Delver Magic III: Balance of Fate, Jeff Inlo [most popular ebook readers .txt] 📗

Sazar left Tabris in her desert oasis as he returned to Dark Spruce to begin his new grand designs of conquest. He promised the sorceress that he would not take long in culminating his plans into action and fulfilling his part of the bargain. He did not, however, wish to utilize the desert as his base of initial operations. His conquests would begin with the humans, and for that he would drive eastward.

Even as he trekked back through the outskirts of the Lacobian and into the western span of Dark Spruce, Sazar utilized his new found powers to expand his small group of minions into a massive horde. The hook hawk under his control soared over vast regions of the forest. When it spotted small camps of goblin raiding parties, Sazar focused his persuasive will through the gaze of the flying beast. The members of the goblin cluster immediately fell under his spell. Once he gained access to their consciousness, he obtained information on the location of competing goblin packs. He directed his winged monster toward these new locations and his minion army grew as fast as his hook hawk could fly.

He sent his smaller shag into the rocky hills in search of more of its kind. Shags in the area would immediately sense the invader and come out to meet the challenger to protect their territories. The smaller shag would never have to fight the larger and more massive monsters that railed against it. Once the small shag locked its gaze upon the targeted creature, Sazar’s conniving mind would take the will of the monster and another powerful beast would be added to his army. Within days, Sazar controlled over three dozen shags. Their combined destructive strength could destroy a dwarf constructed barricade in a matter of moments. He now had a mobile battering ram capable of dismantling any barrier.

The two gremplings he first tested his powers on also became very useful. These furry almost imp-like creatures bounded through the forest, swinging from tree tops searching for bloat spiders, the perfect nightmares to add an edge of fear to his multitude. After all, in order to be ultimately successful in his plans of conquest, he needed not only to defeat the initial resistance, but to break the will of those he intended on ruling. Bloat spiders were almost too easy to control. They spun thick webs and waited for days for prey. Their minds never focused on anything beyond that. Persuading them to move with his army required little more than the promise of endless prey.

As the serp walked through Dark Spruce, he kept his own eye upon the skies always watching for razor crows and hook hawks. Whenever he spotted one, he immediately placed it under his control and sent it to reconnoiter more and more of the forest. With a murder of razor crows and numerous hook hawks delivering images to his own mind, his awareness of the forest and his perception of the surrounding lands grew to god-like proportions. Secret entrances to dwarf mines, hidden trails to elf camps, and guarded meeting places for the two races became as obvious to him as the full moon in a cloudless night sky.

He moved his horde with precision, keeping the mass spread thin. He no longer needed them near his physical presence to maintain his control of their thoughts, and he used this to his advantage. Ensuring that he would alert no one that he now controlled massive army of countless creatures with varied strengths and abilities, he kept small detachments separated across the vast forest. He would bring them together eventually, but only when he was ready to attack. For that, he needed to move them further eastward and equip his forces for an overwhelming onslaught.

With a desire to make his first assault one of such overwhelming fury, Sazar’s greatest obstacle was arming this vast horde of goblins. Most had some sort of crude weapon when he persuaded them to join his league of minions. For what he had in mind, however, this was not enough. He wanted each goblin to carry a crossbow and a short sword of iron at the bare minimum. He wanted the bolts made of metal as well. The number of goblins he controlled soared into the thousands and equipping them beyond simple daggers or crude clubs proved to be a near impossible task. Though they raided several human outposts and two dwarf underground mining stations, he still had many more goblins than weapons. In the end, he ordered many to construct short bows from tree limbs and to carve wooden arrows from broken branches. Not quite what he first envisioned, but it would be enough, enough to obliterate the defenses of his first target and enough to make it clear that his army was never to be trifled with again.

#

When Linda recommended they take a walk outside Burbon’s walls, she thought the open air would lift Ryson’s spirits. Instead, it only seemed to take his focus further away. As they walked about, Ryson often turned from her and stared out into the distance. She grew tired of looking at his back and so she walked around in front of him and looked him in the eye.

“Alright, enough of this. You’ve been like this for days now. What’s bothering you?” she demanded in a caring yet serious tone.

“It’s hard to explain really.”

“Try.”

“I guess I’m worried about Lief. I’m sure he’s reached the Lacobian by now. I can’t help thinking something might have happened to him.”

“That’s not all of it and I know it,” Linda pressed. “I know you’ve been worried about Lief since you got back. I understand that and we’ve already talked about it a lot. You know you can’t stop him from doing what he wants to do. You even talked to Holli and she thinks he won’t do anything too risky. You agreed that now that he knows this Tabris is with Sazar he’s going to be extra careful. That seemed to make you feel better for about half a day, but then you went right back to moping around again. That has me completely confused because as far as I can tell you’ve accepted the situation as it stands, but something is still eating at you and I want to know what it is.”

“The whole thing is eating at me,” Ryson offered as if hoping that a general statement of concern would suffice.

Linda would not let it stand that way.

“That’s not a big help to either of us. Look, I’m going to keep badgering you until you finally admit it, so you might as well save us both a good deal of aggravation and start talking about it to me instead of keeping it bottled up inside.”

Ryson kicked at the dirt. Part of him wanted to take off in a flash and not deal with what was on his mind, but he knew Linda would simply wait for him to return and she’d be back at it again. She was persistent and so he began to explain.

“For the most part, you’re right. I’m worried about Lief, but it’s not like I really have a choice about stopping him. He made that perfectly clear.”

“So what is it then?”

“It’s about why he said he was going to the Lacobian,” Ryson finally offered. “I’ve been thinking about what Lief said to me. What he’s doing is dangerous, there’s no doubt about that, so there has to be a reason for it. I really think part of why he’s doing it has a great deal to do with his anger over his own camp. But he didn’t explain it that way to me. He gave me some solid reasons for going after Sazar. The thing is that when I think about those reasons, I start wondering.”

He paused and looked over to the southwest. He grew quiet again as his expression turned more sullen.

“Don’t stop now,” Linda insisted. “What is it you’re wondering about?”

“What bothers me most is that he might