Sons of Ironstorm - Book 2: Griffon's Call

Fighting Mist and Smoke

Into his suddenly unsteady mind, Lawrence cried in eerie repeat of what the constable had said beside him before dying: 'What manner of madness is this; that my enemy can strike me from any direction without being seen?' he thought wildly as he fought to push back the pain and regain his feet.

By shear will, Lawrence forced the pain to ease. As his senses cleared, they swiftly sent a chill through him at what his ears brought him: the sound of boots running all around him. On the boardwalk, on the ground: it didn't matter. He was completely surrounded. If they belonged to his attackers, then he was in trouble, deep trouble; especially if those attackers remained invisible.

It was as he struggled to stand that his realization triggered a memory of something he had heard a couple of months ago about a series of unexplained attacks in the Hammer kingdoms. According to the report he remembered reading, confirmed by operatives some time later, a handful of attacks had been perpetuated against random targets by creatures witnesses described as able to be visible or invisible at will. The creatures swiftly earned the name 'wraith' and had sown chaos amongst all the kingdoms east of the Giant's Teeth.

Lawrence carefully raised his head to avoid the agony of a sudden shift. Aye, the sounds remained, disembodied as they raced all around him, with no other evidence to suggest that he was anything but alone. The pieces fell rapidly into place: no natural disaster had befallen the crown jewel of Talemon. They were under attack from wraiths.

"Show yourselves, creatures of shadow," he barked, hoping to goad one into visibility, "and I'll show you who holds the real power!"

The bold declaration elicited a round of phantom laughter, the source of the malevolent jocularity as elusive as the owners of the footfalls Lawrence heard earlier.

"Real power is the ability to act according to one's will, Your Highness," a voice, only slightly more solid than the laughter, spoke out of midair, its tone dripping with venomous sarcasm and bile. "And here, the wraiths have the ability to do whatever they wish. So who truly holds the power? You, and your tiny dagger? Or us, invisible and able to strike whenever, and wherever we desire?"

"You will make yourselves visible, wraith. Or, as the Maker as my witness, I'll order every wizard in this city to insure nothing gets in or out until we hunt you down by whatever means possible!" Lawrence tightly promised.

Again he heard the wispy laughter.

"We'll be gone before, ..." the voice began before cutting off abruptly as the ground trembled underfoot.

'What was this?' Lawrence wondered as he dropped his gaze to the ground between his booted feet. 'Some new kind of wraith attack?' So he would've gone on to assume, if he hadn't heard the wraiths cursing as loudly as their phantom forms would allow. Whatever shook the ground was managing to reach them as well. Despite his own trepidation at the quivering beneath him, the young prince felt a smile twitch his lips upward. 'That'll teach those bastards a lesson or two about supposed invulnerability,' he silently mused.

Then he found himself gritting his teeth against the vibration which abruptly, and completely without warning, grew by a magnitude of ten, then a hundred.

"What magic is this, which reaches our wraith forms?" a voice hissed out of midair, sounding more than a little alarmed. "Did you bring this spell against us, Ironstorm? Did you have a pet wizard waiting for your signal to launch their counterattack?"

"I'd take the credit, wraith, if I had planned it so," Lawrence flatly admitted, fighting to keep his feet as the ground now heaved beneath them. He could feel the vibration as a low, thrumming pulse that reached rhythmically out of the ground, through the soles of his boots and deep into his body to shake every part of him.