The Death Wizard Chronicles
Book One
The Pit
Melvin, Jim
ISBN 13: 978-1-897381-47-2
Paperback; perfect bound; 5.5 x 8.5
Sample Excerpt, © Rain Publishing Inc.
Prologue
Such darkness, he had never known. In all the centuries of his long life, the wizard had never felt anything as loathsome as this. Torturous days and weeks lay behind, endless horror ahead. He was helpless in the grip of an eternal doom.
For a millennium, he had freely roamed the planet Triken, using his prodigious powers to unite the forces of good. But now a sorcerer held him captive in a pit bored into the solid rock of a frozen mountain. Beyond the walls of his prison, a war soon would take place that would dwarf all others. An evil had arisen that threatened not just Triken but the fabric that held together the universe. Only the wizard could stop it. But first, he had to survive.
The pit was two hundred cubits deep but only three cubits in diameter. The prisoner lay curled at its bottom like a snake in a well. Fetid dankness swirled about him, creeping in and out of his nostrils as he breathed. A chill like no other clung to his body, freezing his heart.
All he had left were his memories, which provided his only relief from the relentless blackness. He immersed himself in them, focusing on the past rather than the present. Doing this went against all that he held true. But it kept him sane.
For a fraction of a moment. And another. And another …
Monster
1
In his mind, the Death-Knower wizard replayed what had led to this hideous imprisonment. He fled from the pit into a land of fresh air and sunlight where courage and hope were real, where he could once again become what he remembered himself to be. He was Torg, king of the Tugars, the mystical warriors of the Great Desert, and he led the free people of Triken against Invictus, a sorcerer who threatened to engulf the world in darkness as terrible as the pit.
Seventy-two days before, Torg and twenty Asēkhas — the Tugars of highest rank — had set out from their encampment on the western edge of Tējo, the Great Desert. As dawn approached, they walked across a dry ravine strewn with crumbled rock, their long strides barely disturbing the loose ground. Few living things were aware of their presence. A tiny elf owl, hopping from stone to stone in search of beetles, never saw them pass, though its yellow eyes were clever and keen.
Many believed that Tugars were magicians capable of invisibility. Others thought them to be gods who were immortal in battle. Tugars believed invisibility was a state of mind: silence the mind and the body became difficult to see. As for their perceived invincibility, Tugars trained under the guidance of Vasi masters for fifty years before becoming a warrior. No greater fighters had ever existed.
In the fiery heat of late summer, the small band continued westward for three days, traveling twenty-five leagues across the rocky wasteland called Barranca, which partially encircled the Great Desert. At dusk of the third day, Torg and the Asēkhas finally passed through the wastes and into lowland choked with scrub. They scrambled over creosote bushes that stank like skunks and strode past giant sagebrush that stood thirty spans tall. If the task before them had not been so crucial, the Tugars would have stopped and collected parts of both plants, which they used for medicines, dyes, and to weave hats and bags.
They camped that night in a remote hollow that was a three-day march from their destination: a city called Dibbu-Loka, the realm of the noble ones. All was quiet and the Asēkhas slept, except for Torg and one other. The pair stood together on a nearby hillock — two imposing figures dressed in black. Curved swords hung at their hips.
“Lord, is your mind set?’’ said Chieftain Asēkha-Kusala, the most powerful Tugar in the world besides Torg. “Must you join us on this mission? Your people need you more than does our small company.”
The wizard stood with his back to Kusala, staring at the golden orb in the night sky. For the past several months the full moon had called to his heart in a confounding manner. He ached when he looked at it, a sensation that was sweet and sour — though he did not understand why he had begun to feel this way; it was so unlike him. Still, he recognized this puzzling development as far too powerful and persistent to be dismissed as mere imagination.
“My mind is set,” said Torg, his black, shoulder-length hair swirling in the breeze. “I am a Death-Knower, Kusala. I have lived for a millennium; yet I have died a thousand times. The paradox makes me wise. Do you doubt it? You have been at my side for centuries. Do you doubt me?”
