Shadows & Sorcery #210
This one came upon me quite quickly! I had some titles laying around that I suddenly thought would work together pretty well. And work together they did, and pretty well, too, I think. There’s a tale to be told in our high fantasy, high adventure Dragonmagick world, and we’re gonna come in on three key moments of battle between steel, magic, and wills.
Next week, by the way, will be the next chapter of The Path of Poison! I wanted to hit S&S #210 followed immediately by TPoP #40, because it seemed nice. Make sure to keep up to date with Sepp and the gang over here!
Missed last week’s S&S, or just signed up, or wanna read it again? Check it out here! It had a 3k word short story and some dank lore, it was a good one.
This week, the agent Kastaine uncovers a plot concerning Dragon Iron, the sorcerer Alzared delves into the city’s depths in search of the Enchanters of the Sword, and the allies team up to do battle with the Sword of Sorcerers…
Dragon Iron
Castlegrand, the tarnished golden crown of humanity. Kings, Parliaments, Communarchs, Magistrates, Knighthoods, and Councillors had all ruled, led, and squandered its beetling towers in their time, each leaving their own dent. But no matter what, it was mankind’s, built by their hands and maintained by the same, and it would only ever be human hands that placed it upon human brows.
Kastaine had been raised in the aged winding streets of the city of humanity. He had spent his youth upon the ragged, sun-drenched stones, amidst the hazy, snaking alleys, and then, clad in its colours and steel as a soldier holding the line against draconian incursions, dragonspawn assaults, and losing an arm in the defence of an ailing hamlet to a tusked wyrm. But rest never came to the warrior, for in a primordial vault did an ancient king’s tomb grant him a gift and a duty: an arm of spectral kingsmail to replace his own, weightless, swift as wind, and unbreakable, so that his fire might continue to contend with that of the dragons. And so as an agent of Castlegrand had he continued the fight amongst the furthest reaches of humanity, his ideals driving his steel. It seemed as if not a corner of the overworld didn’t see the shadow of the old masters and the old enemy. Now, however, black talons closed about the city of man as fangs flashed with flickering flames in the darkness.
It was at a waterfront along the broad span of a sparkling river where humans came from far and wide to travel and trade. It never slept, not really, but once the sun attained its meridian, the clamour and bustle would rival that of a marching army. Must have been a damned fine task of keeping it in order, Kastaine had thought. But right now, it was far from empty, and far from silent. Pikemen and bowmen in the green and grey of Castlegrand rushed in behind blade-bearing brawlers, there were even a few steelfolk captains, with their distinct angular heads, leading charges. In the midst of it, burly sailors with swords of rugged human bronze put up a hell of a defence, but were outnumbered and outmatched.
At first, it was mysterious shipments of unexplained chests at odd hours that had turned a few heads, but after that, it was the money passed to hush it up that had drawn real suspicion. In truth, all kinds passed through these docks, but it was thievery, banditry, and sundry goods paid for in spilt blood that really brought down wrath against it. Kastaine had argued at first this raid was council business, not his. But the second the smuggler captain unsheathed a serpent steel sword, he understood why he had been called back.
The venomous blade short forth, its winding, wicked edge aimed directly at the throat of a young swordsman--a mere recruit amidst the veteran guard. Were it not for the coiled wire limbs of the agent, the young fellow would have met a grislier end than most deserve. Kastaine knocked the blade aside and threw himself in front of the swordsman with a barked “get back, lad!”. He eyed this smuggler captain. He’d seen the type before in other places. Brash, violent, given to darker impulses. No one with serpent steel was ever all talk. Kastaine knew how to throw his weight around just right. He fought one-armed, hiding his kingsmail, it made his enemies underestimate him, and might be worked to throw them off balance. His blade was heavy, a short slab of true steel forged for heavy, disarming blows against foes as big as him, and enough to cleave through anything bigger. He dodged and weaved the fearsome strikes--she was no braggart, that was for sure. She was in command because she could kill quick, and bloody. Strikes never came in one at a time, always two--even flurries of three, and he had to duck low and bend as far as his limbs could take him to defend. In return, he threw out short, sharp swings and thrusts that resounded against the serpent steel and up into the captain’s arms. He needed to be quick. He met a flurry of strikes upon either flat of his sword, swatting each one as it came in, a few swipes coming perilously close to his flesh. One sting, and the pain would force him to use his kingsmail, but a swift backswing into the edge of the serpent steel sword ripped it from the captain’s grip, sending it skidding across the damp stone.
