Wayward Tail: The Mortal Realms Trilogy, Book 1

Into the Light

Ladon and Throk looked down at Artifax. They each had burned hands from where they had touched the magma covered body. Artifax's skin looked unblemished, save for a raw looking patch on his chest where the acid had struck him.

The magma had burned off all traces of hair and clothing. Before the men was the steaming body of what was once a gnome. He seemed larger to them; not so much that he had grown taller, rather that he was expanding from the inside.

Where Artifax had once had a prominent patch of scales around his right eye, now his body looked more balanced. He had skin, only it appeared stretched from the prominent scales beneath it. The area where this was most pronounced was his chest and stomach. There he had great scaly plates beneath the skin.

On his elbows protruded great gold colored horns. His eyes were still reptilian, yet were surrounded by their humanoid enclosures. He was not a man anymore. He was something else entirely.

The quivering in his body had stopped. The men knelt down beside him and watched as he recovered his breath. Artifax was mostly laying on his side, but attempted to half prop himself up. That is when he saw the body of Theradeax, and followed the blood to Throk's weaponized prosthetic.

Throk saw this progression and spoke, "I had no choice."

Artifax nodded his head. "I know."

Ladon reached out to the man on the ground. "Can you walk? The mountain appears displeased with our presence. We must go."

Artifax stood up and the men wrapped him in an old cloak. Ladon handed Artifax his staff. Throk collected the bones of his sister. And the men exited the far side of the platform.

Through the twists and turns of the mountain tunnels, they meandered for what they agreed must have been almost two days. And on the evening of the eighth day of Artifax's adventure, the men smelled fresh air and saw the light of Sehanine.