The King's Summons Read online

  Oh no.

  She turned to charge back up the ridge. Just as she shifted her weight, the skull hissed, exhaling a noxious, black fog.

  The fog swirled around Blaze, then glistened and began to coalesce at three points equidistant from the skull.

  She had almost certainly discovered a spawning point. As scared as she was, Blaze was rooted to the spot. She couldn’t look away. She was actually witnessing the emergence of life into Crystalia from beyond. Few experienced it.

  Fewer lived to tell about it.

  She knew from her lore lessons that the black fog that swirled from the spawning point was a mutagen. It carried the will of the dark demons, mingled it with the Goddess’s vitality, and brought the three hallmarks of the Dark Consul’s influence:

  Corruption.

  Evil.

  Destruction.

  Here, in the frozen north, the essence was sure to form into something suited to the cold, something—

  Three lizard-like humanoid creatures, draped in icicles, with red-stained fangs agape, rose from the snow where the fog had coalesced, their long crocodilian tails lashing aggressively.

  A vile white-skinned ice kobold flicked its forked tongue as it leveled a blade-tipped polearm in her direction.

  Ice Pick Kobold. Blaze was not excited about the prospect of losing her head to this weapon of wholesale dismemberment.

  Its companion lifted a sling with a snowball and began whirling it. Blaze nearly laughed, before the snowball in its sling began shedding razor-sharp crystals in a wide arc.

  If that snowball hit her chest, it might just send a shower of spikes into her heart.

  “There she is—just one Crystalian human,” said the Ice Pick Kobold.

  The Snowball Chucker cackled with laughter. “We shall feast on this trespasser.”

  A streak of pure rage rose within Blaze.

  “This is our world. Ours!” she said. “You are the trespassers.”

  The third ice kobold rose up out from the snow. Gray blue armor tinged with ice crystals that sparkled in the sunlight. This was an elite Frostscale warrior. It banged a blue steel sword against the skull emblem on its shield and raked its tongue over its fangs. “Your world is passing as the day into night. The Midnight Queen will see to that.”

  “The who?” asked Blaze. She’d never heard that name before. It didn’t sound good at all.

  “Kill her!” the kobold cried.

  She had to ignore the chill. She had to fight the exhaustion in her legs. Blaze’s rage burned through the fog in her head and tapped into the heat deep within her. Her spark lit, and the world took on a red hue.

  “An Ember Mage!” The ice kobold swiveled its head and gave a guttural cry that sounded like a broken wagon wheel squeaking. “Eeeeeeeeeewa!”

  She thrust her right fist out, blasting a fireball into the Ice Pick Kobold. The fire hit it square in the chest, knocking it backward. Its polearm went spinning away into the snow.

  She blasted four more fireballs in quick succession at the Snowball Chucker and the Frostscale warrior, blasting them both backward into the snow.

  The Snowball Chucker hurled a glowing snowball at her. Blaze didn’t want to find out what the cursed snowball would do when it hit her skin.

  “Fireball!” she cried, hurling a fireball nearly half as tall as she was straight at the Snowball Chucker.

  The snowball vanished in a burst of flame. The Snowball Chucker fell easily, but the Frostscale warrior stayed on his feet, huddling behind his enormous shield which had taken the brunt of her attack.

  “Fireball! Fireball! Fireball!” cried Blaze, blasting three quick bursts of molten heat at him. The first two hit his shield, throwing him off balance. She caught him in the head with the third, and he screamed, the snow and ice on his scaly skin hissing as it burned into steam.

  “Yes!” cried Blaze. Maybe she would learn to love the Frostbyte Reach after all.

  Clouds of black fog spilled out of the skull at the center of the spawning point, rolling and coalescing into ten more ice kobolds.

  Ice dripped from their dragon-like snouts, and their human-like arms held even larger swords, or heavy ball and chains. Each one bore a spiked shield.

  “Uh oh,” said Blaze. It was hard to hide her disappointment.

  These hulking warriors were Blockheads—not the smartest but certainly the largest. Blaze had seen sketches of them in her training long ago. She had studied their names. And now they had come for her.

