Crown (The Manhunters Book 3) Read online

  “No student of Thrak Debane is ever helpless. In fact, were you to say a thing like that to a member of my order who was not bound by the rules of hospitality, then you would be taking all your meals in liquid form for the rest of your days.”

  Roth turned to Victor. “Your mage is a braggart and a fool. He is trying to goad me into a duel because he wants the notoriety of having defeated a member of my Collective. We are known all over five worlds, and he wants to get himself another tattoo. I would advise you to tell him to leave before I spank him for you.”

  Decard extended his hand to impact Roth’s robe. He spoke a word Roth had never heard before, and with a clap of thunder, a blast of energy slammed Roth in the chest. The energy dissipated instantly and Roth pulled out a wand.

  Victor laughed and Decard’s eyes widened. Victor stepped back and the other people in the room moved in tight around them.

  Decard pulled a rod and screamed out a word of power. A bolt of lightning arched to slam into Roth’s chest. Roth’s robe pulsed around him and soaked the charge instantly.

  “I worry for your safety, mighty king,” Roth said. He closed his eyes, and with a wave of his wand, a warping field of energy extended out in every direction. It dampened the magical field outside of a circle of Roth’s choosing.

  Decard spat out a word and Roth extended his hand, pushing his aura out and around him, letting the pure power of the spell rush into his aura. Roth strobed before nodding to Victor.

  “Allow me to put up one more precaution,” Roth said.

  The duelist conjured two mighty fists of black that bled smoke and hovered over Roth.

  Roth ignored them and cast an impenetrable globe around himself and Decard. The bubble of power would allow no magic to escape. The two fists flashed out and Roth opened two portals on either side of him. Both fists rushed in, the portals closed, and Roth cracked his knuckles.

  “You ready to get started, then?” Roth asked Decard. The duelist trembled. “See, at this point, I would usually allow you to slink away.”

  Decard pulled a wand and fired it. A ball of energy flicked out to explode harmlessly against the robe. The power entered Roth’s aura, pumping it even more full with magic potential for him to wield.

  “But I’m not going to let you run off now, because you have offended my order.” Roth waved a hand before him, the floor beneath Decard rippled, and the mage sunk ankles deep. Roth dissipated the spell, locking the mage in stone when it hardened again.

  “See, it is the folly of wizards like you to think that because my group is young, and all our members are young, that you have some sort of advantage.”

  Decard extended his hands and screamed. Fire burst from his palms in a wave to slam into Roth. Roth’s aura opened again, sucking the power of the spell up as Roth stepped closer.

  “You insulted my dueling teacher,” Roth said. With a flick of his wrist and the speaking of a word, Decard’s arm turned to stone. The arm dropped and Decard howled in panic. “Silence, you fool,” Roth said. He waved a hand, and the screaming mage continued to wail, but none could hear him any longer. His silent scream looked comical, his face contorted in panic. “Your style is flawed. Your spells are tired. Your training is incomplete, and your methods are laughable. You use items of power, which are a crutch, and you have a boring mind.”

  Roth spoke again and the man’s torso turned to stone. The weight of it too much, he dropped to the ground.

  “I am not a duelist. I have dabbled. I have of course studied how to protect myself, and I have prepared myself for times like these. But this is not what I do. See, I’m a weapons man. My dueling master does not possess the time to make me as good as he is. So this is what I would say to you. Study up. Get your mind nimble. Because when I tell Thrak Debane what you have said today, he might want to come looking for you.”

  With a wave of Roth’s hand, all the spells he had cast evaporated. Decard lay on the ground screaming. The entire room fell to silence.

  Roth turned to Victor. “Your son said something about dinner?”

  Victor stared, stunned.

  The City of Darkness

  Beast snorted and brayed as they neared the skulls. She seemed incensed by their display. She either despised the creatures they had been cut from or was angry at the citizens for bragging about their deaths. Rayph decided it could go either way.

  The skulls were shot through with holes, porous and pock ridden. The bone was degraded to a point of decay but it was still obvious what they were looking at.

