Out of The Darklands

By Daniel E Myers

Things are happening outside Foresight which no one is aware of. But just because they don't happen in the big city doesn't mean they are not important. While our heroes are enjoying jubilee, plans of the Golden Aelf are being set in motion. Soon, they will be revealed, but will Foresight find out to late?

• Language: English
• Publisher: Wyvern's Aerie
• Release date: Jul 22, 2023
• ISBN: 9798986732039

Book preview

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A Gathering Darkness

25th of Frendalo, Year 1124 After the Great War (AGW)

Just Outside the Darklands

Grendall and Vorinelle crept slowly into the darkness. The two Copper Aelf wore their standard traveling clothes, which were deceiving. Vorinelle had spent the last several years apprenticing to the Thieves Guild in Cairthorn. His traveling clothes included a heavy leather gambeson with decorative silver polygons. The polygon placement was such that the coat acted as quite functional armor, particularly with the enchantments on the ornaments. Grendall had just become a full mage. She cast her best spell, spirit armor, when they entered. It usually shimmered, but as soon as they had entered the Darklands, the shimmer ceased. She hoped the protections did not fade as well.

The light from the enchanted stone they had thrown was barely visible. The distance they could see it from had slowly shrunk as they got further into the Darklands. It seemed to be a steady five paces now. They cautiously walked toward it. Upon reaching it, they checked their compass, marked their map, and tossed it again. By their estimation, they were a hursmarc inside the Darklands.

As they crept up to the stone, they listened closely for signs of any activity. The Golden Aelf had taken over this land. To date, none who had stayed in the Darklands for more than a couple of hours had come out to tell the tale. They had been inside for several hours now. Grendall picked up the stone with a velvet-gloved hand once again and tossed it ahead.

Clunk. 

Vorinelle let out a small gasp. Clearly, the stone had hit something. They could see a vague black shape in the faint light cast by the stone. Preparing for an attack, they separated, Vorinelle drawing his sword while Grendall pulled a glowing dagger from its sheath. Noting no movement, they deliberately approached. There appeared to be a black void next to the stone. Lifting the stone from the ground, they investigated it more closely. There was a cylindrical object which seemed to emanate darkness. Vorinelle placed his hand on the object. It was solid and warm to the touch. 

Grendall pulled out a small wooden rod from its case and moved the tip toward the cylinder. 

Wait! cautioned Vorinelle. We can only use the wand once. Do we want to waste it on this?

Of course. Then we are returning to the keep. If the paladins want us to investigate further, we will, but only after they give us another of these. 

We are barely even inside the borders. 

Vorinelle, we have been inside the Darklands longer than anyone who has returned. Maybe that is why they don’t return. They keep going until they run into something. We will return if the paladins wish us to, but we are going back to report what we have found. 

Grendall placed the rod against the cylinder and yelped when the cylinder disappeared, revealing a naked aelf male lunging at Vorinelle. Vorinelle slashed wildly at the emaciated body. Something blocked his sword; it bounced off with another clunk. Meanwhile, the aelf slumped forward before slowly collapsing to the ground. Grendall’s heart was pounding madly. It was several seconds before she could speak. 

He looks dead. 

No, I can see him still breathing. He looks like a Great Aelf. What in the Spirits’ name is a Great Aelf doing here? 

I don’t know. Should we try to help him or report it back to the paladins? 

Let’s try to help. He doesn’t look too heavy. We could probably carry him back with us. 

They moved closer to the body and found an invisible force around him. 

He’s in a spirit cage, I think, Grendall said after inspecting it more closely. Chwala la hudd. 

With a slight gush of wind, the aelf fell all the way to the ground with a groan. 

Tá sé go maith. We have you, Vorinelle whispered as he cradled the aelf’s head. 

Slowly rolling him on to his back then raising his shoulders, he got him into a sitting position. Grendall grabbed the aelf’s arms and helped Vorinelle raise him to his feet so Vorinelle could hoist him over his shoulder. Carrying him, they followed their compass back toward the edge of the darkness. Almost an hour later, they emerged, seeing their horses in the outcropping of rock a hundred paces away. 

