The Light Stone Apprentice: Book One of the Soul Stone Trilogy

By William Shirley

In a world where magic is reduced to almost mere legend an orphan boy finds himself in a deadly plot. He faces dark powers, treachery, fear, and uncertainty as he struggles to gain the knowledge he needs to not only save himself but maybe the world.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Xlibris US
• Release date: Jan 9, 2018
• ISBN: 9781543470871

William Shirley

William Shirley is a longtime fan and author of short stories of the Fantasy Genre. After years of being influenced by authors such as Robert Jordan, Brandon Sanderson, and Anne McCaffrey he started on the long journey of creating his own novel. The Novel, The Light Stone Apprentice, is a work that has been coming together since his first award winning short story based on the same world in 2003.

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The Light Stone Apprentice

Book One of the Soul Stone Trilogy

William Shirley

Copyright © 2018 by William Shirley.

Library of Congress Control Number:         2017918658

ISBN:                      Hardcover                         978-1-5434-7089-5

                                Softcover                           978-1-5434-7088-8

                                eBook                                978-1-5434-7087-1

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the copyright owner.

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to any actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

Any people depicted in stock imagery provided by Thinkstock are models, and such images are being used for illustrative purposes only.

Certain stock imagery © Thinkstock.

Rev. date: 01/09/2018

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CONTENTS

Prologue

Chapter 1     Young man’s motivation

Chapter 2     The difference soup makes

Chapter 3     Everything changes in the light

Chapter 4     What a hood can hide

Chapter 5     Hard decisions

Chapter 6     There is magic in the world

Chapter 7     The grave can’t hold what it doesn’t understand

Chapter 8     Night time answers

Chapter 9     A little bit of knowledge goes along way

Chapter 10   At the beginning of learning is hardship

Chapter 11   The pen is indeed mighty

Chapter 12   To light a flame

Chapter 13   Vows of service

Chapter 14   Road grinds the stone

Chapter 15   Field of stones

Chapter 16   Village of trouble

Chapter 17   Lessons from light

Chapter 18   Fight right outside of light

Chapter 19   The next step is sometimes the hardest

Chapter 20   The wait

Chapter 21   Light with four elements

Chapter 22   The power fear unleashes

Chapter 23   A job never done

Chapter 24   Bodies to the Pyre

Chapter 25   First field of battle

Chapter 26   The Show of Light

Chapter 27   A new day and old problem

Chapter 28   The heart can be stubborn

Chapter 29   Back in the right direction

Chapter 30   First test of force

Chapter 31   The maze of the heart

Chapter 32   A taste of distraction

Chapter 33   Darkness from darkness

Chapter 34   Friends in a trial are friends indeed

Chapter 35   To show mercy can condemn you

Chapter 35   Pain of feelings

Chapter 36   The teacher with his foot down.

Chapter 37   Decisions can pain you

Chapter 38   The face that pulls the strings

Chapter 39   A Tinker with bad news

Chapter 40   A friends knife cuts the deepest

Chapter 41   Placed in dark hands

Chapter 42   First signs of discord

Chapter 43   Whispers in the forest

Chapter 44   Consequences of wandering attention

Chapter 45   Hanzar the Bold

Chapter 46   Put to the sword

Chapter 47   Betrayal is hard on the soul

Chapter 48   Some things you can’t take back

Chapter 49   Light doesn’t cast a shadow

Chapter 50   The heart wins all

Chapter 51   The feel of devastation

Epilogue

About The Author

Prologue

T he wizened old man’s shoes made a soft scoffing sound as he ambled to the window. He looked out `of his tower towards the bright moon that appeared to be just on the other side of the valley. After surviving six worlds and living through so many millennia he had lost count, the sight of a harvest moon still made him feel full of energy.

The old man smiled, I love nights where the illusion makes the moon look close enough you could almost touch it.

A soft mewling sound behind him answered back. The man turned to see Clow looming over the fire at the back of the small chamber. He was a tall boy at over eight foot high and at only nine years old the giant was not even close to his full height. He motioned the boy to approach the center of the room. He began shuffling toward the center himself while building up some energy. He took a little longer than Clow reaching the center. His bones had never felt so old. In the center of the room he snapped his fingers. The dust in the room started swirling in the air and slowly small wooden pieces started forming out of the dust. With another motion of his hands the pieces coalesced into a sturdy chair. The chair plopped down ungracefully onto the center of the floor.

The old man sighed, I use to be so much better with this stuff Clow but that is neither here nor now. Come and listen. I feel the stirring of magic on the wind tonight my boy. When you leave here take a letter to Hanzar and tell him to follow the directions perfectly. We must choose tonight whether to follow the path of the villain or of the hero. In either case we will unite this world before The True Night arrives. I both fear and hope that the magic is trying to tell the world that my old friend once again walks with us. I must make plans for her host if that is the case. If it is not her but the other one that is loose, may the creator preserve our souls?