  Dragons had died here.

  The skulls gleamed white and terrible. The massive eye sockets stared down the road at anyone entering the main gate, the second turned around on the other side of the road staring at anyone leaving the city proper. The skulls were not always displayed like this. Often times they were concealed in a warehouse in the city. Many generations would pass with the dragon skulls hidden from view, but now they stood sentry, and that was all Rayph needed to know about the mayor of the city.

  Rayph rode past the thirty-foot-tall skulls and could not help but grit his teeth at the chill he felt in his bones at their nearness. He turned to the rest of his crew behind him, seeing different levels of alarm and awe. Dran alone appeared unaffected by their presence. She seemed not to notice the bones. Whether they were meant as a threat or boast, they accomplished none of it with her.

  The guardsman at the top of the wall glared down at Rayph before turning and talking to a man beside him. Rayph waited, thinking about the exchange he was witnessing.

  Had this been any other day in any other city, or even this one at a different time, the guard would have called down to them already. They would have been hailed. That was not going on here. They were being assessed. They were being talked about. This guard knew who they were. This guard had been watching for them. This guard worked for the syndicate, and he was talking to a syndicate boss beside him.

  “They know we are here,” Smear said.

  Rayph nodded. “We knew they would as soon as we walked in the streets.”

  “We are not in the streets, not yet,” Smear said. “Already they have the advantage.”

  “Expect any different?” Rayph asked.

  “Would have been disappointed, actually.” There was an excitement in Smear’s voice. A thread of joy mixed with trepidation radiating through the words betrayed Rayph’s friend and his desire.

  “You want to go right away?” Rayph said.

  “Unless you have need for me elsewhere,” Smear said.

  “No, it’s fine. Set up a meeting. I need to know if they are answering to anyone.”

  “I wish I could take Trys with me. I’m sure they are going to love her.”

  “She is easy to love,” Rayph said. He looked at his friend, elation in his eyes, and Rayph smiled. “How long since you have seen them?”

  Smear chewed his lip before laughing. “I guess it’s been twenty years.”

  “They may have lost a step.”

  “Not possible,” Smear said.

  The gate cracked open and Rayph kicked Beast. She roared and they entered the city. Rayph pulled his badge and showed it to the guard nearest him. The man’s eyes widened and he nodded. Rayph turned to Dran.

  “You have the wall. If they give you any trouble, flash your badge and say Thomas’s name. I want this city locked down. No one enters, no one leaves. Send men to the sewers. Guard all exits and entrances. Find the men you can trust and dismiss the rest. Use Sisalyyon if you need to. No one knows a lie better than her. The city guard now answer to you,” Rayph said. Dran nodded and turned for the gate captain.

  Rayph rode on.

  When they reached the Brown Way, Rayph nodded to Smear and the man turned his horse and clopped away. The dirt road was a mess here. Rain and filth had made muck of the ground, and Rayph knew Beast would not be happy about having to tramp her way through this. He braced himself for her complaints and nudged her on. When they reached the highest rise of the Bro
wn Way, Rayph stopped his horse in the center of the street and stared at the majesty of the City of Darkness.

  Dragonsbane was the oldest city in Lorinth. It had at one time been Pax’s capitol, but the taint in the air made it impossible to rule from. The dragons that had come here had left something of their darkness behind. The bodies buried under the hills outside the walls soured the city in some way. It was said to have been cursed by the last dragon to die here, but Rayph could not be sure. He did know terror and tribulation loved this place.

  The mayor’s ziggurat towered over the west side of the city. Powerful and unflinching, it had housed some of the greatest tyrants this nation had ever known. The body politic of this city had never truly answered to the crown. Many kings of this nation wanted nothing to do with this town. Long ago the noble who owned this land had given control of it up to the people. For thousands of years, mayors had ruled Dragonsbane. Kings of their tiny kingdom, they were an authority none balked.

