Realm Raiders – Prologue

The flame spoke to him. A flame. A piece of fucking fire and it was telling him things. Things that made no sense. All they did was convince him he was going mad. Except the voice told him his sanity wasn’t in question. It would do that though. If you doubted whether you were crazy, you didn’t go around asking fucking flames. For a time, he assumed he was dreaming but his fiery friend told him that wasn’t true either, he was awake. He stared at the flame, needing it to make sense. There were times, as it flickered and guttered, when a face appeared. At least, eyes and a mouth. The mouth looked like it moved when he heard the voice. He wanted to stick his fingers in his ears, to find out whether the voice was real or just in his head. He didn’t. That would look stupid. A grown man staring at a flame with his fucking fingers in his ears. Good thing he was on his own.

‘What do you want?’ he hissed at the flaming face.

Shit.
‘I need you to carry out a few rudimentary tasks. Your lack of intelligence is even greater than I’d anticipated, given your background, but beggars cannot be choosers. I work with what I’m given.’
Great. Now the flame was insulting him too. ‘What tasks?’
‘I need you to deliver a document to eight other individuals. It must be done with absolute secrecy, they cannot discover your involvement, they need to find the document and read it. Once they’ve done that, I can proceed to the second stage of my plan.’
‘What people? What document?’
‘I will provide you with names. I will also give you their locations and where you can find the documents. There will also be a purse with enough money to facilitate this process.’
Money. Things were looking up.
‘Don’t be so stupid as to try to steal the money. You will use it for the express purpose I have just explained. To do otherwise would be foolish and exceedingly painful.’
The flame burned blue; the face scowled at him. He believed it. The task didn’t sound too onerous. He was to deliver a document to eight people. He could do that. Despite his apparently limited intelligence. Yet, nagging at him, chewing away at his fading grasp on reality, was the fact a magic flame was the one giving him orders. Nothing good ever came from magic. Not that he’d had that much to do with it. He’d heard stories though. None of them ended happily. Or painlessly.
The flame had gone back to flicking hues of orange.
He looked around the hovel he was temporarily calling home. The candle’s light made shadows dance, this late at night, little stirred apart from the rats in the wall space. With so little work, he had to agree with the flame, beggars couldn’t afford to be choosers. Even so, one comment from his erstwhile employer gave him enough courage to ask a question. That mention of working with what he’d been given. There was no one else. If any of his life experiences had taught him anything, it was that a limited supply tended to push up prices.
‘What do I get out of all this?’ he asked.
‘Ah, there we are. I was beginning to think I’d come to the wrong person,’ said the flame, its mouth curled into a grin.
He smiled back. A compliment. That had to be good.
‘The documents you deliver will set in place a series of events which will lead to me being able to grant you enormous power and wealth. I sense that is important to you.’
‘Oh yeah!’ The offer lacked specific details but he didn’t care. Power and wealth meant he would have far more than he had now. He’d always been poor, money slipped through his fingers like water. Suddenly his doubts melted into the darkness around him. ‘So, we’d be sort of like, partners then?’
A spark jumped out and burned the back of his hand. ‘Ow!’
‘That’s a little reminder to remember your place in the grand scheme of things. You will do what I say. You will do it readily and without question. Do you understand?’
He rubbed the back of his hand, disgruntled but ready to hide his resentment. ‘I understand.’
‘Good. Now we understand our working relationship, I appreciate you will carry considerable responsibility for our mission and I will reward it, handsomely. You are a creature driven by greed, unlike your ancestor who was a man of honour. But time and ill fortune guide destiny, those forces shape and mould individuals into specimens like you. I am confident your eight peers may not be all that different, but you appeared to be the easiest to corrupt. I hope I have not offended you?’
‘No. Not at all.’ He’d been called far worse, frequently, loudly and usually accompanied with a beating. ‘What do I call you?’
‘You don’t. Our contact will be minimal. I will appear to you at such times when you will report your progress. Understood?’
‘Understood.’
‘Good. Now, you need to obtain the documents I mentioned. You know the statue in the centre of town? The memorial to the ancient heroes who defeated Vouring?’
‘Yeah.’ As a kid he’d been forced to accompany his mother to give thanks on Memorial Day. He’d never been all that clear what everyone was giving thanks for.
‘The documents are to be found in a hidden cache at the base of the statue. The money will be found there too. Now go. I will meet you there.’
The flame vanished, plunging the space into ink-black darkness. Stunned by the experience, now it was over, meant considering everything he’d heard – and felt. He rubbed the burn mark on the back of his hand. If he had any doubt about how real it all was, that pain offered a vivid reminder. That was magic for you, a means for some ruthless bastard to make others suffer. Except, on this occasion, so long as he did as he was told, he wouldn’t be one of them, he’d have wealth and power.
He stood up with a grin. After years of ball-aching misery, things were about to change.
A warm breeze blew, moonlight provided him with enough illumination to navigate his way through forest and fields, to the city. He marched along happily, imagining what he’d do with his earnings. He wasn’t sure what power his magical employer had in mind for him but that hardly mattered. Wealth did that for you. He’d buy the Lusty Wench for starters. Unlike Frinkl, he wouldn’t drink away the profits, he could make a tidy sum. He’d buy up most of the shops too, especially the dress shop where all the prim ladies went. He’d raise prices so high, they’d have to drop other things to pay him. He’d own the town, become its mayor. That would be real power.
The city was deserted. By the time he reached the memorial statue, pink and purple strands of dawn streaked across the sky. In the cupped hands of one of the heroes, water rippled strangely. He peered into its depths, only to squeak his surprise when a face gazed up at him. It was pale, lined and with eyes so fierce, he instantly felt afraid.
‘You’ve taken your time.’
‘Sorry. It’s a long way.’
‘Place a finger in the water.’
He did as he was told. A burning sensation, like acid, made him moan and bite his lip. He pulled his finger out instinctively. ‘Ow!’
‘Now place that finger beneath the bowl, you will find a recess. Push your finger into the hole.’
‘Will there be more pain.’
‘Just do it.’
He did. There was. It hurt even more.
At the base of the statue, he heard a grinding noise.
‘Take out the documents, a parchment scroll and the money. You have twenty-four hours from now to locate the eight people on the scroll. Fail to do this, you die.’
‘What? Die? How?’
‘Poison has just penetrated your skin. In twenty-four hours, you will experience terrible pain. Six hours after that you will be dead. Complete your task before that time, I will provide you with the antidote. Then you will be ready to understand your next part of the mission.’
The face in the water vanished.
‘Next part of the mission? There’d been no mention of any more tasks. But he didn’t have time to argue. He had eight people to find. To deliver a document to them without their knowledge. He felt ever so slightly guilty at whatever waited for them. It had to be worse than what he was suffering. Poor bastards.
He read the scroll with its names and locations. If he hurried, he might just make it.
He picked up the documents, there were nine, not eight. He shrugged away such insignificant detail and read one of them.

