The Worlds of J D L Rosell Read online

  The Worlds of J.D.L. Rosell

  A Collection of Epic Fantasy Stories

  J.D.L. Rosell

  Contents

  A Fable of Blood

  When Hunting a Chimera

  Secret Seller

  City of Whispers

  Heir of Empire

  Stay Tuned!

  Books by J.D.L. Rosell

  About the Author

  A Fable of Blood

  Legend of Tal: Prequel

  He’d never been wise. But as Tal Harrenfel ghosted down the cliffside, he wondered if he’d ever been more foolish.

  He kept his eyes on his boots as he slid over the uncertain scree. A hundred feet below, the Obelisk, a tower of stone with no windows and one door, stood empty. He'd watched its sole occupant — at least, the only one he'd observed — shuffle down the mountain path hours before until he disappeared out of sight. Tal had never yet followed; in fact, he'd barely moved from his cliffside perch for three days, and only then when compelled to by his tortured bowels.

  He’d learned long ago that when you were prey, it was best not to move until you knew where the hunters lay. Yet four months could erode the resolve of even the hardiest of men.

  Four months.

  Four months since he'd had a meal other than hard tack and half-cooked mountain ram mutton. Four months since he'd had anything but his cloak between him and the hard stone as he snatched at sleep. Four long, hard, cold months that he'd either been predator or prey in his sojourn across the East's endless mountains.

  But he was close now. Close to the answers he'd sought for all his time in the untamed wilderness, and much longer before.

  Close to knowing how to defy a man who had become a god.

  "Close," he muttered as he scrambled down the cliff. "Yet still so very far."

  He paused in his descent to gaze at the smooth-sided tower again. The Blue Moon Obelisk, he'd learned it was called, from a Nightelf tinker he'd waylaid on the road two months before. Tal had been intrigued from the first. Coaxing the story out as gently as he could — which, in the East, didn't amount to very gently at all — he'd learned the Blue Moon Obelisk had once been one of many towers home to sorcerers fanatically devoted to Yuldor, the enemy of all in the Westreach. But the mages of the Blue Moon Obelisk, it seemed, had been less than devoted to their Peacebringer. After the leader of the tower disseminated heretical thoughts, Yuldor had slain every one of the sorcerers and cursed the stones that remained.

  And if Yuldor feared something here that much, Silence knows I need to discover it.

  According to the tinker, those events had taken place two hundred years before, and the tower had lain empty ever since. Only, Tal had arrived to find it hadn't been completely abandoned. For over the three days Tal had kept watch, he'd seen one man come to and from the Obelisk, ending each day within its walls. If the tower were cursed, that man was able to survive it, and Tal wagered he could as well.

  "After all," he murmured as he massaged his gut and winced as it gave a painful throb, "I am a living legend."

  At one point in the not-so-distant past, he wouldn't have waited nearly so long before charging in, sword swinging and cantrips rattling off his tongue. But if the interceding years hadn't driven caution into him, the last four months finally had. Tal had been hunted most of his life, but never so ardently and capably as once he'd crossed the Fringes and into the East's craggy lands.

  But it had been three days since he’d lost the Ravagers who pursued him, and he’d seen no sign that they’d yet caught his trail. And so Tal had decided the time for caution had passed, and the time for risk had begun.

  It took nearly an hour to descend the cliffside, but finally, Tal reached the bottom. He quickly found a boulder to hide behind and stretched his neck, aching from constantly looking down during the climb.

  Now begins the wait.

  But the sun was still far from overhead by the time the hooded man finally appeared again, bent nearly double as he trudged up the steep incline. As soon as he appeared, all of Tal's aches, pains, and niggling hunger dissipated, and he rose swiftly to his feet and crept deeper into the shadows.

  Hidden from sight by the boulder, he listened to the crunching of the hermit’s feet on the loose stone. With his hood pulled close around his face, the hermit likely wouldn’t have seen him, as he always seemed completely intent on reaching the Obelisk as quickly as his slow steps would bring him, head bent to look at his boots. But Tal knew better than to take more risks than he had to.