Chapter 1

Young man’s motivation

W ith the moon full at its zenith, the streets were filled with an eerie light. Kalan was used to the dark, and normally, on a night this bright, he would have preferred to stay hidden and wait for a darker and quieter evening. The only problem was the last few nights hadn’t been any better, and the hunger gnawing at his stomach was starting to feel like it was reaching to his spine.

Kalan slipped out of a dark doorway to another shadow under a hanging brothel sign. Something felt wrong tonight. The air was charged with power and the moon seemed brighter than he thought it should be. Not by much, and it was probably just his nerves, but something felt off. His stomach chose that moment to send a little spasm of pain and hunger up his body. If he hadn’t spotted the potential easy mark walking past his safe hole earlier, he might have convinced his stomach to wait until morning. As it was, he found himself stealing out from under the sign and following the man.

To any casual passerby, the man would appear to belong here in the poor district. He had a worn old cloak, a hole-ridden tunic, and a dark hood that covered what looked like shaggy shoulder-length hair. Unfortunately for him, Kalan spotted the lie. The rich, in Kalan’s opinion, always had a flaw. They couldn’t live without the luxury money provided. The expensive riding boots that didn’t belong on a disguise like that gave Kalan the impression that this man hid his wealth and maybe a fat purse.

Kalan quickly realized this guy was trying to cover the fact he was lost. The man walked like he was on a mission, with his back straight, not even eyeing the beautiful girls out front of the brothels as he passed. He also kept his knife hand in his cloak and slowed at every intersection, like he was looking for something. The man, being on guard, was going to make this more difficult, but Kalan was the best cutpurse in the city. His former guild boss Dag had told him so many times. The bigger guilds had all banned Kalan from their territories, saying he kept stealing from their high-end clients and that it was embarrassing to them. Dag’s thieves’ guild, The Stones, had been the last to welcome him. After Dag became ill and died, the new leadership had immediately given Kalan the boot. Oh, Kalan could have given fealty to one of the gangs in the poor district and lived better off than he currently did but he couldn’t bring himself to give his loyalty to a gang. He never could understand how anyone could trust a group that consisted of assassins, bruisers, cutthroats, cutpurses, and other killers. You couldn’t make friends with people with blood on their hands. Kalan knew that it was a good way to end up with a knife in his back. Friends were just people who would kill you later or whom you felt bad for killing once they gave you a reason.

Kalan was brought out of his thoughts when the man suddenly spun around in the street. Kalan ducked behind a sign and waited as the man made up his mind and headed down an alley on the left. Kalan, seeing his opportunity, made his move. In three steps, he was behind the man, and his hand was under his cloak. As Kalan had thought, a huge purse was tucked in the man’s belt, and it came loose in a quick motion of his dagger. Kalan bolted to a side street and made for one of his safe holes.

Tucked away in a gap between two shops and hidden behind some old crates, Kalan inspected the purse. Three gold crowns, fourteen silver wings, and five copper marks spilled out into Kalan’s hand—a fortune for sure. These coins would feed him for months, maybe even a year. The brothel at the corner of Third and King Streets had a kitchen that served heaping bowls of vegetable and broth soup for a copper each. A gold crown was worth ten silver wings, and a silver wing was worth twenty copper marks. So if he didn’t splurge on any bread or meat, he had almost nine hundred bowls of soup in his hand.

It was strange to hold a fortune and still think of soup, but he was hungry. Grand plans could come later once his stomach quit yelling. He shook his head at his own stupidity. This may be more money than Kalan had ever held in his life, but it wouldn’t get him anything while kneeling in this hole. He needed to make his way to a cleaner and safer part of the district. He dropped the coins into a hidden pouch under his armpit, only leaving out five coppers, which he placed back into the purse and, with a bit of string, tied it to his belt and left his hiding place.

Chapter 2

The difference soup makes

W hen Kalan got to the brothel he stopped across the street. The brothel was a well-made stout wood building with a sign hanging to the side of the front door. The sign was yellow with a single image of a bright red ring of lace in the center. The street was well lit even at this late hour. The sounds of music and laughter washed over Kalan as someone opened the front door and entered the busy brothel. Mama Veti wouldn’t like a boy of fifteen strolling through the lobby during her peak hour so Kalan slid into an alley and approached the back of the establishment. The cook would still have soup heating and they never locked the back door in case a rich customer didn’t wish to be seen entering from the street. They still risked being seen even at the back door but The Scarlet Garter was the closest brothel to the business district and was considered the best brothel in Absheree. Kalan opened the door and walked into the heavenly smells of the brothel kitchen. The heavyset female cook named Cortie saw him entering and smiled.

So what will it be tonight, Master Kalan? Ms. Veti just purchased two Salivalin girls last month. Tonight will be their first time working. They are about your age as well.

Kalan just gave her a disgusted look. Cortie thought a good woman was the answer to all men’s troubles, but truth be told, he didn’t much care or even think about women. Kalan thought it was hard enough to survive. Who had time for niceties? Who would want to be that close to another human for that long? He suppressed a full-body shiver. Cortie always seemed to act like there was some joke in this that he just wasn’t getting. This time, he wouldn’t rise to her bait.

