The Lost Sentinel: Relics of Power, #1

PROLOGUE

"H umans are so breakable, aren’t they?" whispered the Relic.

Crimson streaks painted the courtyard of what had once been the grandest estate in the city of Tauvice, while Naxel Daimos stood in front of the twisted ruins of the front gates. The crumpled form of Volcan Astera lay at his feet, his sightless eyes reflecting the bright-red thorns curling around the staff Daimos held in his hand.

A smile stretched Daimos’s mouth as he nudged his enemy’s corpse with the edge of his staff.

Not so high and mighty after all, are you?

Inside his pocket, the Relic stirred, its whisper grating against his ear. You owe me payment.

Yes, yes, fine. He was aware that he’d created quite the ruckus in his attack on the Astera estate and that that decision may come back to bite him at some point. Maybe he should have pillaged a peasant’s house or something before unleashing the Relic in such a conspicuous manner, but it’d all been so easy. He’d simply walked up to the gates and blasted them straight off their hinges, and Volcan Astera himself had come running to confront him at once. He couldn’t have timed it more perfectly if he’d tried.

The grey-haired man at his feet appeared harmless now, unimpressive and frail—perhaps because Daimos had taken more than his life. The Relic had demanded blood, and he’d been more than happy to deliver. Now, he pressed the oval-shaped stone to the red-streaked flagstone and whispered the correct words in the old tongue, one few people spoke these days. Volcan Astera had known the language inside out, but his vast stores of knowledge hadn’t helped him in the end.

Before his eyes, the bloodstains began to evaporate, one drop at a time. He watched, mesmerised, his own blood racing in his veins, as the force inside the Relic eagerly sucked at the crimson stains until they vanished beyond the surface of the stone, imbuing it with a ruby-red glow of satisfaction.

Payment complete. He pocketed the stone once again and took up the thorn-covered staff in both hands. The crimson vines intertwining along its length matched the tall, thorny plants curling around the edges of the gate. One could not fault old Astera’s sense of style, despite his many other shortcomings.

Thanks, hissed the Relic. Now move out of the way before someone alerts the authorities.

Daimos swallowed down an irritable retort—he now held the most powerful force in the nation in his own hands and it was absurd to allow himself to be given orders by a mere rock—but the Relic was right. He needed to move. He’d done what he’d intended to do.

All the same, he’d expected to feel a little more triumphant. After those long weeks of trawling mountain passes and forgotten roads had ended in his discovery of a Relic long believed to be lost, he’d imagined this moment a thousand times. Now, that very same Relic hummed contentedly in his pocket, and its power was his to wield. Why, then, did the gaping hole inside his chest persist, as though the spectre of the man who’d seen to his family’s banishment haunted him still, when that very same man lay dead at his feet?

He raised the staff. You serve me now, Astiva, son of Gaiva. The Astera family is no more, and you belong to me, Naxel Daimos.

A breeze stirred. Yes, he thought. You obey me now, Astiva. Show me your power.

The breeze became a strong wind, lifting the hairs on his head. The ends of his embroidered coat—stolen, of course—lifted off the ground, and he braced the staff against the flagstones to keep himself from losing his balance. That would hardly be a dignified way to start his partnership with Astiva.

Stop that! the Relic in his pocket hissed. You’re behaving like a child. Wait until you’re out of the city before you start playing with your new toy.

Quiet, he muttered irritably.

Fine, maybe he needed a little more practise, but he had more than enough time to learn. He glanced down at the staff and startled at the crimson glow that now emanated from his left hand. Unbeknownst to him, the staff’s thorns had snaked across the back of his hand, though he felt no pain where they pierced his skin. As he watched, the colour solidified until he appeared to wear a glove of pure crimson, his knuckles spiked with thorns.

Thorn-hand. An unexpected laugh escaped when the truth dawned on him that this must be where old Astera’s nickname had come from. Still chuckling to himself, he bent over the dead body of the staff’s former owner, confirming that old Astera’s left hand bore the same crimson stain as his own, although the thorns had shrivelled and died along with their owner.