That’s strange, mentioned Vorinelle, after they had walked nearly fifty paces. I thought we had left the horses closer. 

They carried the aelf to their horses, securing him in the saddle in front of Vorinelle. They estimated two days' travel back to Silver Cross Keep unencumbered, three with the aelf male in tow. They decided they would go to Westmoor first, hopefully running into a patrol of some sort. Riding the rest of the day and into the night, they stopped at the hamlet of Castaway. 

There were no inns, so they set up their tent next to a cottage which had no smoke coming from the chimney. With the moon peeking above the horizon, Vorinelle agreed to take watch while Grendall slept the four hours until near dawn. They would strike camp and leave the hamlet before sunrise.

***

Darkhome

Aduialon Ceannaire Uasal looked over the aelf gathered in the great cavern. If not for his ability to see in the dark, he would not have been able to see any of them. No light made it this deep into the caverns below the keep. There were no torches casting their meager illumination. The Golden Aelf had adapted to their new home, requiring no light. Their skin still had the same metallic sheen, as gold ore was still rich in the ground of the Sleeping Dragon mountains. Their main adaptation to living underground was that their bodies had become bulkier and more muscled from working with stone and metal instead of leaves and timber. 

He had spent the last sixteen years building this army after the victory over Darkhome. He lost too many warriors, too many priests, and all but a half dozen of his mages in that victory. He had planned that attack carefully, and his soldiers executed it exactly to his plan. But he had made mistakes in his planning. In hindsight, one mistake he had made was to bring the mages to the front. Too many died before they could get into range of their magics. They had learned the same spells all the human war mages used. But there were human mages who were frustratingly more powerful than the aelf could muster. Fortunately, those human mages were all dead now.

He should have known that the humans would outrange them. In his defense, it was those damned Paladins of the Great Tree who had really destroyed his army. In the end, only subterfuge won the day; his army was all but destroyed. Less than one in a hundred soldiers remained of the absolute best of the Golden Aelf Army. A Candetine victory maybe, but it was a victory. His solace was that the Great Aelf paladins paid for their betrayal and would continue to pay until they died.

This attack would not be the same. He had learned from his mistakes, conscripting and training half again the number of soldiers for this attack as he had at Darkhome, albeit only half were from the warrior caste. While his mages were not as strong as the mages in his previous army, he had used them to enchant armor and weapons for the last several years to make his soldiers worth five of the accursed humans. He also had a small cadre of veterans from that fight. They trained the soldiers how to fight the humans. This time, they would destroy the human armies, convincing the other Aelf nations to join them in ridding the world of the vermin.

The assault on Darkhome had taught him that his force would be no match for the human army, unless he achieved surprise. So, he designed his plans so once again deception could win the day rather than force of arms. He hoped that the grendlaar would overwhelm the human army and force them to pull their entire army outside the castle walls. Then his full plan could begin.

Aduialon proceeded to the meeting of his war council where he addressed the small group of commanders seated around the table. It disgusted him that two of them were grackles. No one really knew how the grackles came to be created, but they were the nobility of the grendlaar kingdoms. Larger than aelf, but not as large as humans. They looked nothing like the grendlaar race. They had long, oversized forearms and biceps, broad, muscular shoulders, but narrow chests and waists. Scales covered their upper arms, while the lower arms looked like boiled leather with thick, coarse, black fur. 

Their legs were over half their height and they had scale-covered upper legs with hairy, thin lower legs that looked like a horse’s, except for the clawed feet they stood upon. Their faces were snouted with black noses, small razor-sharp fangs lining their mouths. Their eyes were yellow, with pink or red, oblong-shaped irises. They had no hair on an external skull that looked more like horn than bone protecting their heads. 

Welcome, everyone. With our new allies, Aduialon began, giving a nod to Graelshnar, the elder of the two grackles, "we shall begin the attack on Nighthome in one week. Graelshnar will attack with his army in two columns from the east. The Golden Trees will wait until they