Book One
The Pit
Melvin, Jim
ISBN 13: 978-1-897381-47-2
Paperback; perfect bound; 5.5 x 8.5
Sample Excerpt, © Rain Publishing Inc.
Prologue
Such darkness, he had never known. In all the centuries of his long life, the wizard had never felt anything as loathsome as this. Torturous days and weeks lay behind, endless horror ahead. He was helpless in the grip of an eternal doom.
For a millennium, he had freely roamed the planet Triken, using his prodigious powers to unite the forces of good. But now a sorcerer held him captive in a pit bored into the solid rock of a frozen mountain. Beyond the walls of his prison, a war soon would take place that would dwarf all others. An evil had arisen that threatened not just Triken but the fabric that held together the universe. Only the wizard could stop it. But first, he had to survive.
The pit was two hundred cubits deep but only three cubits in diameter. The prisoner lay curled at its bottom like a snake in a well. Fetid dankness swirled about him, creeping in and out of his nostrils as he breathed. A chill like no other clung to his body, freezing his heart.
All he had left were his memories, which provided his only relief from the relentless blackness. He immersed himself in them, focusing on the past rather than the present. Doing this went against all that he held true. But it kept him sane.
For a fraction of a moment. And another. And another …
Monster
1
In his mind, the Death-Knower wizard replayed what had led to this hideous imprisonment. He fled from the pit into a land of fresh air and sunlight where courage and hope were real, where he could once again become what he remembered himself to be. He was Torg, king of the Tugars, the mystical warriors of the Great Desert, and he led the free people of Triken against Invictus, a sorcerer who threatened to engulf the world in darkness as terrible as the pit.
Seventy-two days before, Torg and twenty Asēkhas — the Tugars of highest rank — had set out from their encampment on the western edge of Tējo, the Great Desert. As dawn approached, they walked across a dry ravine strewn with crumbled rock, their long strides barely disturbing the loose ground. Few living things were aware of their presence. A tiny elf owl, hopping from stone to stone in search of beetles, never saw them pass, though its yellow eyes were clever and keen.
Many believed that Tugars were magicians capable of invisibility. Others thought them to be gods who were immortal in battle. Tugars believed invisibility was a state of mind: silence the mind and the body became difficult to see. As for their perceived invincibility, Tugars trained under the guidance of Vasi masters for fifty years before becoming a warrior. No greater fighters had ever existed.
In the fiery heat of late summer, the small band continued westward for three days, traveling twenty-five leagues across the rocky wasteland called Barranca, which partially encircled the Great Desert. At dusk of the third day, Torg and the Asēkhas finally passed through the wastes and into lowland choked with scrub. They scrambled over creosote bushes that stank like skunks and strode past giant sagebrush that stood thirty spans tall. If the task before them had not been so crucial, the Tugars would have stopped and collected parts of both plants, which they used for medicines, dyes, and to weave hats and bags.
They camped that night in a remote hollow that was a three-day march from their destination: a city called Dibbu-Loka, the realm of the noble ones. All was quiet and the Asēkhas slept, except for Torg and one other. The pair stood together on a nearby hillock — two imposing figures dressed in black. Curved swords hung at their hips.
“Lord, is your mind set?’’ said Chieftain Asēkha-Kusala, the most powerful Tugar in the world besides Torg. “Must you join us on this mission? Your people need you more than does our small company.”
The wizard stood with his back to Kusala, staring at the golden orb in the night sky. For the past several months the full moon had called to his heart in a confounding manner. He ached when he looked at it, a sensation that was sweet and sour — though he did not understand why he had begun to feel this way; it was so unlike him. Still, he recognized this puzzling development as far too powerful and persistent to be dismissed as mere imagination.
“My mind is set,” said Torg, his black, shoulder-length hair swirling in the breeze. “I am a Death-Knower, Kusala. I have lived for a millennium; yet I have died a thousand times. The paradox makes me wise. Do you doubt it? You have been at my side for centuries. Do you doubt me?”
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