As he rose to his feet, the Relic made a low noise of warning. He hadn’t taken a single step when a blast of wind struck him in the back, too sharp and swift for him to keep himself from sprawling onto the flagstones. Pain speared his hip where it struck the stone, and he scrambled upright as a figure stepped over the ruined gates. A tall, broad man, dressed in a red cloak identical to the one worn by the man who lay dead at Daimos’s feet—and carrying an identical thorn-covered staff.

Oh, Powers, he thought. Another Astera had survived? The Astera family must have split Astiva’s magic among its members, but he thought he’d already killed all of them. Worse, the Relic had gone awfully quiet in his pocket, and his grip on the staff felt uncertain compared to the strong, confident way the newcomer held its twin.

Crimson thorns pierced its owner’s left hand, forming a mirror image of his own, but the newcomer didn’t so much as stumble as he sent a roar of wind sweeping towards Daimos. This time he was prepared enough to grip the staff with both hands, but it wasn’t enough to keep from being tossed aside like a ship in a storm. The Relic jarred against his side when his back hit the flagstones again.

No. He refused to die when he’d come this close to his goals, least of all at the hands of this child. This must be Volcan’s son, who was barely into his twenties, yet he wielded the staff without voicing a single command. As Daimos scrambled backwards, the fierce grey eyes of the younger Astera looked down upon him without mercy.

Sliding his free hand into his pocket, Daimos whispered the Relic’s name. Orzen. I need your help.

What do you promise me this time? the Relic whispered back. Destroying this one will take more than the blood of an old man. I need more.

The lifeblood of the youngest Astera, he murmured. When we kill him, I’ll give you every last drop.

At once, the stone lit up in a crimson flare. The young Astera’s angry grey eyes widened as a blast of ruby-red light slammed into him, and it was his turn to struggle to keep his feet. Seizing his chance, Daimos advanced on the boy, raising his own staff.

Astiva, he intoned, loud and clear. You answer to me now.

The thorns on his hands glowed, bloodred and vibrant, and a gust of wind swept up as the Power answered his call. Weakened from the Relic’s strike, the young Astera faltered as Daimos turned the magic of his own deity against him. Flagstones cracked, walls crumbled, and Daimos stepped back to avoid being hit by the debris.

You fool! yelled the Relic. Unless you’re trying to escape our agreement by burying us both under a nobleman’s house, I’d suggest you exercise a little restraint.

Daimos opened his mouth to shout a retort, but the ground cracked beneath his own feet. He leapt clear of the gap in the flagstone, and his gaze found the young Astera lying sprawled amid a pile of shattered stone. Daimos approached him carefully, but the boy was barely conscious. Blood streamed from his mouth, and his fingers curled limply around his staff.

I’ll take that. Daimos swayed on his feet as he bent to take the boy’s staff for himself. Evidently, the magic he’d used had taken more out of him than he’d expected, but Astera was in a worse state. Yet his lips moved when Daimos lifted the staff from his grip, though the words were inaudible.

What did you say? he growled.

You can’t wield that staff, whispered the young man. It will destroy you…

A jolt of sudden anger shot through Daimos. What right did this child have to look at him with such defiance even at his moment of death?

You’re mistaken, Daimos told him. Tell me, are there any more of you that I need to kill, or are you the last one?

Astera simply gave him a hard stare in response, but Daimos was certain that this man was the last Astera he needed to worry about. If any others survived, he’d easily be able to find their hiding places. The mark of Astiva was difficult to hide, and with two deities on his side, the mere idea of anyone denying him anything he asked for was laughable.

All the same, the notion of stripping away the youngest Astera’s confidence before dealing the final blow was tantalising enough that Daimos allowed a smile to creep onto his mouth as he pointed the end of the staff at its owner. I think I’ll take your deity away from you, before I kill you.

The boy raised his head. The deep tan of his face had faded to grey, and his fingers twitched as if to grasp the staff that was no longer there. Even if by some miracle he survived his wounds, the shock of losing his Power would surely kill him in the end.