In a flash, he was in with his shoulder and a high strike through the ribs. The captain fell, coughing blood. The others had seen. Curses flew in the air, and the tide turned. Spears, daggers, and axes clattered as the guards moved in. Kastaine went to retrieve his blade, but stopped. The captain’s eyes fluttered as death came, but words emerged from behind her vicious smirk. “Too late,” was all she said. He wrenched his blade out and spun around. “There! That way!” came the desperate cries as a steelfolk warrior thundered into the winding alleys with a cadre of human fighters behind them. Kastaine let out a ragged sigh. Damn it anyway. He needed a second. He strode over to a guard captain. They exchanged one look before throwing open one of the great chests they had caught.
He knew it the second he saw it. Dragonblood. But that wasn’t all. What had the others escaped with? It had looked, for all the world, the captain said, like a blacksmith’s mold, for a weapon. A mold, Kastaine echoed. But not the blood. That implied a bit too much.
The greyfolk had steel, silver, and stone--their namesakes, and the materials through which their Arts were expressed. Humans had concocted a metal they called bronze, a lustrous, tough, but temperamental and unreliable metal. Much like its users, perhaps. Dragons, however, they had a black metal forged out of their crimson innards they called iron. It was rare. The kind of rare mankind had old, old legends about, the kind of rare greyfolk balked at upon even hearing about. Kastaine was not too deeply versed in draconic lore, truth be told, but he didn’t need to be to understand the profound peril at play here.
He looked about as he thought. The countless streams which ran from the Steel Summits at the top of the world met sometimes with the numberless meltwater rivers which came from the ice belt in the middle of the world, the ice belt that divided the land of grey and man from that of dragon. Had it come from there? It was the most likely answer, across scores of vessels in the night, in the fog. Or had it come from below? From burrowing wyrms, or caravans of draconians in primal caverns, or even from black shadows soaring high above in the clouds, descending come nightfall? The very thought made him shudder, unlikely as it was. But no matter. The chase was on. They’d know soon enough.
Enchanters of the Sword
How the agent had found him, Alzared couldn’t even begin to hazard a guess, but then, he supposed, that was the fellow’s profession. Not too long ago, they’d worked together in the capture of a Castlegrand traitor, and odd business it had been. But he had gained the man’s measure, and had vowed to himself that should their paths cross again, it would be as true equals. He was glad that Kastaine had thought first to seek out the sorcerer.
Alzared had only ever passed through Castlegrand a few times in his life. Truth be told, he avoided it if he could. The sorcerer was a man of the free wilds, born in the ice, he was a savage to these people, no matter his dress, bearing, or learning. It had been as much a help as it had been a hindrance in times past. And now, here he was, far beneath beetling Castlegrand of old, amidst its dank tangle of forgotten caves and lost dungeons where thieves, killers, and hidden secrets could dwell. Aye, this was more in line with the sorcerer’s temperament.
His dragonblood sceptre had been restless ever since he stepped through the towering city gates. He assumed the blood was simply reacting to all these human lives to whose ancestors it had once been god and master. But by the time he came to the time-worn passage into the city’s underbelly, it was writhing. According to the agent, great jars stained black with dragonblood had been found amongst a smuggler’s cargo--dragonblood! He hadn’t believed a word of it, not because he doubted his friend’s expertise, but because this was Castlegrand. Any draconic blood, spawn or otherwise, would have been sniffed out by the city’s magicians. But curse it all, he went from belief to full well knowing the deeper he went. The signs showed themselves clear as ice. The blood in his sceptre all but made way for his passage, answering to his demands for light and flame almost before he even thought of them.
