The Sacred Woods of Silvernarion (Book 1)

Chapter 5 Cursed Decision

Cursed Decision

A mysterious figure walks slowly through darkness underneath the earth. He enters stench corridors, which lead into murky caves. The path he walks illuminates no light, yet his vision guides him easily towards his destination.

He leaves the cave to enter another corridor, which descends further into the earth to reach a dead end. He leaves a trail of blood, as he carries a leg of a goblin that he just recently slaughtered.

“Saraaantiiilikmm,” he hisses as a black stone door grinds slowly, allowing him entrance into a dimly lit cavern.

A ten foot long basilisk lazily snorts at the newcomer. The dark figure walks past the huge lizard throwing the shredded goblin’s leg at the grotesque creature. He then turns and walks into another room where a tall, darkish female elf stirs a pot of slimly liquid with a stick. She smiles revealing scattered sharp teeth as he enters.

“You made it back,” she says.

His dark eyes show concern, as he looks frantically around the room.

“Where is my son?” he asks gruffly.

“He is in the other room studying,” she replies.
He grunts and sits on a stone platform across from the kettle, which holds the greenish, bubbling slime. He is weary from his journey, thinking of the spell he had cast on the human town a few days ago. It had taken much energy out of him.

“One day our people can resurface the earth,” he finally says.

“You have no time to talk. The black wizard has come and asks for your audience,” she replies throwing a half conscious rat into the kettle.
He sighs, looking at the rat that squeals in the bubbly liquid.

He then gets up and walks towards a faintly lit corridor. It twists and turns deeper inside the earth, as it eventually reaches a magnificent hall decorated with glimmering precious stones.

A decorated black stone table with arched metal chairs meant to dine a brigade of soldiers fills most of the huge room. In the hall, many dark elves are standing in front of a smaller round table at the corner of the room. Long and slender glasses filled with purplish thick liquid sit on the table. Some of the dark elves sip on them as others chitchat about their recent adventures.

They stop talking and turn to watch the dark elf enter. They remain silent as he approaches.

“Finally you have come back to us Ald’Seran,” says an older dark elf who suddenly appears from another room.

He adjusts his black robes carefully studying the dark elf.

“We thought you wouldn’t make it back from surface,” he continues before walking to the table and offering a glass of the drink.

Ald’Seran accepts his offer before sipping on the precious liquid, enjoying the mild taste of it.

“As you see I am still alive black wizard,” the dark elf replies.

The other dark elves begin talking again as the wizard sits at the end of the long dining table. He then waves Ald’Seran to sit next to him.

“So tell me mighty one. What have you accomplished?” he asks.

“The town of Augshill has been cursed,” Ald’Seran replies quickly before enjoying some more of the creamy taste of his drink.

“It has been awhile since I had such a treat,” Ald’Seran says to change the subject.

“Unicorn blood is not easy to find,” the wizard chuckles before sipping some of the blood from his elegant, golden emblazoned glass.

The wizard adjusts his interest on one of the four fancy cut emeralds that hold a troll hide map.

He then takes a small red block and places it on the spot Augshill represents.
“There are many towns we have left to curse, “the wizard says while wiping the slimy blood off his lips with the back of his scarred and wart infested hand.

Ald’Seran frowns. He is troubled of the length of time needed to accomplish these tasks asked of him. The black wizard observes his fellow warrior for a moment, as he stares into his glass pondering away from the map.

“I see you are troubled,” the wizard says.

Ald’Seran looks at the old elf and nods.

“I fear this plan will take a long time before the human civilization will decrease. I don’t think we have much longer to stay in these caverns,” he finishes shaking his head in dismay.
The wizard shows a concerned face at Ald’Seran before clapping his hands.

The other dark elves stop talking and go immediately to their seats at the long table. The wizard rubs his greasy beard before standing up.

“We have initiated our first step in securing a future home for our race. As you know we have agreed on our last meeting to take over the human kingdom of Bavidarian.

Each of us has made an adventure onto the surface and has cursed thus far, eighteen of the twenty five towns that this human kingdom controls. I believe none of us have been seen and our plans are going accordingly. In return our reward is to watch patiently the human population decline.

As they cannot reproduce, we will silently reclaim the lands that are rightfully ours without having to confront a civilization much larger then ours. Let us raise our drinks and celebrate our first victory,” the wizard offers as he raises his glass.

“Why do we take over the lands in this fashion?” asks a troubled elf rising from his seat and not raising his glass in celebration.