The same fate had befallen Daimos’s own father.

Yet despite himself, he found himself feeling some measure of pity for the boy. The youngest Astera hadn’t been part of the contingent who’d banished Daimos’s family; he’d have been an infant at the time, if he’d even been born yet. On the other hand, the Invoker families had been a pestilence upon the nation for countless generations, and in the long term, Daimos was doing everyone a favour by bringing an end to their tyranny.

More to the point, if he survived, the boy would hunt him for the rest of his days. It was far better to finish him off beforehand. Kinder, even.

Daimos spoke the deity’s name again. Astiva.

As he raised the twin staffs, the boy’s hand twitched again, grasping a piece of shattered stone. Even wounded as he was, he insisted on putting up a fight.

I don’t think so. Daimos brought the left staff down upon the boy’s hand. Bone cracked; the stone slipped from his grasp. To his credit, the young Astera didn’t utter so much as a cry of pain. His eyes had glazed over, his breathing shallow.

You’ll… never be worthy of Astiva… The boy’s voice faltered on the last word.

A new burst of rage took hold of Daimos. "I am worthy," he said as he brought the twin staffs down for the killing blow.

The city of Tauvice was ablaze. A trail of fire moved like a serpent through the streets, and the two deities tracked its process through the window separating them from the world below, watching the flames leap across the street to the wooden roof of a temple to the lesser gods.

Not the offerings! cried Xeale. There are so few humans who remember our names, much less have the kindness to pray to us.

Oh, but they won’t forget this in a hurry. Kyren cackled, eagerly leaning through the window to see the chaos unfold in the city below. A row of houses ignited along the seafront, while ant-like figures fled the roaring flames. Look at them run!

Orzen is having the time of his life down there, remarked Xeale, who currently resembled a large grey dove. The deities’ forms were fluid, but most tended to mimic creatures or beings from the mortals’ realm, an old habit from a time the humans had long forgotten. I do hope he knows what he’s doing. Humans are not known for their reliability.

Oh, this one will be different. Kyren, who currently wore the form of a towering black raven, spoke with a barely restrained laugh. He’s giving Orzen free rein, the fool.

Yes, and what if he manages to get himself killed in the process? responded Xeale. If his Relic ends up buried at sea, then he might have to wait another few thousand years for it to be recovered.

One of us might as well get to have a little fun, said Kyren. Has it truly been that long?

Xeale’s feathery wing brushed the edge of the window, his beak not quite touching the realm on the other side. None of the humans below could see either of them; even if they hadn’t been too occupied fleeing for their lives, the realm of the Powers remained as inaccessible to mortals as the human realm was to the pair of them, including the wastelands that lay south of the lands the humans called Aestin, cut off by an impassable range of mountains. Yet one human had ventured south and had been rewarded handsomely. Might others follow suit? If they did, then perhaps one would finally bring what the deities needed.

Of course, then the fires igniting the coastal city would be the least of humanity’s problems, but the fault was entirely their own.

Who knows, said Xeale. "Maybe one of them will unearth my Relic next."

Mother help them all if they do. Kyren smirked. They’re not ready for this. None of them are.

1

Zelle Carnelian was on her way to the Sentinels’ outpost when she ran into her first tourists of the day.

The man and woman both wore long travelling cloaks that must be newly purchased, as they bore no stains or markings from the road. If Zelle had to guess, they’d taken a carriage until the roads had come to an end close to the village of Randel, nestled between patches of dense forest. Catching sight of Zelle, they hurried in her direction.

Is this the outpost? The woman, whose deeply tanned complexion indicated she’d travelled from the eastern spear of the continent, held a crumpled, hand-drawn map in her hand. The Sentinels’ outpost, near the location of the lost Relic?

Zelle stared at her for a moment, baffled that anyone would think the outpost would be situated close enough to human habitation for hapless tourists to wander into. No, the outpost is up in the mountains. You won’t reach it before sunset.