He could afford not even a moment’s hesitation. They were on him the second he reached the final step, spitting curses, and flinging mage darts of steel. Neither cheap nor easy to commission, the thought flashed through his mind. They could return after being thrown, and often were the last resort of magicians, scholars, and others not trained in battle arts, rather than an opening volley. That told him a lot. Bringing up his sceptre, a spiral of flame whirled about him, scattering the shimmering steel spikes against the dungeon walls, reverberating as they sought to return to their owner’s hands. As the fire cleared and he stepped into the chamber proper, however, he was met four flashing daggers held in hands whose arms, and bodies, were clad in what anyone would have considered ostentatious finery. He almost laughed as he prepared to defend himself. Scions of some old noble line, unable to contain themselves, seeking rule, was it? As puppets, if what his gut told him was true. Swinging his hand out in an arc before him, a wall of sheer mental force held the daggers at bay, their points clanging off a wall that was not there. They fell back, shaken. He wouldn’t allow them another chance. One hefty dagger came down, a ring of wyrmstrength behind it, which would have sent a crack through most weapons or shields sent to block it, but this was met with a sweeping conjured blade of dragonmagick that shattered the dagger into four separate pieces. Alzared scoffed as they fell back. Clumsy, counterfeit imitations of greyfolk arts, their designs pilfered from old libraries and righteous grimoires, and paid for in mouldering old coin to back alley steelsmiths. This cabal of traitorous nobles and would-be dragonmagicians hadn’t expected anything like the sorcerer and his dragonblood sceptre of purest silver.
He would have laid them low, and perhaps would even have made these pathetic specimens beg, had the serpent-man not revealed itself. And if that didn’t change things, then the great stone sarcophagus of unmistakable human make steaming with livid dragonblood certainly did. One sweep of his sceptre and there issued a monstrous growl, a white flash, and the cowering nobles were reduced to streaks of ash under the dripping stalactites. The serpent-man eyed him, its black slits focusing as one taloned hand was slowly extended, and the other was thrust into the blood. Serpent-men didn’t die easily. He’d have to be smart about this. And yet, the sorcerer felt compelled to watch. He knew he was seeing something here he had never seen before. The hand emerged, raining long tendrils of black blood, but it held something--heavens, it was a sword, black like the blood from which it was drawn. The muscles in the sorcerer’s arm had merely twitched when a great gale of black smoke erupted from a flick of the serpentine wrist. Alzared fell back, choking, the sceptre barely creating a leaking bubble around him. That was stupid, he thought, and growled. He cursed, and knew it was futile to give chase. Serpent-men did not die easily, and they were swifter in retreat than in battle, too. This was, for now, its domain.
A smuggling ring, four dead nobles, a serpent-man, a blade of iron forged in secret dragonblood--raw, potent, unbowed stuff, too. Aye, a picture was beginning to form. This needn’t be a loss, but for it to be an advantage, to the surface he must return as fast as human feet could carry him.
Sword of Sorcerers
Under the magisterial dome of Hearing Chamber of the High Council of Castlegrand, once a throne room, storehouse, senate, and more, the warrior Kastaine burst in on two figures circling each other, wounded, breathless, the great and terrible powers in their hands straining at their leashes to fly forth and destroy. Alzared had cornered their prey, as well as two councillors who grovelled in a corner, and a third who lay dead. Kastaine had heard the battle from outside the building, and it was his voice alone that held the sorcerer back.
“These snivelling fools,” the noble assassin said, glance thrown to the councillors, “have grown distant and complacent in their long age of rule. They are slow to act, and are imbalanced when they do. The folk are left to fend for themselves more often than not, looking to people like me for aid where their governors grant them none!”
“Aye, you’re right,” Kastaine said, stepping forth. “Their favour falls by the day. Even I, who fights at their behest, will admit to that. But this... Mankind will never learn if we just run to the greyfolk for aid at every bad turn, and we certainly won’t if we crawl back to the dragons!”
“Damn it all,” the noble shook with anger, “we’re not the helpless savages of the past! But we can’t hold our own fractured as we are, always living under two shadows. We need a return to order, and it needn’t be as slaves.”
“What is a dragon to you?” came Alzared’s voice, dripping with venom. “A story? A symbol? Something from old myths, painted in a fear you no longer feel?”
“A challenge! A mark to meet! What we can do proves that!”
“And what of the greyfolk, then?” Kastaine asked.