  The Candle Tower stood tall and imposing from the city center. This tower had once belonged to the villain Vrice. That man’s rule had been dark and terrible, and when he was killed, his tower passed to his two students. The great golden top they added to the tower gave it the appearance of a building lit to flame. The onion bulb roof gleamed in the dying light, and Rayph knew this would either be a powerful ally or a devastating enemy. Rumors had reached him of a great power housed here, and Rayph did not yet know what to expect from it.

  His eye went to the tower of Cult Vanity, to the two statues of Duessa, to the terrible Crown prison, and the steeples of the religious district, and Rayph felt overwhelmed. He turned to the carriage behind him and smiled at Sisalyyon who commanded it. She did not hold reins in her hands. She controlled the steeds that pulled the conveyance with nothing more than whispers and pleas of their love for her.

  “Can you take him to the playhouse?” Rayph asked. He looked at the carriage, boarded up from the light, and frowned. “He will want to set up there.”

  Sisalyyon nodded. She clicked her tongue and the carriage rolled forward. Rayph turned to the one on the horse beside him and he smiled. It was so reassuring to see this woman beside him once again.

  “I missed you,” he said.

  She said not a word, then nodded.

  “I missed you, too, Rayph.” Dissonance pushed her hood back to expose her smiling face and looked up at the sky. Rayph had heard little of her time in Tienne. He knew almost nothing of the church she had dedicated and the young warriors she had brought into the fold of the church, but her time away from Ironfall and his Manhunters had been long and dark for him.

  “Go home,” he said to her. She nodded. “See what help they can be to us and ask for any information they can give. Let them know I will come see them soon and ready them for the coming trouble.”

  Dissonance nodded and kicked her horse forward. She rode as fast as traffic would allow until she disappeared into the city’s gullet.

  Rayph turned to Fanhon and smiled at the load the trapper had brought along. Two oxen and a massive flat bed wagon. An entire cord of wood, the tools of a smith and a carpenter, two hundred feet of silk rope. A box filled with knives. Six different types and sizes of saws. A family of files. Steel, a collapsible forge, an anvil. Three horses bound to the back and a plant, potted and no more than a foot tall. Fanhon looked to be setting up a business in town. Rayph smiled at him and the trapper grinned.

  “Where do you want me?” Fanhon asked.

  “Far be it from me to tell you where to set up. Find a spot and take it. That badge will get you anything you want. If you find a suitable place and it is occupied by another, flash the badge and oust them from the area. Thomas has given us the power of the king. Anything we need to take, any property that will aid us, we can have. I can walk up to that ziggurat right now and show them this badge and take the mayor’s mansion from him in a flash. The Manhunters have the power of the throne now, my friend. Feel free to use it.”

  “I’m not so much for taking what doesn’t belong to me,” Fanhon said.

  “Do what you can. If you need help, reach out,” Rayph said.

  “What are you going to do?”

  “I’m gonna go flash this badge at the mayor and take over his mansion.”

  Fanhon laughed, and Rayph rode away.

  The guards did not want to let him in. They summoned more of their numbers and filled the mayor’s courtyard. They carried their weapons in their hands, plain to the eye, and spoke loudly about how Thomas was far from this city and his hold was tenuous at best. Rayph waited until they had strutted and puffed themselves up before he touched his fetish and called out for Dran.

  He sat Beast’s back and waited for ten, maybe twenty minutes before the sound of marching boots approached and the mayor’s guard looked up to the streets beyond. Dran came stomping up the street with four hundred soldiers and a battering ram. The mayor’s guard paled and formed ranks. Their commander looked at the soldiers at his gate and wiped his sweat-drenched face, though the wind was turning cold at winter’s approach.

  “You are one of those, aren’t you?” Rayph asked.

  The guard gritted his teeth and cast a terrified glance at the men behind Rayph. “One of what’s?” the man sputtered.

  “Well, in a situation like this one, guards like you tend to get a bit of an arrogance problem. You think because you are guarding the mayor that makes you better than a simple city guard.”