Not unless they knew the shortcuts, that was, and Zelle had no intention of enlightening them on the matter—nor anyone else who was willing to risk being eaten alive by a wyrm or dashing their brains out on the harsh cliffs in their quest to find the supposed lost Relics of the gods. Would-be adventurers came here in droves during the summer months and either returned home empty-handed or not at all, yet the stories persisted. The mist-wreathed expanse of Zeuten’s famed Range certainly looked alluring from the ground, but Zelle had spent years traipsing all over the mountain paths and had found nothing in the way of mythical Relics.

Besides, Zelle didn’t trust anyone who aspired to heroics. They never met a pleasant end.

The two tourists exchanged dispirited glances.

In the mountains? echoed the man. Are you sure?

Of course I’m sure. The Sentinel is my grandmother. Not that she’d ever tell that to these two strangers. From outward appearances, Zelle looked like any other villager from the Range, with neither the classic black hair nor the tanned complexion of her mother’s family. Her freckled face and the reddish tint to her brown hair she owed to her father, along with the pale complexion of someone who’d spent most of her childhood with her nose in a book rather than embarking on the wild travels of her ancestors. She could blame some of that on her dear departed Aunt Adaine’s habit of remarking that adventures belonged between the pages of a book and nowhere else. These days, there was no need for heroes in the country of Zeuten.

We’re all better off without them, Aunt Adaine had often added. We don’t bother the gods, and they don’t bother us in return.

Easy enough, since no living person recalled the times when the deities had ever been anything more than a word uttered in anger or prayer, or a silent recipient of an offering left on the doorstep. As for their Relics, most people had more important things to concern themselves with than the mysteries of the Range and the inhospitable lands to the north.

We can always wait until the morning, suggested the woman. Explore the trails instead.

Do that, Zelle encouraged. You’ve come such a long way that it would be a pity to waste your trip. Try the Randel Inn. They offer reasonable rates on rooms, and the owner is very knowledgeable about the walking routes in the forest.

If they asked the advice of a local, they were less likely to fall victim to one of the mountain’s pitfalls. The forest might be dense, but the villagers were familiar with its trails and paths, and the newcomers ought to be able to avoid any wild predators if they returned before nightfall.

Thank you. The woman turned to her companion. We’ll explore the forest. There are rumours of abandoned settlements, so we might get lucky anyway…

As the tourists departed, Zelle watched them leave, their cloaks trailing behind them. Then she turned back to the stretch of pine trees clothing the mountain’s base, contemplating the dark mass of clouds blooming on the horizon. Typical of Grandma Carnelian to neglect to check the skies before leaving for the outpost. While her visits were primarily for the purpose of scrounging up any old junk that her grandmother could spare to sell in the shop she’d inherited from her aunt, Zelle suspected that if she didn’t make the occasional journey here to check on the old Sentinel, she’d probably have got herself killed long ago.

Once she was certain the tourists had gone, Zelle sought out a shortcut that sliced through the forest directly to the base of the mountain. Silence wreathed the thick pines, the faint hum of the villagers’ chatter fading with each step and shadows stretching across the leaf-strewn paths. When the rain began, it would turn the paths into puddles and render even the smoothest trail into a treacherous bog. The return trip would not be pleasant, but an isolated outpost in the mountains was no place for a ninety-five-year-old woman to spend the night.

As Zelle walked, a faint rustling sounded from amid the trees to her left. Her shoulders stiffened, her gaze skimming her surroundings, and she caught sight of a pale shape sticking out of the bushes. Her heart leapt into her throat. That was a hand… a human hand.

Zelle walked closer, spying the hand’s owner. The man wore the garb of a messenger, with his sack of letters lying nearby, but it was the arrow piercing his throat that caught Zelle’s attention. No wild animal had killed him. Travellers undoubtedly had a habit of dying in strange and unpleasant manners in Zeuten’s wilder regions, but this was different. A human had committed this murder—but who would lurk in the foothills of the Range, shooting down messengers? Her family were the only people who willingly ventured into the woods, aside from the occasional hapless tourists, and she knew nobody in the village with that level of skill with a bow. Much less a desire to fire upon oblivious messengers.

