MILLENNIUM (Descendants Saga) Read online

  Malak-esh dissolved in his hand like smoke on the wind. He clawed the air for it, crying out as if in agony. “NO!” he screamed long and loud. But Malak-esh had already gone, just as its master had arranged for it to do in the event of his death.

  Morning had just broken over Beijing when Oliver arrived to do battle for the last time with Southresh. The sky had remained dark, though, as the storm reigned over the province. In Tidus, however, it was still the middle of the night when Sadie’s cries for her mother and father were heard in the palace.

  Sophia had arrived first in her daughter’s room. Lamp light was delivered through gas sconces on the wall. By the time Laish arrived in the room, Sophia was sitting on the bed with her daughter, consoling her.

  “She had a nightmare,” her mother said as Laish approached the bed. “About Oliver.”

  The child looked up at Laish, as he came around to the side where they were sitting together. “Uncle Laish, I don’t understand,” she said. “This was in my bed, when I woke.”

  Sadie held in her hand the wolf’s head cane. Malak-esh had returned to its new owner just as its former had said would happen. Oliver James would not be coming home.

  Harbinger

  The blinding sun did nothing for the cold. The ability to teleport anywhere near the location of the lock at the Tunguska River was nullified by a power neither Tom nor any of the other elf spell casters could decipher. At most, he might have been able to teleport one person in or out of the area where the lock was located—certainly not his army. They had no choice but to travel the old fashioned way—walking through the snow, outfitted with heavy clothing and furs to keep out the buffeting cold wind.

  Tom led a small army through the forested Siberian landscape. Nearly two hundred elf soldiers and spell casters had volunteered to go on this mission to stop the mysterious stranger of Donatus’s vision.

  “It might be overkill,” Tom had said to Charlotte before their departure, “but even though it won’t be an angel, it will be a very powerful Descendant. He must possess strength to call down the keystone from the heavens.”

  Tom had briefly considered leaving some of the volunteers behind in Xandrea. But, with so many willing to go, why not go all out? After all, this fight might very well determine whether or not Xandrea and Tidus and everything else in the spiritual realm survived.

  He watched Charlotte trudging through the snow just ahead. Tom regretted bringing her on this journey now. It had occurred to him that, in his father’s vision, the keystone had been called down and the Underworld opened.

  The destruction that had accompanied that event was incomparable. All of these tall trees they were winding their way through had been flattened in the blast of the vision. Everyone on this journey might very well die. Cole would be left alone without his father or mother.

  Tom considered making that argument to his wife, but he knew already what the result would be. She would insist that he come back with her. She wouldn’t want Cole to be without his father anymore than he wanted the child to be without his mother.

  But they could not turn back. Tom knew that doing nothing would ultimately kill them all. So, it was only a matter of who could be saved now. He resolved then and there not to let Charlotte die. Whatever the cost, she must survive for the sake of their son.

  His army of elves marched for hours. Twilight was already upon them by the time they found the place where the lock was located. They were still several hundred yards away.

  It was plainly visible for two reasons. First, the snow was melted around the lock, and the ground dry for nearly fifty yards. Secondly, the man he had feared would arrive to call down the legendary keystone from the sky was already there, walking toward the broad pedestal that served as the lock, securing the Underworld and its Realm of Abominations.

  I woke from a deep slumber to find it earlier than when I had gone to meet Oliver in the Atrium. Laish had been there in his place, which had been odd, and I had felt dizzy soon after coming to speak with Laish. I hadn’t felt the least bit ill prior to that moment. The time of my waking told me that I had slept at least until the next day, which was bad enough, but I hoped it hadn’t been more than that.

  No one was in the room. I whipped the covers away; inspecting myself to make sure I had no visible wounds. Nothing. However, my shoulder was a little sore. I leaped out of bed—someone had changed me into a set of bed clothes—bounding over to the closest mirror in the room. Turning my shoulder to the looking glass, I found a small welt there. It was in just the right place to have been inflicted by Laish. I remembered telling him that I had been stung.

  I had a bad feeling about this. Sophia wasn’t here either. There was no way she had not found out precisely what had happened to put me in this bed. Was Laish in custody? Where was Oliver? Had we missed our opportunity to rid the world of Southresh?

  “You’re awake, Daddy?”

  I turned to the balcony. Sadie had come up the side of the palace and hopped the balustrade. This was nothing new for my little girl. She got that sort of thing from her mother. She had explored every nook and cranny of the palace, if not the city, by now.

  “Yes, sweetheart,” I replied as she bounced into the room with sunlight illuminating her hair.

  “Mother said you weren’t feeling well,” she said. “You’ve been asleep since last night. Do you feel better? I had a nightmare about Uncle Oliver last night. When I woke, his wolf’s head cane was in my bed. Mother said we would talk about that later, after you felt better. Is now a good time?”

