The city of Karasar is an ancient city that was built by a people whose name has been long lost to history. They had their rich culture and history ground out of them by the Sorcerer King Ceros. A sorcerer born in the rat ridden filthy streets of lower Karasar. He lived on the streets but rose to become a mighty ruler for over a hundred years, bending the city to his every whim. The people were living in misery until one day a hero by the name of Randolph Thar took up the quest to rid Karasar of its evil king. Randolph searched across the land for a weapon capable of killing the sorcerer and found Feather, the Sword in the Sky. A mysterious sword forged of storm clouds. He returned to the city and slew Ceros, dying in the process. He became a hero for the whole city and freed it from tyranny. The Thar family rose to great renown as warriors and heroes and remained that way for the last fifty years.
That was the story Alphon had been told anyway. That the ornate sword hanging up in his solar was actually Feather, the Sword in the Sky. It was of immaculate craftsmanship, that was certain, but whether or not it was actually magic was hard to determine. He’d taken it to master blacksmiths and asked if they’d be able to make anything like it. They’d grumbled and muttered and claimed that the hilt had too much ornamentation with all the feathers and lightning bolts and such carved into it. They’d go on grumbling and muttering about the weight distribution, the heft, the swing, the tapering, before finally Alphon had managed to drag out of them that no, they couldn’t make anything like it. At least nothing as sharp they said, and nothing that wouldn’t gather dust after hanging on a wall for fifty years.
So maybe it was magical, Alphon had concluded when he’d been younger. But at that age, magical meant it could grant flight, it could shoot lightning, it could cleave a house in two. He had been disappointed to learn from those who had used it, that it in fact, did none of those things. That for all intents and purposes it was merely a sword, if a very very good one, one that with a bit of practise, could down small trees with a single swing. But the only really magical thing about it was its supposed ability to kill sorcerers. Which, Alphon thought, wasn’t much use any more.
Alphon had grown older and thought less and less about the sword. Then his father had died in battle and he’d assumed the position at the head of the family which meant the solar became his solar. The sword became his sword. He couldn’t help but wonder, looking up at it, if his father might have survived had he used it in battle. He assumed it probably wouldn’t have helped. As he’d learned, it didn’t do much that a regular sword couldn’t do. And it hadn’t done his grandfather Randolph much good in terms of surviving. So the sword hung there, awaiting the day when it would again be needed. Alphon assumed that that day would never come. That Karasar’s days of dealing with sorcerers were over. How wrong he was.
Kulrod sat in his tent, ripping a bloody knife through the flesh of his hand, dragging it along the sides of the bones. Blood sprayed from the hand onto the boar carcass laid out across the ground. The whole tent reeked of blood and death and sweat. The sweat of the boar, freshly killed by his hunters and dragged back here for his ritual. The sweat of the hunters who’d filled the tent just moments ago. And the sweat of Kulrod, the sweat pounding down his brow and into his eyes as he dealt with the excruciating pain. No matter how many times he did it it never got easier.
He yanked the knife out of his hand, spraying blood everywhere. His hand dropped to his side, a jagged cut chopping it nearly in two. The fingers still spasming in pain. He waited as it healed. It didn’t take long.
Meanwhile the boar’s glassy eyes rolled about in its head. It’s legs kicked feebly and twitched. The sorcerer’s blood burned on its fur, searing its skin and sinking into the still warm body.
The boar stood up, its neck still gaping from the spear wound that had killed it, its mangled side still sizzling from sorcerer’s blood. It turned to look at Kulrod.
“You will obey me,” Kulrod said. “You will be my raging beast in my army. You will kill who I tell you to kill and hunt who I tell you to hunt. You will be tireless, merciless, furious. You will not stop for anyone other than me and my men.”
“Yesss...s...ss...s...” the boar replied, it’s mangled mouth struggling for air it couldn’t breathe.
“Go join the other animals and await further instructions.”
The boar nodded and walked out, it knew where to go. Beasts raised from the dead with the blood of a sorcerer have a distinctive smell.
Kulrod stretched out his hand. It was drenched in blood but was otherwise fine. He wiped the blood on a cloth they’d looted from one of the villages. It was a nice cloth, far too nice for such a small ugly village.
He smiled and tossed the cloth aside. Soon he would have all the cloths he would need, and all the slaves to clean up his rituals for him. Soon he would be the next Sorcerer King of Karasar.
The sorcerer wasn’t subtle in his approach. Before him fled a deluge of refugees straight into the waiting arms of Karasar and they were all too ready to divulge everything they knew about him and plenty they didn’t. He was ten foot tall and had two heads, they said. He could call on fire and lightning and all the fury of the sky. He walked with an army of dead mangled creatures in the shape of animals, each one impossible to kill with any weapon. His men wore the flesh of the dead to give them strength. His men were dead to give them strength. He was one hundred foot tall and had a hundred heads.