  Blaze slammed her fists together twice until the pain in her knuckles doubled the fire within.

  Not today.

  An ice kobold at the back of the pack with a headdress dangling with shrunken skulls pointed its priest staff at her. Three ice spikes grew right out of its head.

  “Human . . .” it hissed.

  A Frozen Priest too? Blaze shuddered at the hideous sight. Its scaly hide was old and wrinkled, and its eyes shone with pure hatred.

  “Foolish, girl. Your magic is no match for the power we bring from the Dark Realm.” Its crackling voice was raspy, like the scratch and crunch of feet on dry leaves.

  The Frozen Priest hissed a command, and all ten of the hideous, pale-skinned lizards hissed in unison as they fanned out around her.

  She needed time. She’d shot out that first barrage of fireballs so quickly, and her inner fire was not yet the vortex of roiling power she would need to fight so many enemies. She needed time to stoke it.

  She was going to need a lot of fire to take down ten of these monsters. She’d never summoned that much so quickly, especially in the cold. And this was not the place to be caught slow-footed.

  Blaze pulled back her hands, ready to form a sheet of flame, when the Frozen Priest swung a twisted skull-tipped staff in a wide arc. Dark magic poured from it, conjuring a whipping, icy wind that blasted straight into Blaze, knocking her backward and flinging her rucksack from her back.

  Blaze picked herself up. Her rucksack lay open in front of her, its contents scattered in the snow.

  To her delight, a small, round flask with blue liquid inside sat inches from her nose.

  “Fire Water!” she cried. She snatched the flask of blue liquid, uncorked the bubbling potion, and drank it in one gulp. She’d trained with Fire Water before. The familiar aftertaste of the Fire Water tingled on her tongue.

  Less than a second later, Blaze’s arms rippled with new heat. The snow melted around her, and ice crystals swirling in the air melted before they even touched her skin.

  These potions really work!

  And just in time too. She could hear the Blockheads beating their swords against their shields behind her as they charged.

  She’d have to target one at a time.

  No, she had two hands.

  “Ahhhh!” cried Blaze, leaping to her feet, the inner fire swirling within, a torrent of power rising up within her. Her hands burst into flame. The Blockhead Kobolds hesitated. Fire was not their favorite. Well—there was plenty to go around.

  “Fire Blast!” she cried, thrusting both hands forward at an angle and spreading them outward. The fan of flame knocked three Kobolds down and sent two more screaming in terror.

  The Frozen Priest raised its staff. “Cutting Wind!” it cried. A blast of cold snow whirled around Blaze. Ice crystals lashed at her as the whirlwind grew tightly around her, nearly blocking her view of her attackers.

  Through the haze of whirling ice, Blaze was just able to make out the shapes of the remaining Blockhead Kobolds as they closed in on her from either side.

  If Blaze was going to survive this battle, she would have to be able to see her attackers.

  Letting the magic surge within her to a dangerous level, Blaze lifted a large stone at her feet out of the snow. She poured every ounce of heat from the Fire Water potion inside her into it. The rock hovered between her hands as raw energy swirled into it, like a whirlpool of heat.

  The stone melte
d into red-hot lava.

  “Magma Strike!” Blaze thrust both fists forward, unleashing the magma like a stone from a catapult. The Frozen Priest disappeared over the snow bank in a burst of fire, and the ice storm stopped abruptly, leaving her enemies in clear view.

  Their source of magic cut off, the Blockhead Kobolds stopped and exchanged looks, either worrying for their own fate, or trying to come up with a new plan. Perhaps now they would retreat.

  “Surrender?” asked Blaze. She was hopeful.

  One of them raised its sword. “Our master!” it cried in a dull, slow voice.

  The rest of the Blockheads screamed savagely, beating their shields.

  “Destroy the human!” cried the one closest to her.

  As a swarm, the entire mass of Blockheads surged forward. In less than three paces they would all be on top of her.

  Blaze tapped her anger, opening it to full and unleashing a rapid-fire barrage. “Fireball! Fireball! Fireball!” Three balls of superheated plasma found their targets, but now the Blockheads were in range with their own weapons.