  Ever full of questions, Sadie had not noticed when I stopped breathing. I was still alive, of course, but my mind had gone numb when Sadie mentioned her nightmare about Oliver and the sudden appearance of Malak-esh in her bed. Still, there was the chance I was just overreacting—misinterpreting what my daughter was saying. A little early morning disorientation could do that to a person.

  “Where is your uncle this morning?” I asked.

  “He went on a trip,” she said “Odd that he would leave Angel Fire behind.”

  My daughter was not so naïve as she pretended. Her questions were meant to catch me off guard. She was looking for answers, playing at ignorance.

  I sighed heavily. She was right. That was impossible. Oliver would never leave without Malak-esh. I only knew of one time when he had parted with it—to allow Tom and Charlotte the opportunity to destroy Hageddon’s host. Other than that it never left him—would never leave him—not while he lived.

  Cole arrived within the courtyard of the giant’s castle in the mountainous wilderness of Greystone. The main gate was closed behind him. The castle doors remained barred. There was no sign of the goblins Ishbe had mentioned. However, Cole knew that his master spoke the truth—even when it hurt, he spoke the truth. That brutal honesty was something he had come to expect over the five years he had known the Lycan warrior.

  Still, the truth was better than being shielded from it. If he was deficient, he must know in order to improve. While his parents might spare his feelings for the sake of love, his master would tell him regardless of its emotional effect—in spite of it. He knew that Ishbe cared. But his caring was the kind that sought to improve his weaknesses.

  There would be goblins here, but that didn’t mean they would be waiting out here in the cold for him. He would have to go in after them, find them and destroy them. Only then would he have fulfilled his master’s commission. Only then would Greystone be safe from these invaders.

  He knew from his studies of the various Descendant races that goblins employed a defensive invisibility whenever they felt threatened. Trolls were able to do the same thing, but there weren’t many things that could actually threaten a troll.

  Both of these races also possessed the ability to see heat as part of their visual field. So, Cole had several problems to deal with immediately. He had to know how many goblins he was dealing with and their locations. He would need to infiltrate the castle and spy out this information without
alerting them, or being seen.

  Fortunately, as a vampire, his heat signature would be less noticeable. Vampires could tolerate lower temperatures than humans already. He was quick and possessed the ability to go unseen by prowess, but his master had forbidden him to use teleportation as a means until he was ready to return home. All part of the test, and he meant to pass with flying colors.

  Cole spotted all of the windows that were located on the front of the castle. Like the goblins, he could employ invisibility, though his method was by spell casting alone. A complex hand gesture rendered him unseen as he made his way to the castle wall. He would avoid the doors completely.

  Using his natural ability as a vampire, he became a small raven, like his mother’s animal form, and hopped into the air, taking flight. He wound his way around the castle, flying higher and higher until his found the topmost window in the tallest tower. He had decided that he would spy out the castle as completely as possible from the top down.

  The raven lit upon the stone window seal, surveying the glass that kept him at bay. A phasing spell allowed him to pass through the glass—a near cheat on teleportation—but he took the liberty anyway. Cole became human in form again, finding no one presently occupying the small tower room. He took the simple stone stair winding down from the perimeter through the inside of the tower toward the lower levels.

  As he might have predicted, all of the spaces and furnishings in the castle were oversized for the first occupants. Cole found that he did not know a great deal about the giants, other than the fact that there remained very few of them. To his knowledge, there were none at all in Greystone anymore. Otherwise, they might have taken over this castle years ago, instead of it remaining empty for the goblins to find it.

  The first signs of life in the castle were found on the third level where bedchambers were located. Cole crawled silently in the dark shadows along the ceiling. It had occurred to Cole’s father that, when looking for him, the first place to investigate was the ceiling. Such was Cole’s fixation with roaming around inverted like a spider, or a fly.

  The goblins on this level, however, never once looked up at him. Here he found each of several bedrooms occupied with three or four or five goblins at a time. Cole remained on the corridor ceiling, looking in, but he did not attack any of them.

  Already he was attempting to formulate some plan of attack that wouldn’t quickly have him outnumbered. After all, he was small in stature by far compared to these goblins. The likelihood of successfully destroying these invaders in hand to hand combat was diminishing rapidly with every new group he spotted.

  Cole knew he would have to find another way. He had not come to die in a blaze of glory. He had come to defeat the enemy, leaving none of them alive to bring harm to his people or his family. Then it occurred to him how he might do it. He didn’t need to defeat the goblins so much as the castle around them.

  He continued his investigation, proceeding down through each successive level until he came to the basement. Here Cole found what he had been looking for. There were many dry goods and supplies, tools and even barrels of wine. In addition to these, there was an ample supply of weapons—swords, shields, spears and armor—all of it made for use by the giants.

  Also, in crates packed away from everything else, was a supply of explosives. The Descendants, like anyone else, had taken to employing the weapons of the time. And, what better method to create mass destruction than with dynamite manufactured in the mortal world?