The stories grew more and more outrageous. Alphon believed none of them. But he knew what a sorcerer coming here meant. He knew that his sword might be needed again. He could have asked someone else to do it. He could have demanded that one of his men or knights rode out to face the sorcerer. But he wouldn’t do that. It was his grandfather that had slain Ceros, it would be him that would slay Kulrod. So he put on his finest armour, gathered up his most loyal knights, took Feather from the wall for what might be the last time. Then he rode out to meet the invading army at Arnock Bridge.
It was a long way to the bridge. There was Shandran, the little town, then the Howling Forest, filled with wolves, then the Rocklands and the hills. And then finally the Arnock river and across it was the army. It was still very far away and he couldn’t see much from this distance, but there was no giant figure with a hundred heads so that was a good sign.
One brave messenger volunteered to carry his message and so he was sent forth. In the hours he was gone Alphon could imagine all sorts of horrible things that could befall him. Sending messengers to treat with rival leaders was always a risk. Some vile men had horrific ideas about what they could do to messengers. And this time it wasn’t even a man they were treating with. Who knew what a sorcerer might do to a messenger?
But he returned, galloping back across the bridge faster than was probably necessary, he came back and delivered the message to Alphon. Kulrod would meet him in single combat at the bridge exactly as requested. He didn’t know whether that was good or bad.
He knew he could wait within his city walls, set up better defenses and prepare for a siege. But a siege would endanger more lives than just his own, and if the sorcerer truly could only be killed by Feather, it would come down to this anyway. So he’d rather it happened before the entire city was attacked. He wasn’t sure if the sorcerer could only be killed by Feather. He wasn’t sure he could be killed by anything. But that had always been the one constant in all the stories about the sword. It could kill sorcerers. It couldn’t grant flight, it couldn’t shoot lightning, and it couldn’t cleave a house in two. But it could kill sorcerers and if he had anything to say about it, it was going to.
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Kulrod was not one hundred foot tall with one hundred heads. He was not even ten foot tall with two heads. He was fairly tall but not inhumanly so and he had just one head. He had black matted hair falling down around his face and a twisted smirk of a mouth. He wore a great fur robe that wrapped around his spindly figure, its fur shaking and shivering in places as though it was still alive, next to him stood two hulking brutes of men, looking sullenly at the ground. But Kulrod was not looking at the ground. He was looking at Alphon with piercing golden eyes.
“Alphon Thar,” Kulrod said from across the river. “I’ve heard many a story of you and your ancestors.”
Alphon shrugged. “I don’t put much store in stories,” he muttered back.
Kulrod chuckled. “No? Then how do you know that blade will kill me?” he asked, his slow laugh rattling away.
Alphon shrugged again. “Maybe it will, maybe it won’t.” He leapt down from his horse and strolled onto the bridge. “At least I’ll finally find out.”
Kulrod smiled wider. “You are very brave Thar, possibly too brave.” He tossed aside his fur cloak and out of it poured spiders. Hundreds of spiders, huge and hairy and reeking of death. They swarmed toward Alphon, rustling over the grass and ground until they reached the bridge and filled it. A black carpet with hundreds of legs sweeping toward him. He struck at one but the others reached him, clambering over each other to cover him. He staggered back and flailed about but they stuck fast, crawling up his armour and in between the gaps until he could feel their furry bodies pressed against him, and he could feel their vicious bites. They were heavy, he’d never thought of spiders as heavy but these ones were and he fell to his knees as they swarmed over him, his face drawing ever closer to that swarming black carpet. Then they were on his face, they’d crawled between his armour and he could feel them on his eyes, his cheeks, his mouth. Wriggling and biting and crawling and thrashing.
He could hear Kulrod laughing, fully laughing now, not just that chuckle he’d had before. He’d never even seen if the sword could hurt him. He’d never found out if it was really magical. Well he’d have to do something about that.
He thrust up his head, flicking off some spiders and then grabbed his helmet and ripped it off, taking off all the ones on it and inside it. More swarmed onto his face but by then he’d already got a glimpse of the bridge and he could see that all the spiders were on it, exactly where he wanted them.
He swung the sword, not at the spiders although he probably hit some of them. He swung it at the bridge. It was an old bridge, thick and strong, a bridge that had weathered years and years of the elements. But the sword was Feather, he’d seen it cut an ancient oak tree down in a single swing. The bridge stood no chance.
Him and the spiders all plunged into the river. It was a small river, not really deep enough for drowning in. If you weren’t a spider.
He spluttered to the surface, his armour dripping and filled with cold water and all the spiders and wood of the bridge floating slowly away downstream. He could still feel some trapped in his armour, struggling weakly as they were soaked in the water. He didn’t mind though, he was too full of adrenaline to care about a few measly spiders.
Up on the bank Kulrod had stopped laughing.