  Blaze unleashed a flash of heat to blind their eyes momentarily. She spun in a melee attack, sweeping the legs from under the largest Blockhead while blasting a double-handed fireball into the face of the next nearest attacker. She spun, releasing two fire streams from both hands in a circle of devastation.

  “Get back!” one cried. Shrieks of terror met her ears. She forced a column of flame into the enormous skull. It cracked, then broke in two.

  Blaze cut off her inner fire. Those shrieks reminded her of her own cries of terror as a child trapped in a burning house.

  The ice kobolds were fleeing, rolling themselves in the snow to douse the flames that licked at their scaly hides. In full flight, their long tails lashed side to side until all were out of sight beyond the next ridge.

  The fire within winked out, and the blood-red tint that had covered the world around her faded from her vision. New, brighter colors shifted into view: green pines on white snow set against a bright blue sky.

  The spawning point skull flaked into cinders with a slow, satisfying hiss.

  She’d won. She’d destroyed a spawning point. So the darkness could be beaten back. She had proved that much.

  The Ember Mage dropped to one knee. She tried to lift her pack but couldn’t. She lacked the strength. She shivered. She had spent all her heat. Suddenly even the inside of her bones felt cold. She had channeled too much heat too quickly.

  She shook herself as an ashen tree collapsed in a pile of soot, entirely consumed by her last fire burst. Blaze felt just as hollow.

  Must keep moving.

  Her body desperately craved the softness of the snow, to simply lie down and rest.

  Please. She begged her body not to give up. When night fell, the kobolds would be back and attack under cover of darkness. She needed to get as far away as possible and find shelter.

  With a tremendous effort, Blaze lifted her pack. She stood and turned to continue on the path and made it several steps forward before she looked up.

  Through the gap where the tree had fallen, she spied a lone figure on the rise.

  It was the orc.

  Chapter 5: Warrior Monk

  The orc. Her quarry. Only now, she had nothing left.

  She’d been so stupid. And he’d waited until after the battle—after she had spent her fire and had nothing left.

  The orc was draped in a cloak; his rocklike head was bare, with twin tusks protruding up from his bottom lip. In his hand was what looked like a great club. The orc’s face was marred by a tattoo that curled around his right eye.

  Blaze gasped.

  A Crook-Eye.

  All her life she had waited for this moment, for revenge. And now she had no strength. She was at the mercy of this monster.

  She stared daggers at the creature. Rage filled her. A Crook-Eye! She would fight him with her fists if she had to.

  But there was no chance in that. Blaze had fought men before. Even normal human men were far stronger than a teenager like her. And this orc could toss a man as far as he wished.

  The orc raised his staff and moved his arm to the side, pointing.

  “This is the way. You cannot go that way,” he said, cocking his head back toward what was left of the spawning point.

  What? Blaze was confused. This giant orc was giving her directions?

  “Hah. I won’t follow you—I’m not stupid.”

  The orc let his arm fall. “You are tired? I will carry you.” He began clomping down the rise toward her.

  Blaze scrambled backward, only to trip and fall backward onto her pack, like an upturned tortoise. With his huge strides the orc was by her side before she could get free of the pack’s straps.

  She hadn’t been so close to one of the hideous allies of the Dark Consul since that day in her village ten years ago. Now she was staring him in the face. His nose was squat and broad, his jaw wide and heavy. His head was gray, and his hulking forearms rippled with muscles, like twisted tree trunks. He reached for her with hands covered by boney spikes on the backs of his knuckles. There was an odd, misshapen lump under his cloak on one side, like he had something slung over his shoulder underneath the cloth.

  Blaze lashed out with a kick.

  The orc was astonishingly fast. He snatched her leg and hauled her upside down. “Why human come here?”

  Blaze shivered. “To kill orcs.” She couldn’t tell him her true reason.

  The orc turned his gaze to the still-smoking remnants of the corrupted trees surrounding the spawning point. What he had in reaction speed, he more than made up for in lack of thinking power. For a few seconds, he mulled the scene.

  “You did not climb mountain—Dreck knows if being followed.”

  “Put me down!” Blaze thrashed to free herself.