“There is none on that surface who can compete with our powers. These humans are no match to our superiority in magic, combat, or even stealth skills. The only one who may offer a challenge is pixies and that is if they even exist.”

“It is true what my colleague says,” yells another elf that didn’t raise his glass. I don’t think we have enough time to wait until a kingdom falls on its own. The demons are knocking on our door as we speak!” he protests.

Everyone shifts their head to see how the old wizard will react. He puts his glass on the table and stands up.

“It is true that we are a formidable force, yet as I have mentioned before, we are too few to fight a civilization of such magnitude. Have you forgotten that what you see in this hall is the last of what is left of our race? We cannot afford to lose anymore.

We must be wise and stay this course or we will perish to never exist,” he finishes before sitting back down.
Another dark elf in red robes rises and begins to scowl.

“We cannot wait so long! As my colleague has mentioned, demon hordes are at our doorsteps! It will only be a matter of time before we must fight them again!” he shouts throwing his empty glass at the wall, which shatters into many pieces and falls to the ground.

“True, true,” the old wizard replies ignoring his actions.

“We must make haste and curse all of the remaining towns left in these infested human lands,” he finishes before drinking the last drop of the unicorn blood.

Ald’Seran continues to stare at the peculiar cream in his glass showing no interest in the discussion before him. Everyone begins to disagree with one another on what needs to be done as the old wizard continues to observe the warrior carefully.

“And what say you Ald’Seran?” he finally asks that suddenly breaks off the fighting across the table into an eerie silence.

Everyone shifts their interests to Ald’Seran waiting patiently for him to reply. Ald’Seran looks up from his glass to look at the many wizards suddenly stare at him.

“It doesn’t matter what I think. I have done what you have asked of me mighty Torak the black wizard,” he replies dryly.

Torak puts his glass down and frowns at the formidable warrior impartially. He then gives a big sigh and looks at the rest of the elves.

“Everyone here is dismissed,” he manages to say quickly before standing up.

He turns and leaves to disappear behind a door to rest in his private chamber. The other elves look at each other before standing up to get the rest of the unicorn blood a the side of the table.

Ald’Seran sits alone thinking of the day he cursed the inhabitants. He cannot understand why he feels different then the rest of the wizards. Why he cannot do these terrible acts anymore and how he wishes to end his long life of killing and fighting? Can it be his age is slowly catching up with him? His mind and body has become weary of war and running.

He looks around to see if anyone is watching him sulk in his chair. He knows he cannot defy the master wizard. After all he has managed to save what is left of his race. He slowly rises from his chair and walks down the long hall and dark corridors back home not interested in the other wizard’s affairs. The long walk will give him time to think of what is best for his family, yet he wishes not to anger Torak.

Perhaps it is best to do what is told of him and continue to cast curses on these lesser beings. Yet as his fellow comrades have said, time is of an essence.

What could the dark wizard be talking about if he knows this to be true? No one wants to fight another demon war. Ald’Seran’s skin turns to goose bumps thinking of what havoc these demon’s can bring to his people. He finally reaches the end of the corridor.

“Saraaantiilimmm,” he hisses as the black stone door slowly grinds itself on the ground sliding open, allowing him entrance into a dimly lit quarter.

As he walks inside the black stone wall slides back shut. A young dark elf is levitating in the room.

His eyes are closed and his face is dripping with sweat. Ald’Seran sits on a stone platform admiring his son’s talents. The young elf finally gives up and falls to the ground. He looks up frustrated.

“Well done son,” he says clapping his hands.
“I don’t think I did well,” he replies disappointingly.

“Quite to the contrary, you are progressing fast,” Ald’Seran replies.

The young elf sits next to his father looking at him with curiosity.

“Why are we always moving to a different home?” he asks.

Ald’Seran thinks of what to say logically to his son.

He is now a mere sixteen years. He remembers the day his son was hatched from his temptresses egg deep in the underground, and the day he began to eat his first meals of mucklarsh. Now his son has grown into a young man learning at an apprentice level on dark magic.

He smiles at his son who only continues to stare for answers.
“You are now old enough to be told everything. This may take a moment and I will need your complete attention,” he says.

His son nods, anticipating the knowledge his father is about to give him.

“It started a long time ago when we were separated from the elves that lived on the surface.

Yes we had at one time green skin and lived on the surface,” he explains.
His son looks at his skin rubbing it before looking back at his smiling father.