My name is unimportant. My purpose just. My imminent death, unavoidable.
Know this. Evil Exists. It lurks in corners darkened by its malevolent stain. It waits – to be found by the greedy, the ambitious and the immoral.
Defeated long ago, its corruption remains. Its physical body may be imprisoned but its energy is too primal to be contained. It is restrained in a spell that must be renewed every five hundred years. You are my descendent and as such it is your responsibility to complete this task. By reading this incantation, you will acquire the knowledge needed. Locate the three items, use them to renew the spell.
Locate the gold found in verdant glade
Hidden in sunlight is the righteous blade
To complete the ritual, open the door
Defeat the evil with blood, tooth and claw

Before . . .

Tam’s small fists were clenched so tightly his arms were shaking, though he did his best to hide it, to smile, to keep moving forwards. As he knew he must, because today was his seventh birthday and his parents had brought him to stand before Vouring. After waiting all day, The Tormentor of Worlds, Dragon of the Abyss and Eater of Light, was just moments away.
The queue to reach him was enormous, snaking around the squares and streets of the Citadel in wide loops, more people than Tam had seen in his whole life. Young and old, man and woman, ailing and hearty – all waited in line. Because, of course, everyone made the journey from their own realm to the Citadel at least once in their life. A duty and a pilgrimage, a chance to stand, to wonder. To remember. And because not to do so was bad luck.
A visit on your birthday was especially auspicious.
The bright sun clashed down on Tam’s head, weighing heavy on him. His mother passed him the flask of meltwater the village wise woman had given them. It had seemed a strange gift up in the cold and snow of the mountains. It simply hadn’t occurred to Tam that it was possible to be short of water. Now he was grateful a thousand times over.
“Drink as much as you want,” his mother said once again. “It won’t run out.”
Tam nodded. He sipped the near-freezing stream water, almost too cold in his parched mouth. The chill of it made the bones of his headache for a moment, but he didn’t mind. He drank four mouthfuls then returned it to his mother’s outstretched hand.
Squinting, he peered up at the bright walls and towers of the Citadel: white and gold and blazing red. They were approaching an arched gateway, finely carved with scenes from the Edain, the saga of the war against Vouring. Tam ran his fingers over the smooth stone, touching the figures of the nine ancient heroes as they battled the Beast. He knew the stories by heart. Everyone did. The realms were peaceful, more or less, but no one forgot the calamities that had nearly enslaved or destroyed them twelve centuries previously.
Tam took another step forwards, the shiny cobbles worn as smooth as mirrors by the passing of so many feet over the centuries. And then, looking up through the gateway, he finally saw into the central courtyard around which the Citadel had been built. There in the centre, held for all eternity by his magical bonds, stood Vouring.
The sight of the god made Tam gasp. His father placed a reassuring hand onto Tam’s shoulder. Vouring was vast, three times the height of an adult, his monstrous body huge and muscled, his flesh red. Blood-red, fire-red. The seven seals that held him were black against his skin: one on each of his four arms, one on each leg, and one around his chest, chaining him for all time to the outcropping of white rock at the centre-point of the Citadel. The bonds looked insubstantial, easily broken, but Tam knew well they were more than mere steel. They were bonds of deep magic, wrought by the spellsmiths of old to contain the Tormentor for all eternity.
Vouring’s eyes, of course, were open. Unkillable, he had been placed there alive, to experience every moment of his unending torment as punishment for his crimes. Tam had lain awake at night shaking at the prospect of standing before Vouring, but he hadn’t expected the Tormentor’s eyes to be the worst of it.
Because Vouring was watching him, his gaze boring into Tam as he was admitted by a guard into the central courtyard. The sight nearly made Tam turn and flee. Vouring’s mouth, too, was moving, uttering syllables through his sharp teeth that no one could hear or understand. The scholars of the realms had tried to understand what Vouring was saying for centuries but had never succeeded. In Tam’s nightmares, they were words of welcome to Tam. Whisperings of Tam’s own evil, his own fallen nature.
