Read Online Under the Shadow of Darkness: Book 1 of the Apprentice Series by James Cardona, Issa Cardona - Free Book Online

recently dead, not wanting to become marauders like the others but yet still driven by the desire for blood, the desire for life. It was something that they could not escape. The others, the ones attacking, were, by their behavior and dress, the town outlaws, drunks and thieves. They howled, leapt, spun and made terrible, angry faces. How good could they expect their behavior to be in death considering how it was during their life times? It is these evil dead that are the problem, Bel thought. If we can be rid of them, the others will not attack.
    Bel called life into his staff and was surprised to see wisps of light flickering out of the surrounding villagers chests, some from the second floor balconies, and quickly gathering into the head of his staff. Bel said to himself, “This is real. This is real. This is what I have been training for the last six years. I am about to get into this real stuff. I am not a Fifth Year anymore. I am an apprentice. I am going to do this.” He stepped off the front porch and headed towards the others in the center of the roadway, uncertainty still shaking through his frame.
    Nes’egrinon glanced over at Bel. “Fifth Year, quickly. Join us here. We want the ghoul-kind to focus their attacks on us. To keep the villagers out of the line of fire. They will be drawn to our mage-blood.”
    He skipped over to them and held his staff high. He was nervous. He was shaking. But he was really excited. He knew the dead would stream toward them. No one knew why but ghoul-kind could smell mage-blood. And for some reason when one of the dead drank the blood of a mage, the effect lasted much, much longer. All the dead would want to drink the blood of the masters and Bel and Kerlith were standing next to these two giant targets.
    What to do? What to do? What to do? Bel knew that healing worked. Kerlith had told him as much and now he had seen it with his own eyes and by his own hands. But it was risky because he would have to touch the ghoul and he could only reliably do it to one at a time. Of course there was the trick that his master did, tricking the ghoul-kind into thinking that he could destroy them all with a word. But how long would that last? The villagers seemed to be doing all right with fire though. The ghouls were certainly susceptible to it. As soon as they caught fire they would immediately run back into the forest, screaming their dead heads off. Several trails of fire and burning ghoul entrails could be seen streaming into the forest. It smelled none too nice either.
    A handful popped out from behind the edge of a wall and charged them. They were close, too close and running at them in a full gallop. Nes’egrinon slammed his staff into the ground, sending out a tremor, collapsing the group to the ground. Kerlith stumbled then latched onto Bel’s shoulder and braced himself, nearly falling down in the quake.
    “Come! Let’s go!” howled the leader of the small band, pulling the arms of one of the others up and pointing toward the mages but the others retreated.
    “Let’s see how much longer that works,” Muolithnon muttered under his breath.
    Just then, a dead man leapt off a roof just over the young wizard’s head screaming, “Aaaahhhh!”
    Kerlith quickly flashed his stone up high and called out, “” repelling the ghoul into the air and away from them.
    “Nice,” Bel said but perspiration was heavy on his brow.
    The four squeezed in, pushing their backs against each other and slowly rotating, knowing now that the attack could come from any direction.
    Bel tried to focus his eyes on any incoming threat but he couldn’t get the smell of decaying vegetation and sloppy wet mud out of his mind. It invaded his nostrils the moment they arrived and it wouldn’t leave. Some smells you get used to if you are around them long enough. This wasn’t one of them. There was something primeval and base about the dank mud they were treading in. Bel morbidly thought, Is this