“Our skin turned this color over the many centuries because of our desire to live underneath the earth. A powerful God named Pythonian offered our ancestry immense knowledge of magic unknown to any on the surface. A power that can fight and defend anyone or anything that wishes to harm our race. A group of curious elves had seeked that power and became the God’s apprentices.

“You mean to tell me that we were high elves once?” the young dark elf asks.

“I thought these elves were nothing more then a myth,” he finishes.

“Oh they are real and still exist on the surface,” Ald’Seran replies.

“Over the centuries we integrated into the earth under rule of the snake god.

As the high elves continued to have wars with the goblin hordes, we had the opportunity to study this ancient and powerful magic. We interacted with no one except of our God and his summoned gargoyle helpers. We are still uncertain of our lord’s true origin and none have dared to ask him. He chooses primarily the form of a giant python. Then mysteriously our lord disappeared and we were to survive without his protection. We created huge caverns, one after another expanding our territory.

We managed to go to the deepest levels of the earth exploring areas forbidden to us by our God until he had disappeared. Let me remind you son that the most dangerous demons roam in these areas we have found interest in. They have the powers unimaginable to anyone on the surface or even for us dark elves to challenge. Our interests grew and we learned much from the demons abilities adding to our experiences.

Otherwise we would not exist today if we couldn’t fend off these vile creatures when they attack. Unfortunately we have created a disaster in the undergrounds, as we have awakened many of the demon lords and gave passage to our dens.

It is rumored that our God had prevented there expansion when he was amongst us, yet now with his absence nothing seems to stop their advancements to the higher levels of the earth. We fight gallantly to keep what territories that belong to us, yet we lose many of our battles. After many centuries of battle our race has declined to a mere few families.

We have retreated to the highest levels of the earth. As a matter of fact we are not far from where goblins and orcs choose to live in their caverns. Fortunately, we have been neutral with these creatures as we enjoy their trade of fine red wines, beast skins, rodents,” Ald’Seran explains.
His son looks at him with much interest daring not to interfere.

“Because of the demon advances we were forced to move. To tell you the truth, I have moved at least fifty times before you were even born,” he finishes with a chuckle.

His son laughs also. A loud scream occurs across the halls to the next cavern. Ald’Seran gets up quickly unsheathing his scimitar.

“Wait here son,” as the dark elfin warrior dashes quickly into the dim lit hallway.

He approaches the end of the hall. He then peeks quickly at the room to see a pool of blood on the floor. He follows the blood to see his wife. Her body twisted and ripped apart lays next to his dead basilisk. He looks in every direction including the ceiling to see if the attacker is still present. The stone door is open.

“This is impossible. Who would know how to enter his domain without knowing the password?” he questions himself.

He leaves and runs quickly into the dark corridors using his keen eyesight in the pitch of darkness.

He kneels down to touch a black puddle. He smells it and gives a wrinkled face. This is the doing of a gargoyle. He gets up to run quickly down the dark corridors hoping he can get revenge.

After passing many various zigzagging corridors, he eventually gives up the chase and walks back disappointingly to his cavern. He looks at his wife sprawled next to his pet. His son is kneeling next to the upper half of his mother’s body weeping. He then looks at his father full of tears, shocked at the loss.

“Son we must leave. We are no longer safer her,” he says painfully.

“Where will we go?” he asks in a screeching voice trying to control his emotions.

“We must go to the highest level of the underground,” Ald’Seran replies.

“Will we not be confronted with goblins? Where would we live?” he asks eagerly.

“I don’t know son, but we must go now. We are not safe here anymore. It will not be long before that gargoyle will bring demons. Follow me,” as his father walks slowly ahead in the pitch black corridors.

The young dark elf looks at his mother who did not have a chance to defend herself. His anger rises as he clenches his fist.

“Come Sald’Morack, we have no time to waste!” his father yells from a distance.

“We have to find a place to rest and go back to the surface to fix a mistake I did,” he continues to scream.

“What mistake father?” Sald’Morack asks yelling back.

“I will tell you later. Now come quickly son!” Ald’Seran screams, which is heard as a faint noise now.

Sald’Morack snatches a thin necklace off his mother’s neck.

“I will make the demon hordes pay for this. I swear to you mother!” he screams in rage.

He then gets up and runs down the pitch dark corridors to catch up with his father.

To continue go to chapter 6 - http://mingle2.com/topic/show/195597