  The guard captain swallowed hard and Rayph continued.

  “You have treated these men behind me with disregard and condescending attitude for years. You have this idea that for some reason you are the better man and you have let them know it, haven’t you?” Rayph looked at the soldiers behind him and saw the truth of his words in the faces of the men. He turned back to the mayor’s guard and grinned. “If I turn them loose on you, they will rip this gate from this structure and jerk you out into the streets. They will clap the survivors in irons and slam you in a cell in the Crown until the time comes for me to leave this city. They will do this because I tell them to. They will do this because they hate you. And they have reason to. Let’s set this aside and let you keep your lives, your freedom, and your jobs. Let me send these men back to their noble work and you will get back to yours.”

  The captain of the mayor’s guard looked around. He fought for any argument he might make, but in the end, he stepped aside. Dran took her men back to their posts and Rayph marched into the ziggurat.

  He found the building in the throes of a party. The most influential members of Dragonsbane twirled and spiraled around the floors as bards sang and played their instruments. Rayph did not expect this gaiety in broad daylight, and he walked through the party with his guard up and his spells ready.

  The lesser halls held hundreds of beautiful men and women, but Rayph knew they held no real power. He turned his attention to the main hall and what he might find there.

  He remembered the layout of the building well from his visit here hundreds of years ago, and he made his way through the swell of bodies, searching for the head of the city. He caught a scent on the air and it lightened his head. He growled, knowing that scent, and he cast a shield on his face against smell. No shield could be seen, no visor or image of any kind was apparent, but no scent could get to him.

  Rayph found the main hall’s doors and came up against guards with pikes and swords. He knew there would be a struggle, but they stepped aside without a word, as if he were expected.

  When he pushed the doors open, the herald at the door spoke up loud and clear.

  “Rayph Ivoryfist, Court Wizard of Lorinth, the Hope of the Nation, Commander of the Manhunters, Heir to the Ivory Arm. Accompanied by none and free of entourage.” Rayph suddenly was very aware of the fact he was alone.

  He looked at the main table, the mayor sitting at the head position.

  She wore her hair high in a bun that dripped tendrils of purple locks tracing down her neck and gen
tly kissing her shoulders. Her dress was open to the front and plunging, dropping almost to her belt before it closed. Her bust had been tattooed with a bouquet of flowers and vines that spiraled her neck and up her left cheek. She held a wine glass, drank to the dregs, and jeweled. She was devastating to look at and terrifying to behold all at once. She carried a small glass dagger on her belt, and from within the handle, a blackish liquid sloshed.

  “You made it!” she said with a smile. “We have been expecting you.” She motioned to the company around her and Rayph’s eyes widened. He touched his fetish and snapped out a word that dropped his sword into his hand.

  “All of you, now!” Rayph said. He pointed his sword at the table as portals ripped open all around him. The room filled with Manhunters and Rayph looked to the right of the mayor’s seat to see Brody Bedlam smiling at him.

  The Dinner Party

  “How did I not expect you here?” Rayph asked.

  Blade Silvertooth stood and snatched his chair from under himself. He gripped it in his mighty hands and snapped it in two pieces. The mayor screamed and dove under the table. Blade snarled and roared, his white tiger raksa face twisting into the very visage of terror and wrath.

  Artan stood, wiping his mouth and dropping his napkin on the table. He slowly pulled his rapier and the parrying dagger on his hip and stepped lightly around the flying chairs that spat villains, until he stood directly in front of Smear. He grinned, displaying rotting teeth, and lowered his delicate blade in Smear’s face.

  Rhonda pushed her chair out and ripped the bastard sword from her back. She pulled the weapon around for a mighty swing and lined up with Dran.

  Radamuss exploded into an army of rats and scattered in every direction. Rayph fought to keep an eye on where they went and what they were doing, but knew it impossible. Shiv roared and jumped to his feet. He kicked his chair, sending it flying. He jerked his club from the floor and swung it down with an ear-splitting report that brought Rayph’s ears to ringing.