He was too hungry for pleasantries, A bowl of your finest copper soup, Cortie.

Cortie smiled good-naturedly and waved him to a sidebar. The people who came in for soup were supposed to eat out back at crates that were left stacked just for that purpose. Recently Cortie had been making sure he sat near the fire while eating. Also, the meat of the soup was for actual patrons of the brothel, but Cortie usually slipped a chunk into the bottom of his bowl when no one else was around. As Kalan set down to his bowl, not only did he have a piece of meat but Cortie walked over to the cat bowl and picked up a piece of stale bread and brought it over. I’m guessing you are not too proud to take the cat’s bread. I just dropped it in the bowl, and he hasn’t touched it yet. He has been lazy lately anyway, so I figured it would be better if you had it.

Kalan swallowed the prideful little voice that tried to surface and took the little hard piece of bread, thanking Cortie. He submerged the bread in the soup to soften it and looked up at Cortie. Here. I don’t want you getting in trouble for not taking the copper.

Kalan opened the coin purse on his belt and handed her a copper. As he went to tie the purse back to his belt, he felt something odd that he hadn’t seen earlier. After making sure that Cortie had walked to the drop box to place the copper, Kalan reached into the purse and pulled out the other object. It was a bluish purple crystal about as long as a two finger joints and as big around as his thumb. It was mostly transparent except for a faint smoky image of a star floating in the center, which was barely visible.

What is that? Something given to you by a lover mayhap? Cortie’s sudden comment made him jump. He had been so wrapped up in examining the object that he had forgotten he wasn’t alone.

No, just something I found in the ditch two streets down, Kalan lied. I just thought it interesting. With that, he pocketed the object and finished his soup. Before leaving, he thanked Cortie and used the basin to wash his bowl.

Once on the street, he headed to his favorite safe hole, which had a candle and light sticks, to examine the object better. If it was worth something, then he could sell it. The problem was he had no idea what it could possibly be.

As Kalan left the brothel kitchen, Cortie sighed. The squeak of the door made Cortie look behind her. You spoil him too much, Mama Veti said from the door that led to the common room.

I know, but there is something within him that is so much more than what he lets people see. How many young whelps come in during a day for soup? Twenty maybe, maybe more, and how many wash their bowl? Cortie paused for a moment. One. She turned to look at Mama Veti. I bet if I could get him in the arms of a girl, he would settle down by a good measure, maybe get a real job.

Mama Veti laughed so sharply that a short snort escaped her lips. No, Cortie, I don’t think that would be the way to tame that one. No, don’t look at me that way. I don’t think he would trust anyone whom we trapped him in the room with, and he definitely wouldn’t thank us later. Just let him be. He will find his way out of this dump and will hopefully never look back. The good ones always do.

Cortie nodded and kissed the gold ring that hung from her necklace. May it be so, Mistress.

Chapter 3

Everything changes in the light

K alan eased into the opening of his home. It was the largest safe hole , as he called them that he kept. In truth, he had found it about six years ago while running from some thugs he had robbed. They had almost caught him, and in desperation, he had squeezed himself between two herbal shops and found a secret entrance. It seemed to him that when they had repaired the second story of the stable behind the herb shop on the right, they had accidentally left a square hole big enough for a man to squeeze through. It took a slight jump to reach the lip of the hole, but once through the entrance, there was a compartment big enough to stand in with no entry or exit into the stable itself. It was big enough for a pallet and had a loose board near the south wall, which he had turned into a stash of sorts underneath. He was a realist though, so he knew that one day he would come back here, and everything would be gone, or the stable would go under repair and they would notice the missing space. Right now though, as he stood up, he was comforted to see everything as he had left it a week ago. His curiosity was beating him into examining the strange crystal stone piece, but with a full belly and daylight approaching, he decided it could wait till after he got some rest.

Kalan woke to the smell of smoke, not the comforting smell of a campfire or that of a kitchen hearth but that acrid smoke of wrongness. The smell told of a fire that was burning not only wood but also anything it could reach. He was up in an instant. Light spilled into his home from the opening. He stopped and listened but there weren’t any shouts coming from the stable, so it was daylight, and the fire wasn’t in the stable itself. Kalan got up and quickly checked his coins and daggers before darting out the hole. When he hit the street he froze. Before him half of the city was ablaze or covered in smoke. He quickly grabbed ahold of the stable roof and pulled himself up for a better view. Kalan could see that it was burning from the edge of the business district all the way to the worse part of the slums.

Kalan’s heart went to ice. If you used a little imagination, it appeared that most of the fire matched the route of the stranger he had stolen from last night. He tried to convince himself that it had to be just his nerves and strange coincidence. The dream he had last night was disturbing and the feelings were now leaking over to real life. In his dream, a little man had been following him and writing down every move he made. The little man had destroyed with fire every item or person Kalan had interacted with. He knew dreams weren’t real but the chill running down his spine was. He strained his eyes toward the business district and his heart stuttered when he spotted smoke coming from near the