, consumed with his mind and soul. In its place was a glint of inhuman evil.

The gorthling stood up, slowly testing the muscles of the new form he had invaded. Other than the injured hand, which the gorthling could heal over time, the body was basical y fit and healthy. The creature grinned. In his normal shape, the gorthling had no power of his own, only the ability to enhance other forms of power. However, once he tasted blood, he was able to inhabit a mortal body and add his powers to the new host's own abilities. This body had potential, especially with its inherent ability to wield magic. A great deal of damage could be done to this world before anyone became aware of his true identity.

First, though, the gorthling had to find out more about the people who lived here. In the immortal world beyond the realm of the dead, he had been distantly aware of this world and the human beings who trampled the earth. He had noted the course of their history in a faint, disinterested fashion, paying only slightly more attention to the clanspeople who had the unique ability to wield magic---a talent granted to them by Valorian, the Hero-Warrior and rumored half-human son of the goddess, Amara.

Only a magic-wielder could have called the gorthling to the mortal world, and only a magic-wielder could sent him back. If he was going to stay here in this big, powerful body, he would have to find all of the clan sorcerers and destroy them. Particularly the one that caused his host, Branth, such hatred. That magic-wielder had piqued the gorthling's curiosity.

Something crashed behind the gorthling, causing him to whirl around. The wooden door was lying on the floor, consumed in flames. The gorthling looked around at the spreading fire. Usually fire did not bother him, but this body did not like it; the creature coughed and drew back from the heat.

Then he remembered the woman. She had been standing by