  As the footsteps on stone softened, Tal made his move, slinking around the boulder on silent feet until the hermit came in sight a mere dozen feet away. Readying himself, he made three swift bounds, then was behind him. Finally alerted, the hooded man spun around with a startled cry, but Tal had already seized him, a knife held to his throat.

  The hood fell back, and Tal experienced a moment’s hesitation. Hair as white as freshly fallen snow and as thin as dandelion seeds blew free of an onyx-hued, weathered face. Even though he could only see the profile, and the features had long since lost any delicacy they’d once possessed, it was an unmistakably feminine face. A glimmer of pink eyes, like those of an albino rat, showed as the old Nightelf twisted her head around to glare at him.

  She said something in a language he didn’t recognize, though her meaning was clear enough.

  “Reachtongue?” he asked her.

  The woman seemed to struggle with that for a moment, then said with a throaty accent, “Then it is a Western marauder come to kill me.”

  “I’ve been called a marauder more than once in my day, but I didn’t come to kill. I need your help.”

  “Then perhaps you would have been better served asking for it.”

  Despite the knife to her throat, the old woman seemed to possess no fear of him. The trembling of her body, he suspected, was more from the laborious climb up to the Obelisk than terror. He considered his options. While the old woman hardly seemed a threat, she was a Nightelf, born with sorcery in her veins. However ancient she seemed, she could still be dangerous if she wanted to be.

  But didn’t my mother teach me to respect my elders? He withdrew the knife and swiftly stepped back, secreting the blade up his sleeve. “Please, accept my sincerest apologies for my boorish behavior.”

  The old woman rubbed one hand over her throat as she turned to stare at him, bushy white eyebrows lowered. “You like to hear yourself talk.”

  Tal smiled sheepishly. “I have been before accused of that quality.”

  The Nightelf shook her head, then turned away. He watched her with admiration as she completely ignored him and continued toward the tower door two dozen feet away.

  Tal tailed her. “Aren’t you going to ask what I want?”

  “Why ask when you’ll tell me?” She didn’t look around at him, but kept her head bent to her feet.

  Another smile tugged at his lips. “I think I’ll like you.”

  “I suspect I won’t.”

  They reached the tower door, and Tal studied it in surprise. Always before, the woman had pulled out a key to open it — or, he’d thought it was a key. But this door had no keyhole, nor any visible contraption to reveal one.

  “How does it open?” he wondered aloud, then added, “It’s like a riddle, isn’t it? What unlocks a door with no key, hole, or latch?”

  The Nightelf glared at him, not bothering to hide her disdain. "If you wish to enter, you will not learn the secret from me."

  "That's alright. I've always been clever with riddles."

  "No other soul has entered this tower since the day our Lord meted his punishment upon the Blue Moon Obelisk. And no other shall so long as I live."

  Tal fro
wned. "Now, that's a rather stringent measure. You sure you can’t find an alternate guideline?"

  But though he kept his tone light, his thoughts spun through idea after idea on how to enter. For he'd known as soon as he’d discovered it was an old woman he'd accosted that he couldn't kill her.

  The woman stared at him, unblinking, pink eyes swirling with the subtle glow all elves possessed. She didn't speak, but her answer was clear.

  Tal sighed. Though he didn't like to resort to it, he knew he had only choice left. Telling the truth.

  "My name is Tal Harrenfel. This side of the mountains, you've likely never heard of me, but among the Reach Realms, I—"

  "The Man of a Thousand Names." The Nightelf's eyes had widened, her puckered mouth parted as she stared. "Devil Killer. Red Reaver. Magebutcher. I know you, Tal Harrenfel. I know every story about you."

  She took a step forward, hand half-rising, and he flinched, almost stepping back. She didn't seem to notice. "Of course — I see it all now. His hair, streaked white, with scars no blade could inflict. His smile, daring and cutting, dampened by no enemy or obstacle. His eyes, hungry and lupine, that see beyond this World.”