Tam’s heart thundered in his chest. Despite the heat of the day, the still air of the courtyard, he felt an extra heat burn in his cheeks. He looked away, to the nine statues set in a ring around Vouring: the ancient heroes of the Edain. They were frozen in the moment of their triumph in which they had finally weakened the Tormentor enough to capture and restrain him for all eternity. They were not, it was said, merely stone: in some of the stories, the ancient spirits of those heroes lived on in those statues, watching over their foe until the end of days.
Tam hoped it was so. He looked to their beautiful faces, seeking some reassurance, some guarantee his awful dreams would never become real. He had told no one of his darkest fear: that he, somehow, was tied to Vouring. He didn’t know why it might be true but everything in his young heart told him it was. All the bad things that happened, the cruelties and agonies of the world, they were his fault. Guilt crushed him and yet the evil creature had been captured long, long ago. It made no sense for him to feel such a strong connection, and yet he did. He had studied his own flesh for hours, fearing to see some tint of red there, some clue that Vouring’s blood ran in his veins. That Vouring was whispering across the Aether to him. He had admitted his fears to his mother once, but she had only smiled and told him not to worry. It was normal to have such dark and unreasoning worries. There was nothing to fear. There was no evil in Tam.
‘Take the blade, boy.’
A guard held out the knife to Tam, handle first. Here was the moment that Tam had feared the most: the moment of contact between him and Vouring. It might only be through the medium of the thrust blade into the Tormentor’s flesh, but it threatened contact. He worried about the possibility such a powerful being could use that interaction for its own evil purpose. He would be to blame.
Tam looked up into the impatient guard’s eyes, there was nothing he could do about it. Everyone did this. This was a part of Vouring’s punishment. Each person came to skewer a ceremonial knife into Vouring’s flesh, another wound to add to the millions inflicted over the centuries, another agony to repay the Tormentor. Vouring had no choice but to suffer each blow. The god healed rapidly; always there was enough skin for the people in the endless line to find a place to cut a mark of their own.
The handle of the blade was warm in Tam’s hand. He wondered how many times the bright steel had sliced into Vouring. No matter. He would do this thing quickly and be away. He and his family could leave the Citadel, return to their own realm, never to return. This searing, fearsome day would be only a memory.
Tam stepped forward; the blade held high as his father had shown him. He chose his location: the smooth curve of the Tormentor’s leg. There were ten or twenty other wounds there, dribbling red blood like so many ruined mouths. There were whispers coming from them, too – either that or he was imagining it. Whispers telling him to strike, telling him to fulfil his destiny, as if Vouring somehow wanted Tam to inflict this wound.
It made no sense to Tam. He just had to get this over with. He felt his arm flinch as he practised the blow in his mind one more time. Ignoring the bone-deep belief that something about this moment was very, very wrong, he struck before his own fear stopped him. The blade sliced into Vouring’s flesh and muscle, an extra heat pulsing through Tam’s hand as the connection was made.
Visions flashed through his mind: screaming faces, burning buildings, a lightning-cracked sky. Tam stepped back with a shout, leaving the blade buried in Vouring’s body. For a moment, it seemed as if no one moved, as if the world were frozen. Oddly, a shadow passed across the sun, a rare cloud on the bright hot day.
He heard laughter: deep, rumbling and malevolent. His wide eyes met the gleaming darkness of The Tormentor’s gaze, Tam finally listened to the screams of his instinct and fled the square.

Realm Raiders is written by the following authors: Phil Parker, Alex S. Bradshaw, Frank Dorrian, Rachel V. Green, Simon Kewin, Patrick Samphire, Ed Crocker, Damien Larkin, Phil Williams and Derek Power. READY TO DIVE INTO CHAPTER ONE?

Before . . .