The King Trials 2: Beyond.

Primus Kelan P.O.V

The colossal expulsion of energy weathers my vigour, taking its toll on my body. But nothing will hinder, nothing will stop me. In the treeline a rectangular-shape wooden dwelling emerges, rising as I race closer. A provisional stable on the one flank that houses two fretful horses. The door is wide open, a tall frame of black, I hurry inside. A girl with convoluted markings etched in the sides of her head, carelessly throws items into a carrier bag. She then gasps in delayed fright at my sudden advent. She stumbles back, but her frantic demeanour tempers at the sight of Aurora in my arms.

“Where is Erulis?”

The girl shouts a name in a foreign language. From the archway in the centre of the back wall, an older female rushes out, but her eyes instantly draw to me. Then it falls on Aurora.

She takes me in, standing unnaturally still before rendering her judgment. “Primus Kelan, my daughter and I just came from city,” she says with a choppy accent, “where I was healing sick boy until Emikrollian troops invaded. We are leaving now. I cannot help you.”

Ropy, vivid red scars run across her face, from the one temple to the opposite jaw, scars that appear that she was clawed by a wild beast and had the misfortune of surviving. Only her eyes, a lurid and dark, remain whole. I do know the tale behind them. But she disclosed that she refuses to heal her own scars; they serve as a personal reminder.

“You can save us both time and heal her now,” I roar, the daughter quivers, fear shaking her, “or I rip the head off your daughter’s shoulders, and we can truly test your healing capabilities.”

The girl frees a high-pitched wail.

Her dark eyes do not betray daunt, but she yields and tersely nods me over as she dashes to the left side of the room, a large table in the centre cluttered with tomes and scattered parchments. The flanks are lined with cases that bear the semblance of the store in the Tent-city with strange, glittering concoctions that occupy the shelves.

With a mere flick of her wrist, all the contents on table go flying, crashing to the ground. I rush to lay her gently on the surface, deadly still, so stagnant. I move aside, allowing Erulis to begin undoing her bracers, then her corsage beneath it.

An ear-shattering scream sounds from behind me and I whirl around. An object smashes through the window, rocketing to the wall, exploding on impact. The girl leaps out of the way as an inferno of fire burst out to sheathe the walls in flames, quickly rising to lick the ceiling.

Erulis whips out at her arm, hand outstretched to the flame, face contorting as she turns her splayed fingers like she’s turning a knob, then her fingers contract slowly as flames begin to shrink rapidly as if bending to her will, as if she’s sucking out the oxygen from just the fire, constricting its breathing, hampering its ability to expand, it diminishes until seconds later the air is clear, the only remnant is a brush of black shades on the wood.

I dash around her and the table to peer out of the window, figure by figure, armed soldiers prowl out of the woodland, the dark silver of their armour a-gleam, their drawn blades glinting menacingly.

How did I not sense them?

“The Emikrollians are here,” Erulis states without looking up at me. A fearful tone undermining her austere voice. She flings off the bracers, then her hands work to undo the corsage. “They are here for me.” She gives me a rapid once over. “As you are no mere Primus, I am no mere shaman.”

“Do not worry about them,” I say as I make a start to the door. “Just focus on healing her.”

Erulis shouts alien words to her daughter and I hear small steps scurrying behind me.

I exit the dwelling. I regard the inverted wedge of smug-looking Emikrollians warily. The one at the point strolls a few steps closer and casually rests his hand on the hilt of his sword tucked in its scabbard.

“Primus,” he says with a distinct note of surprise. “We are not here for you. We want the shaman but as you are here, you might as well pledge your allegiance and those of your Legion to the new reign.”

I tilt my head downwards. “The Avangard and its Four Legions are loyal to the Crown.”

“Yes,” he says with deference and calculation. The blood of my brothers strewn across his face. “But the crown will sit upon the head of an Ethane. Even if the might of the military descends. It will not change the fact that the High King has breathed his last, his line ended. The throne stands vacant. Someone must fill it.”

“Now, Primus. Because of your rank, assuring the loyalty of the First Legion. I will only spare you one chance; I know you would rather demand death’s attention than forsake honour. But your honour belongs to the one that sits on the throne. So I ask. Do you pledge your allegiance to the Crown?”