  The orc ignored her and perused the scene again. “How you get here?”

  Blaze tried to swing a punch at the orc’s neck, but he deftly swung her—pack and all—off to one side. “Hmmm. Fire magic scare kobolds.” He looked at her, and Blaze, though upside-down, recognized how different this orc was from the ones who had raided her village. His tusks were far smaller, his eyes a vibrant green. There was something almost kind in the creature’s features. Blaze had to look away rather than admit it.

  The orc was a magnificent creation. Powerful, like her, but somehow gentle and naive, and a slow thinker. Orcs were not stupid. But this one . . . seemed to struggle.

  He dropped her on her head in the snow.

  Blaze rolled to her feet and ran for it.

  The orc kept pace beside her at what seemed like a brisk walk.

  “Get away!” she shrieked.

  The orc swung his staff, blocking her path. “Goddess send you.”

  “What?” Blaze couldn’t believe her ears.

  “Stars moving,” said the orc, pointing to the sky. “Goddess is moving.”

  How dare an orc demon speak of the Goddess.

  “Who bring you here?” he asked.

  “None of your business,” Blaze snapped as she desperately tried to get away.

  The orc gave a snort of a laugh. “Go fast, little one. Far to go. Dreck show you.”

  “Little one!” Blaze scampered ahead, trying to distance herself from this strange orc. “You’re not much for an orc anyway—I’ve seen bigger warriors.”

  “Dreck not warrior.”

  Blaze nearly tripped over her own feet. “Well—scout.”

  “Dreck tracker.”

  “A tracker—you hunt humans?” she asked.

  “Tracker of great mystery. Seeker of Goddess. Dreck . . . Wandering Monk-in-training.” He opened his cloak to reveal the simple brown garments of a monk. A strange, thick iron hoop hung over one shoulder and across his chest like a sling. It was covered in runes, and the iron was dark. It struck Blaze as very odd. Why would he carry something so heavy all this way? And what
was it for?

  But an orc-monk? “Have you lost your mind?” Blaze laughed out loud.

  “Well. Dreck not monk yet. Haven’t traveled to Wandering Monk Mountains. But Dreck lose self. Not mind. Dreck find peace.”

  Legends spoke of the time when the land of Crystalia had not known, nor feared, the Dark Consul’s power. But in her lifetime, the Dark Consul’s corrupting influence had reached even to the heartlands and twisted many creatures—such as the orcs—into monsters of darkness. Now none of the orc tribes followed the Goddess.

  The unlikely Wandering Monk beckoned to a narrow trail that split off from the route Blaze had been following. “This way. Less travelers, less trouble,” Dreck said.

  Blaze was too cold to argue. Certainly, this Dreck knew where he was going. Fine. If he wasn’t going to go away, she could use his knowledge of the land. She pulled her cloak tighter and fell into step beside the orc as snowflakes began to fall, covering their steps. A Crook-Eye Orc Tracker . . . monk?

  After an hour, Dreck said, “Nice locket. Friend give you that?”

  Blaze tucked the King’s locket under her shirt. “Not exactly.”

  Blaze looked again at the much larger bulge underneath Dreck’s cloak. The giant iron ring.

  “My name to the Crook-Eye tribe means big heart,” said Dreck.

  “Is that your heart sticking out of your chest there?”

  Dreck looked down, almost panicked, before realizing the enormous ring he wore under his robes was not, in fact, showing.

  So it’s a secret. That’s more like it. He is hiding something.

  “Does your name have a meaning?” Dreck asked.

  “Of course not.” She didn’t know what it meant, unless trouble counted as a definition. “I’m Blaze.” She changed the subject. “Does this path lead to Hetsa?” The village of Hetsa was on the map the king had given her. Just the place King Jasper had told her to start.

  “Yes,” said the orc. Now that he spoke, Blaze guessed he couldn’t have been much older than her. “Hetsa, far. Enemy know fire mage come now. No use big roads. Find own road.”

  “All right,” Blaze said, suddenly glad for the company. “How much farther?”

  The orc only opened his fanged mouth. She supposed the horrible expression was a smile.