  Cole’s education had not been left incomplete by his master. Ishbe had instructed him in the use of all manner of melee type weapons, firearms, hand to hand combat styles, chemistry, herbs and medicines, even sewing. You never knew when you might be forced to stitch up your own wounds, after all. Cole could even disassemble and reassemble a simple steam engine. And he had been trained in the use of explosives like these.

  He located a spool of wire and several blasting caps among the supplies. Several plunger boxes had been left to consumption by dust and cobwebs on a nearby shelf. He grabbed one and went to work.

  Trailing the wire off of the spool, Cole made his way back towards the stairs. He came to the first landing, heading for the main level and stopped to wire the leads on the plunger box. When he was finished, he inspected his work. With what the giants had kept in store down here, the entire support structure for the castle would be demolished by the initial blast. The rest of the building would cave in upon itself, finishing the job he had been sent to do here.

  Sounds he had not expected to hear filtered down to him. Cole distinctly heard the laughter of children at play. He left the plunger in the up position. Without a significant downward push it would not generate the charge necessary to set off the caps and the explosives.

  He took on the form of a black rat and squeezed under the door onto the main level. The great hall he had come through before was now bustling with small goblins—children playing a game of tag as near as he could tell. Why were they here in this castle? Wasn’t this an invasion of his homeland?

  Cole made his way through the room, darting between the shadows and furnishings. He had not counted on having to kill children. Surely, this could not be Ishbe’s will. Whatever the older goblins were planning, these were just innocents caught in the crossfire.

  The black rat darted out from under a table, heading for a dark corner of the room where he could observe better. A clawed hand pounced on him suddenly. Cole turned his dark muzzle toward the one who had snatched him up. He was headed for goblin fangs.

  Cole erupted from the goblin child’s hand, returning to human form.

  “Ah!” the child cried.

  “A changeling!” shouted another.

  “An elf?”

  “A vampire!”

  “Kill him!”

  Cole leaped over the table with goblin children running after him. They bashed through the table and chairs, scurrying about in confusion, looking for him. He rounded a corner as an adult goblin became visible in front of him.

  Committed to his path, he tried to duck beneath the goblin’s sword. He received a foot to the side of the head instead that sent him sprawling back into a corner against the wall. He recovered quickly, only to find swords and spears pointing at him from every angle.

  “What have we here?” one of the males asked.

  “A vampire child,” another adult answered.

  “Its parents can’t be far behind,” the first observed.

  “Let us have him,” some of the children complained. “We’ll play with him.”

  These children had knives in their hands, ready to peel his flesh from his bones. Why had he felt sorry for them?

  “Where are your parents?” the first male asked, prodding his spear toward Cole.

  He did not reply.

  “Let’s just beat the information out of him,” another said.

  “We want him!” the children complained. “We want his head for a ball!”

  More adult goblins were coming to investigate behind these. Soon, it would be difficult to escape. He decided to take a chance for the sake of information.

  “Are you planning on invading Greystone?” Cole asked, using his meek voice to disarm their aggression.

  “Who told you that?” one of the adults asked.

  “Does their queen know?” another asked.

  “Who told you that?” the first asked again, prodding with his spear.

  Cole had heard enough. Ishbe had been right about an invasion. It was time to finish his mission.

  He stepped forward as the spear came near. Cole snapped his foot out behind the spearhead, cracking the wooden shaft in two. He somersaulted backward, landing with his feet flat on the wall. Springing up from the wall, he became a raven again, soaring across the room as weapons were hurled after him.

  Cole landed in human form near the basement door where he had come under as a rat moments before. A goblin tackled him. They crashed through the wooden door, tumbling down the stone st
air to the first landing.

  Reaching out, Cole grabbed the plunger box by the handle. The goblin grabbed his arm, realizing what he had a hold of. The box fell on its side, leaving him no leverage to push the handle.

  “I’ll tear you apart!” the goblin threatened, as others appeared on the stair behind them.

  Still holding the handle of the plunger box, Cole slid it hard across the stones into wall. When the base hit the wall, the handle sank into the box. The plunger gear whined, releasing a current through the terminals.

  Cole vanished out of his captor’s arms, and white light bathed the stair where the goblins, wide-eyed, were waiting. Their screams were instantly drowned out in the blast.

  Cole appeared on the mountain below the castle as the explosion blew out the foundation and the main level. The upper levels were engulfed as they toppled into the inferno. The towers fell also, topping the heap of stone that had once been the giant’s castle and the potential launching point for a goblin offensive against his people.

  He looked back on the destruction he had caused. He wouldn’t allow emotions to interfere with what had been necessary. Still, he was a bit shaken up. Cole had never killed anyone before.

  He tried to stay calm. A rush of adrenaline was still flooding his body. He had considered, for a moment, the possibility of not destroying the goblins. He still couldn’t fathom why goblin children were present where an assault on his people had been organizing. Perhaps the goblins simply taught their people war from a young age.

  Then he remembered his own age. His master had been teaching him the tactics of warfare from the time he could walk. At age seven, he had just killed numerous enemies and prevented an attack upon his home. War was the way of the world, it seemed. And he now had his place in it.