“I may be a Primus by title.” Shadows rise from the earth in multiple places unwaveringly. Solid and sturdy, like faceless bodies of black columns. “But that is not what I am.”

Alarmed, the soldiers jerk, stepping away. The cold of a winter’s midnight lacerates inside of me. Shadows circle them, snakes of black slithering threateningly. The Emikrollians try to slash at them, sharp steel slicing through them, but to no avail, the shadows continue to merge and proliferate.

Like a puppeteer I raise my hand and the shadows ascend—my hand drops—the shadows sink to submerge them in a sea of black. I flutter my fingers. The shadows separate into a multitude of appendages, black tendrils seize soldiers by their waist, ankle, or arm, coiling around them to launch them into the nearest trees, tossing them around like they weigh nothing.

A few of them manage to escape, lunging for me. I unsheathe my sword and parry away the onslaught, the surrounding shadows attack fast and unrelentingly, in perfect balance of my strikes, a storm of raven lashing the ones in range. Metal screeching against metal. Aggravated that it is taking me longer than it has ever to slay a measly squadron.

“You are making a mistake, Primus!” their Commander barks.

Shadows furies all around. I decapitate one of them with the diminishing might of my swing, spraying blood everywhere. With a final swing, another shoots up with expert efficiency, pushing me away, sending me staggering back to regain footing. I grimace, huffing through gritted teeth, intensifying the ruthlessness in my attacks. Fatigue claws at me, but still they fall at the arcs of my blade.

I end them all. Purposely, leaving only the Commander alive.

He tries to move but rising shadows swirl all around him, blocking him in a standstill as he observes them with shock-struck eyes, brimming with untold bewilderment, the deference that once lived washes out into dread.

“You are… one of them.” The realisation only upon him now.

I say nothing.

“Slay me,” he says with quiet content. “It will change nothing. The revolution has begun. A new era has dawned, not only for Urium but for all the realms, because we look beyond, to share the glory of Emikrol with others.”

“You mean to enslave them?”

“Enslave is such a foul word.” He eyes the black snakes that smoulder around him. “I prefer the term… respected colonies with a frequency of self-determination.”

“In result, you will make enemies of powerful dominions like Nivalis, Cistern, Alazar.”

“We only need their compliance for a timed period, until the time of black sun comes,” he admits. “Then who needs allies when we will have the limitless power endowed by the Ulris. They will see that is they who need us.”

My head shakes furiously. “You fool.”

I raise a hand.

His eyes gleam with an unknown malice, a feral smile tugging at his lips as if there is so much more that I do not know, so much that not I, the Legions or anyone else can prevent.

I clench my fist.

The black serpent tangles itself, strangling him until his eyes and mouth rounds, the tendrils gush into his mouth like a black, belligerent stream, filling his eyes and nostrils. He convulses wildly before the shadows fade and dissipate, scattering like wisps of smoke. He drops dead on the ground, his eyes hollow, skin shrivel like he aged a thousand years in one instant.

I swivel and hobble back to the dwelling. A wave of biliousness bashes my mind. I clutch the doorframe for support, blinking like something’s stuck in my eyes. As Aurora clings to a tuft of life, weakened, and so am I.

I shuffle inside. Leather pieces cast on the ground. Aurora’s blouse lifted up to her chest to expose the wound punctured in her stomach, blood pouring out as Erulis spills a few ounces of a dull orange elixir into the wound. She snaps at her daughter, nodding her head at something. The girl dashes to the cases and snatches out a jar of pearlescent green leaves.

I make my way to the other side of the table, then I move to stand at the head. Leaning, I place a hand on her cold cheek, rubbing circles over the skin with my thumb. Bending over, I inch closer so my lips near her ear.

“I know it is difficult,” I murmur. “I know you might even yearn to succumb. But you must not. You need to live, there is much still to be done, my queen. A fight that only you can win. You must live.”

Erulis and her daughter are a fading haze on the flank of the table, darting, busying themselves over Aurora who still does not move nor responds in any way that affirms life.

“You deserve the world.” I sniff, caressing an inky strand off her forehead. “And the world deserves you.”

Trembling fingers move their way to her throat, to where her pulse should be. I feel nothing.

Anguish sunders through me, sharper than any blade. “Aurora.” Harsher. “You need to wake up now…I beg of you. Wake. Live.”