A quiver of alarm snaked through her. Grandma Carnelian was armed at all times with her Sentinel’s staff, so whoever had fired the arrow was likely to come off worse from a confrontation with her, but Zelle herself had no weapons but the cheap knife she typically carried on the road. She gripped it tightly as she left the body behind and returned to her route to the mountains, the first rumble of thunder echoing in the background.

The path wove between thick pine trees, closing the distance between the woodland and the foot of the mountain in a matter of moments, and yet Grandma still did not appear. Nor did whoever had shot the arrow. Instead, she found herself facing the sheer cliffs of the Range, shrouded by bruise-coloured clouds.

Stifling a shiver, Zelle pulled her thick wool coat more tightly around herself and continued on until she came to the narrow slash in the cliffside which led into a cave containing a set of stone stairs hewn into the very mountain itself. No tourists would easily stumble upon this particular spot, yet Zelle remained tense as she hurried up the stairs. The echo of her footsteps pursued her, punctuated by the occasional rumble of thunder. When she neared the top, a faint whistling reached her ears from outside. The wind had picked up, the storm moving faster than she’d anticipated.

The stairs came to an end in a small cave, whose narrow opening led out onto the mountain itself. Zelle approached the exit and was greeted by the sight of a torrent of snow racing downwards at the mountain path. A fierce wind propelled the swirl of flakes into the cave entrance, and Zelle had no choice but to brace herself for the onslaught as she walked outside. Her steps slowed as she pressed a hand on the nearest cliff to keep her balance, the other shielding her eyes as she looked for any signs of her grandmother.

A short distance away stood the first outpost of the Sentinels, a crooked towerlike construction whose slanted walls made it appear to be leaning against the cliffside. As a child, Zelle had once remarked that it looked like it’d travelled halfway across the mountain and had to stop for a rest. Right now, she sincerely hoped her grandmother had had the sense to get indoors before the storm had struck, because the snow had already formed a thick crust around the tower’s base and clung to Zelle’s feet as she covered the short distance to the tower.

To her intense relief, the door was unlocked, so she wrenched it open and slammed inside.

That’s one big storm, she murmured, brushing snowflakes from the sleeve of her coat and running her fingers through damp tendrils of reddish-brown hair. Grandma?

No response came from within the Sentinel’s quarters, which appeared untouched since her last visit. Inside the main room, a fire lay guttered and empty. The shelves to either side were packed with books, the air replete with the scent of old pages. She’d spent many a happy childhood hour nestled in the window seat, thumbing through old storybooks while Grandma and her sister Aurel discussed Sentinel matters. Today, though, a sense of neglect permeated the tower, and most of the valuables had been stripped away over the years.

At one time, their family had held enough wealth to rival the Crown Prince, but their fortune had dwindled away with each passing generation, and so had their numbers. Zelle’s own father had met a tragic end in a boating accident, while her mother had died of a sickness when she was eight. As a result, Zelle had begun to help her aunt in the shop from a young age and had quickly learned that her family’s history held little value in the modern world. Many Zeutenians prided themselves on having nothing to do with the scheming magicians in Aestin, and the Sentinels were the sole reminder that those ties had ever existed.

Of course, there were always the few who were keen to probe her for knowledge of the lost Relic of legend, but with the way her family’s luck usually went, the legend probably referred to some mundane object a settler had lost on the trek through the Range rather than anything of worth.

Oh, Powers. I’m starting to sound just like Aunt Adaine. And just where is Grandma?

Zelle strode through the quarters, peered into both the main bedroom and the guest room, and was readying herself to climb the stairs into the Sanctum when her gaze fell on a long stick of dark wood, half concealed beneath an armchair. Her grandmother’s staff. The Sentinel never let it leave her sight if she could help it, and she muttered to her staff more than she talked to her own grandchildren. If she’d left it lying on the floor, then something must be horribly wrong.

Zelle’s fingers closed around the end of the staff. A sudden voice rang out, sharp and demanding: Put me down!

