The Ancient Ones (The Legacy Trilogy Book 3) by Michael Foster

Author:Michael Foster [Foster, Michael]
Language: eng
Format: epub, azw3
Tags: Magic, legacy, magician, Fantasy, samuel
Publisher: Dragonfall Press
Published: 2012-05-13T06:00:00+00:00

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The edge of The Heavenly City was no reflection of its name, looking sullen and grey.

A checkpoint marked the entrance. Samuel paused briefly until the guards stepped aside and the group was given free passage to enter.

It seemed as if their luck was holding, that they would continue uninterrupted to the palace, until a gruff Eudan voice shouted above the city noise. Merchants hid behind their stalls; the street emptied as common folk fled. Leopold felt a nervous lump congeal in his throat.

‘Hold!’ the caller demanded, striding quickly to catch up.

‘It is a sorcerer!’ Phoenix hissed, peeping around enough to see, keeping her eyes hidden.

‘Before the invasion, we would not allow them to set foot on our lands,’ Lady Wind whispered to Samuel as the thin man approached. ‘Be careful. I cannot guess what they can do.’

‘Never mind,’ Samuel said and waited without concern.

The sorcerer was shirtless and his weighty, black skirt hung down in heavy strips to the ground, just above his sandalled toes. His head was shaven bald and his forehead was tattooed with an unknown script in a thick ruby ink. A silver ring pierced his nasal septum. A scarlet sash, adorned with more inky incomprehensible symbols hung over his left shoulder, down past the opposite hip.

‘Where are you going? Who are you?’ the man barked.

Samuel approached him. ‘Fortunate tidings to you, oh wondrous master. We come now from the Village of Swans, and we bring gifts for Pradmet.’ He curled his hand about and bowed deeply as he spoke, as was the Eudan way, much deeper than the Koian custom.

The response pleased the sorcerer. ‘Where did you get that white one?’ he asked, pointing sharply to Jessicah.

‘A freak we found in the south,’ Samuel told him. ‘She has lost the pigment in her skin, cast out from her village and family. She is wild and uneducated, living with pigs until we discovered her. We are taking her to the slave market. Perhaps someone would pay something for such a beast; although she bites and makes a beastly mess. Perhaps you would like to make a bid?’

The sorcerer scrutinised Jessicah intensely. ‘I have no use for her. Go on.’ He departed without awaiting a response, as if having somewhere else he urgently needed to be.

‘Pigs!’ Jessicah snorted in disgust once the man was out of earshot.

Leopold laughed, but Lord Samuel was not likewise amused.

‘I see Rei is keeping you abreast of the conversation,’ the magician noted to Jessicah. ‘I’m glad she is not keeping you entirely in the dark.’

It stopped Leopold’s mirth. He looked to see if Captain Orrell had overheard, but Samuel had used the Old Tongue to mask his words.

Jessicah looked set to reply, caught halfway between frustration and bewilderment. Unsure of how to respond, she said nothing.

‘Lord Samuel,’ Lady Wind asked, not having overheard, ‘how is it you are familiar with Eudan greetings?’

‘I told the man what he was expecting to hear, showed him what he expected to see,’ was the magician’s response.

‘Was that what all their sorcerers look like?’ Leopold asked.

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