  With every half-sung word, Tal's gut twisted all the tighter. "I wouldn't believe everything the songs say about me — they were composed by a rather unscrupulous bard.”

  The old woman wore a smile, every bit as daring and cutting as Tal’s was made out to be. “There are other names for you in the Empire. The Scourge. The Puppet. The Widowmaker. You are both enemy and ally, both feared and lauded, for all you have done against and for the Peacebringer.”

  Never had he imagined this. Tal stared at her, mouth working to find the words. “I’m flattered,” he finally managed with a weak smile.

  “But my interest in you goes beyond the tales, Tal Harrenfel. Only the truth of one matters. Who is your patron spirit?”

  “Patron spirit? I have none.” He shrugged. “I am no warlock.”

  “Then on whose side do you descend from the Heart Races?”

  His brow furrowed. “I don’t know what you mean by the Heart Races. But as far as I know, only human blood runs in my veins.” He shrugged. “Though perhaps I have a distant elven ancestor. I’m not exactly close with my father.”

  The aged woman scarcely seemed to be listening, but studied him with eyes almost feverish with desire. “I have guarded the Blue Moon Obelisk since long before you were born,” she said softly. “If I permit you to enter, then you must do something for me in turn.”

  The back of his neck prickled, but he relaxed his expression. “That only seems fair. What did you have in mind?”

  She didn’t respond, but turned and approached the door, fishing out an object that resembled a seal from within her dark robes, then pressing it to the center of the door. For a moment, nothing seemed to happen. Then, in complete silence, the door unsealed from the stone around it and swung slowly inward.

  “Come,” the old Nightelf said, eyes darting toward him as she entered. “Let us discover if we can both find the answers we have been searching for.”

  “Should I not at least know your name before I follow you into darkness?”

  “You may call me Keeper.”

  Wondering what he’d gotten himself into, Tal followed Keeper through the door and winced as it sealed shut behind them.

  He’d never loved towers.

  The day was nearly two decades past, but the memory still cut as sharp as if it were a newly honed blade. In a tower, he’d acquired the name he feared hearing the most, the name that sent him trembling, as if it were a sorcerous word to activate a long-simmering curse within him. In a tower, he’d been broken, wounded in a way that had taken years and many friendships to scar over, but had never fully healed. In a tower, one part of him had died, never to resurrect.

  The Blue Moon Obelisk made him feel no easier.

  No windows interrupted the solid stone of its walls, yet there was light, for balls of werelight flared up in dusty glass lamps mounted along the walls, illuminating their passage in ghostly, azure light. Tal followed Keeper, wondering if this tower was as cursed as the local tales would have it, wondering if he was placing himself right in the midst of them. Yet the Nightelf’s fascination with his fable had seemed unfeigned and lacking maliciousness, and he’d always considered himself sharp at sniffing out the truth in others. Unless he completely abandoned his conscience, it seemed he had to trust the bent crone. As much as I ever trust anyone.

  Though the aged woman seemed to live in the walls, he saw little sign of habitation. Dust and cobwebs hung from every corner and covered furniture long broken. Shards of glass from broken frames and goblets caught the sorcerous light and glittered like a thousand watching eyes.

  But as they ascended the spiral steps that ran the edge of the tower from one floor to another, one curious absence emerged from the chaos. Though there were innumerable bookshelves, not one of them held books.

  At his question, Keeper paused amidst the flight of stairs and peered back, pink eyes glimmering with a light of their own in the dimness. Her robes shifted with each heaving breath. “I thought the stories of what happened here in Blue Moon Obelisk drew you,” she said between pants.

  “They did. But they were not as specific as to explain this.” Tal gestured back at the last landing, where yet more empty shelves had been toppled and smashed in half.

  “Perhaps not. You know the Obelisk was condemned for heresy?”

  “Of course.”

  “Our Lord never was tolerant when it comes to unbelievers in his lands. But when he suspected Hellexa Yoreseer of fomenting heresy among his mages, it evoked in him a fury as has never been seen before.”