Her hand opened of its own accord, sending the staff clattering to the floor. Her heart thudded against her rib cage, and her mind recoiled from the knowledge that the staff had spoken to her. Only the Sentinel was supposed to be able to hear its voice.

Where’s Grandma? She scrambled to pick up the staff again, but it tumbled from her grip as though it would sooner lie neglected than allow her to hold it. Gritting her teeth, Zelle crouched down beside the prone wooden stick. I’m not an intruder. I’m Zelle, the Sentinel’s granddaughter. Where is she?

This time, when her hand coiled around the staff’s length, a jolt of awareness shot through Zelle’s nerves to her fingertips. Zelle, the voice said. Ah yes, the talentless one. Still alive, are you?

Excuse me? She pushed to her feet, keeping a firm grip on the long wooden staff. Where is Grandma? This place looks deserted.

She went through a door.

Zelle stared at the carved stick for a moment, wondering if the staff might be lying to her. Why, she couldn’t say, but she shouldn’t be able to hear its voice at all. What is that supposed to mean?

Are you simple?

Not in the slightest. She narrowed her eyes in a glare in response to the insult, though the Powers only knew if the staff could see her face when it didn’t have eyes. Tell me where my grandmother is, or I’ll chop you up and use you as firewood.

You would never.

How had her grandmother endured the staff’s stubbornness for so many years without tossing it away in frustration? She muttered to it a lot, Zelle knew, but she’d never heard it talk back. Not until now. A sentient staff wasn’t too unusual here at the outpost, where the Sanctum was full of ancient tomes teeming with secrets and rattler-imps lurked in the shadows, but she hadn’t expected the Sentinel’s staff to be this… temperamental.

I can tell you’re going to be a difficult one, the staff remarked.

Speak for yourself. Her gaze snagged on the window, from which she could usually see all the way down to the forests surrounding the village below. Instead, snowflakes swirled in thick dervishes, and the wind rattled the window in its frame. If Grandma wasn’t inside the outpost, then Zelle had no chance whatsoever of finding her until the storm abated. There were worse places to be stranded in a snowstorm, given that the Sanctum contained books which weren’t available anywhere else in the nation, but for once, the notion of losing herself between the pages of a story was far from Zelle’s thoughts.

What could possibly have dragged her grandmother away from her staff, and why had she even come here in the first place?

Zelle suppressed a flinch when the wind struck the tower like a heavy blow and the staff in her grip grew cold. Someone’s coming.

The storm began when the young man was halfway across the Range. One moment, the sky was clear; the next, clouds rushed in, bringing a sweep of snow which numbed his hands and froze his skin to the bone. His battered leather travelling boots skidded at every other step, threatening to send him into a fatal tumble. But he kept on, because the alternative was death. He felt its cold presence lurking inside him, like the jaws of some beast waiting below a sheer and inevitable fall. Yet a single image remained etched in the front of his mind: a red leather-bound book. Once opened, they said the book would give its discoverer what they most wanted in the world. For that reason alone, he had to survive.

The mountain had other plans, however, and the path grew more treacherous with each step. On either side of him, the ground dropped away, with nothing to grab onto if he were to slide too close to the edge. If he hadn’t spent the last few weeks existing in a place far beyond fear, he might have returned to steady ground to take a ship home, to live out his last days in the land of his ancestors. Then again, in his current state, he might not survive another voyage across the ocean. And so he stumbled on, both hands gripping his staff tightly. He’d bought it with the last of his coin, and while it was nothing more than an ordinary walking stick, he could still imagine that he sensed the ghostly presence of his deity under the surface.

He kept going uphill while his hands grew red with cold and his feet numbed in their boots. Gritting his teeth against the bitter wind, he kept his gaze fixed on the peak of the mountain visible beyond the sweeping snow. Occasionally, he wondered what kind of people lived up here in the most desolate part of the world. Who in their right mind would trade safety, security, and human company to guard the secrets of the Powers? If rumour was to be believed, the rest of Zeuten had