“They’ll never see us as anything but stumbling children. We can’t meet them, but the dragons...”
“The grey ones may have left their mark on your flesh,” Alzared intoned, “but we left ours on your hearts. Do you know who said that to me?”
The assassin was silent, his brow furrowed.
“A dragon. And it was right. A second hasn’t passed where this blood in my hand hasn’t wanted to tear you asunder, and I’ve wanted to let it. But I didn’t.”
“You speak like you’re so above it all, but you need their power just as much as the rest of us.”
“I’ve tasted their ire a dozen times over, and returned it just as well. And it was because I’m human. Only in humankind can the arts of the ancients come together. Living in shadows,” Alzared spat, “listen to yourself, as if our place in this world is so helpless, as if we aren’t free of the duty of grey blood, or of a power so immense it threatens to crush if not expressed!”
The assassin’s eyes darted, seeking an answer.
“Then why are we so fractured?” came his cracking voice.
“Because we are FREE! Uncertainty is the wager we make to become greater!”
“Your cabal are dead,” said Kastaine, standing straight, “and I don’t see you running this little would-be empire alone. Set down that blade and the worst you’ll be is clapped in irons while cooler heads consider your fate.”
“My fate...” the noble’s voice trembled. “So I’m a slave either way, in your eyes...” Whether he spoke with anger or despair, they couldn’t tell. “You want me to make a choice? So be it.”
The noble’s feet seemed as if lifted from the ground, and he leapt forth, the black blade crackling with a white lightning crackling about its edge, trailing in the air as he flew. Alzared caught the very point of it upon the orb of dragonblood at the head of his sceptre, though it sent him skidding back. Alzared looked up to see streaks of the same white lightning chasing him, he brought up the grip of his sceptre around which they twisted and writhed before he cast them aside. He drew then the blood’s power to his eye, readying a dragon’s glare of death--he’d had just about enough. But the blood didn’t agree. He could feel its words, “you’re pleased he’s fighting, you don’t hate him, you won’t get this”. With a growl, Alzared ripped the stone flooring up in a cracked wall billowing dust. It’d give him a second.
But second came and went with the tearing through the stone of the black iron blade, the noble’s red-ringed eyes peering through the dust. Alzared could see it up close here. It was all of one piece, with a broad, straight blade, with an elliptical body emerging from a rounded, coiled handguard out of which two short sort of curved horns or spikes jut. One handed. Light, easy to swing. Much of it seemed rounded, belying its organic origin. Elegant and fearsome, brimming with savage yet focused might. Like the kind of dragon whose power beguiled human minds. Which probably had beguiled this noble’s mind. And if it came even a hair’s breadth closer, it would be the end of him. The man had chosen to fight, and unlike so many of these fools before, he had the skill to back it all up. A small part of Alzared admired that, in some way, as he scrambled to think of a defense he was sure would even work in this moment. But if it must die, it wouldn’t be so bad to die at the hands of real conviction.
He all but saw the blade meet his flesh, yet in the whirling dust, there was a deep, resounding clangour as like a bell muffled by ocean waves, and the sorcerer saw the sword, stopped in mid air. It wasn’t his dragonblood sceptre reaching out. It was a limb of spectral armour, and it pulled the sword up and outwards. Alzared fell back, watching Kastaine push the black blade forward, the noble’s eyes wide with fright as the sound of tearing metal roared, the iron sword bending, blood spurting from the rents, before snapping in half in a dripping crimson cloud, the broken shard thrust into the noble’s throat and Kastaine’s own great slab of a sword sent through the chest.
The dust and blood settled.
“So much,” Alzared said with a ragged breath, “for cooler heads.”
“I know, damn it,” Kastaine rumbled, “but we wouldn’t have learned much anyway. His conspirators, if any even survive, will dissolve back into their little circles and get found out soon enough. A high councillor lays dead, after all. And you,” he strode over to the others who had stayed in their corner to watch the battle, “you and the rest of this council, take heed. He was right. This is what you get. Not a corner of Castlegrand will be quiet about this for months on end! If you don’t want more knights, communarchs, lords, and would-be masters at your throats, learn your lesson. Don’t let the height of these walls fool you.”