  Tal thought of the beasts he’d seen come down from the East, and of the demon Heyl that had burned a quarter of the elven capital Elendol before he and the defenders had put a stop to it. He’d seen his fair share of Yuldor’s fury. But he only asked, “Hellexa Yoreseer?”

  “She was the Pyramidion of this Obelisk, the sect’s leader. As one in a position of power, our Lord reasoned, she might have converted any of the mages to her beliefs. So he slew them all, and cursed this tower for her sins.”

  “If it is cursed, how do we walk its halls?”

  Keeper glanced at him. “Not all curses are meant to kill.”

  His gut twisted again, but he tried to put it from mind. If I’m cursed, I was cursed a long time ago. The thought wasn’t as reassuring as he’d hoped it would be.

  “And what of the books?”

  “Again, every precaution was taken. A cipher might be hidden in a book, or its pages ensorcelled to only reveal itself to those seeking to believe it. Thus, every tome was held suspect, and every tome burned.”

  For the first time, Tal saw another emotion in Keeper’s hard expression, one he hadn’t suspected in the aged Nightelf. She mourns them, he realized. Mourns the lost knowledge still. But what did she suspect was lost?

  There could only be one thing.

  “Hellexa Yoreseer’s legacy lives on,” he said softly. “She didn’t lose all followers when Yuldor expunged this place. She retains one, does she not? The phantom who wanders the Obelisk still.”

  Keeper’s pale eyes met his, and the hardness returned. “Just as Hellexa Yoreseer was never a heretic, neither am I. But that does not mean even our Lord does not make mistakes.”

  “What did Hellexa preach? What could she say to invoke Yuldor’s wrath? That he wasn’t a god?”

  “Never that!” the old woman hissed. “Perhaps you Western infidels do not believe, but those of the Empire never question it. How can the Peacebringer be anything but our God? No — Hellexa did not question his divinity, but that his Path was inevitable. She feared that there were those who could interfere with his plans, and even break them.”

  His skin prickled again. “Who? What do you speak of?”

  Keeper abruptly turned away and began mounting the stairs again. “Come,” she said shortly, knowing her h
ook would dig into his skin and pull him further along.

  Gritting his teeth, Tal gave way to the inevitable and climbed after her.

  When sorcery was in the air, he’d long ago discovered, it was every bit as palpable as rot in an egg.

  It wasn’t a smell, nor a taste. It wasn’t something he could see or hear or touch. Sorcery revealed itself in another sense, a sixth one, unaccounted for in the physician’s journals or the priest’s prayers. Tal’s one-time mentor, a warlock who’d taken him in when he’d had little cause to and a hundred reasons not to, had spoken of it before as a thing every worker of the World’s magic knew, yet found impossible to explain. For some, it was like the awareness of a presence before one turned to see a person enter a room. For others, it was like a weight on the bones.

  For Tal, it wasn’t a feeling outside of him, but inside. Almost, his very blood seemed to rear up at the first hint of magic, like a hound scenting its prey. And just like a hound, he always found himself eagerly seeking after it, though sorcery had ever been more a bear than a hare to him.

  As they mounted the last of the stairs onto the top landing of the Obelisk, and Keeper leaned against the wall to catch her breath, Tal felt his blood rear up in familiar acknowledgment. Only this time, the feeling was stronger than he’d ever felt before. Almost beside himself, it propelled him forward into the center of the empty room, where the feeling was strongest, and his blood seemed to sing with it.

  Trying to keep ahold of his senses, Tal turned back to the Nightelf. “This magic. Is this Yuldor’s curse?”

  She shook her head. “I long ago cleansed that.”

  When she did not continue, Tal glanced down at his feet. A circular pattern was painted in silver on the floor, and did not seem to be aged as the rest of the tower. A series of waves and swirls dominated it, coalescing into two points, one with what looked like a droplet of water at the center, the other with the symbol of a harp.