“That is an impressive sword,” he said. “But I wonder what you’ll do now that you have no more bridges to chop down.” He flicked his finger and his two men began to walk down into the river. Except they didn’t really walk, they sort of shambled. They were wearing armour but Alphon suspected they didn’t need it.
“These are corpses filled with the vilest of plagues my sorcerer powers could conjure. Even if you do defeat them and go back to Karasar you will only bring plague and death back with you, making things all the easier for me.”
Alphon shrugged again. “I’m not going back.” Then he swung and the shambling man’s head came clean off. That didn’t do much though as he kept walking and swung a huge sword at Alphon who ducked back out of the way, slowed by the water. He could smell something other than the reek of death coming off these two. Something that smelled all too much like bile and disease.
The second corpse was approaching now, bearing a huge club that was far too heavy for anyone to wield effectively. But the corpse swung it like it weighed nothing and Alphon dragged himself through the water out of the way. But he left Feather behind and the club went clean through it, coming out the other side in two pieces. The corpse looked confused and before he could react Alphon took his arm off. The corpses were strong but they were slow, even slowed by the water this was going to be easy.
The club and the arm attached to it splashed into the water and the corpse looked up at him. It was blocking its friend off and Alphon had a clear swing right through it. Then its body erupted into a blast of blood and bile which struck him like a hammer and sent him crashing into the mud and water of the river. He struggled to his feet as the other corpse moved toward him, its ally collapsing, truly dead now that it had exploded. Alphon tried to stand straight but instead vomited blood into the river. That was a fast acting disease.
The corpse swung its sword and bent over in sickness, Alphon lacked the coordination to block it with Feather. So he thrust up his wet bracer and caught it with that. He felt the bones in his arm break. The corpse took its sword away to swing again and the last trickle of blood left Alphon’s mouth. He could feel more coming on and a terrible headache but he ignored them as he’d ignored the spiders. He spun around from his crouched position and ripped Feather through the knees of the corpse as it raised its sword.
It collapsed into the river and Alphon dived away as it too exploded. The bile and blood just missing him. He didn’t need more diseases. He coughed up some more vomit and then looked up at Kulrod standing atop the bank. He wasn’t smiling and chuckling now.
“You bastard!” the sorcerer howled. Alphon moved toward him. “Do you have any idea how difficult those are to make?” Alphon’s heart was pounding now, he ignored the bile and blood in his throat, the terrible headache between his ears, the weak feeling in his legs and the throbbing pain in his left arm. “You will pay for this!”
Kulrod raised his hands and Alphon stopped. Not because he wanted too but because the mud of the river had constricted around his feet. He tried to pull free and grumbled in annoyance. Then he heard a roar and looked up to see huge waves coming up from both sides of the river toward him. His eyes grew wide with fear. He’d been ready for the vermin, he’d been ready for the plagues, but he hadn’t been ready for a sorcerer who could control the elements. There hadn’t been any hard evidence Ceros had actually done that, although there were plenty of stories. Maybe that was what he got for not putting much store in stories.
The waves crashed over him and he disappeared into the swirling muddy water.
Kulrod stared down at the river, panting. Sweat beading his brow. Why did sorcerer’s have to sweat? They were supposed to be perfect human beings weren’t they? They didn’t need to eat or drink or sleep or breathe. But they had to sweat. He didn’t like that, it made him feel human, made him feel weak. Like he could be killed with a sword.
He wiped the sweat away and looked up at Alphon’s men arrayed on the other side of the river. The bridge was down but it wouldn’t be hard to cross the river especially when he could control it. The men were looking very worried and some were already starting to turn their horses away. He took one step forward then the river erupted.
Alphon burst from the river, spectral feathered wings sprouting from his back. The sword had been able to grant flight after all, although it seemed to work best in near death experiences. He hovered over the river and looked down at Kulrod who was staring up at him in shock. Alphon shrugged, ruffling his new fancy wings. Then he bore down on the sorcerer and plunged the sword through his chest, spraying sorcerer’s blood all across the grass.
Kulrod choked in surprise, the sword piercing the spot where his heart would be if he had one, he’d taken it out long ago and used it in a ritual somewhere, by now he’d quite forgotten where.
“It is said...” Kulrod choked quietly, “that to kill a sorcerer you need a magic weapon.”
Alphon nodded, all his evidence corroborated that.
“Wielded by a magic creature.”
Alphon’s heart sank. Of course his research had uncovered that too but he’d hoped it had been wrong, prayed it had been wrong. His grandfather hadn’t been magical and he’d killed a sorcerer. Hadn’t he?
“You...” Kulrod said, his voice growing louder as his lungs healed around the sword. “Are not...” He grabbed Alphon by the neck. “A magic creature...” He snapped his neck with muscles much stronger than any human’s. Alphon’s body went limp and his wings disappeared. He was happy though, the sword had done what he’d really wanted.