Spellwright

Shannon cast a blaze of Magnus at each attacker. Two of his wartexts found their mark and detonated. The blasts tossed one kobold into the air and knocked the other flat. But the third monster produced an ax-like spell that shone with indigo light. With a quick swing, the creature burst Shannon’s wartext into silver sentence fragments.

Nicodemus’s heart went cold. The monster was a kobold spellwright.

Bellowing, the creature stood on his hind feet and rushed at Shannon. The old man tried to cast another Magnus spell but dropped it. Nicodemus threw himself forward and slammed his shoulder into the monster’s hip. They tumbled to the ground. Then he was on the kobold, jamming his knee into the monster’s throat. The kobold drew his arm back as if to strike with his claws, but Nicodemus pulled a dagger-like Pithan tattoo from his chest. The indigo spell illuminated the kobold’s golden eyes now wide with terror. Nicodemus jammed the spell into the monster’s shoulder and felt it pierce muscle and sinew.

Shrieking, the kobold thrashed violently enough to shove Nicodemus off. The world spun and then Nicodemus was lying on the sandy ground.

The cavern echoed with howls. Nicodemus pushed himself up to see the kobold spellwright clawing at his massive chest. Everywhere the monster had touched Nicodemus, his blue skin bulged with black cankers. Beside the terrified monster were his two companions. Shannon’s Magnus spells had covered them with short lacerations, but not killed them.

Nicodemus stood and pulled a long tattooed wartext from his hip. The indigo sentences folded themselves into a jagged broad sword whose spikes danced like flames.

All three kobolds fell perfectly silent and still. The wrestling had dispelled part of Nicodemus’s subtext, making him visible only from the waist up. He took a step toward the monsters and raised his textual sword.

The kobolds turned and sprinted away.

“Kobolds have prophecies as well,” Boann observed when all was quiet again. “They will come back for you, Nicodemus. And when they do, I will have work for them.”

But the monsters did not return that night or any other during their journey.

Three days later, toward midday, the party emerged from a tunnel to behold the Heaven Tree.

FIVE MILES IN diameter and almost perfectly circular, Heaven Tree Valley sat within a tight ring of mountains. Indeed the valley walls were so steep that in many places they became small cliffs. Atop these sudden drops stood grassy plateaus that were home to small herds of white goats.

On the valley’s far side, a narrow stream tumbled down, pausing in places to form pools and short waterfalls. A lush covering of ferns grew on the surrounding rocks.

The stream flowed into a crescent lake that lay along the valley’s northern edge.

Giant roots-each as thick around as a Starhaven tower-grew from the dark waters to stretch toward the valley’s center. All across the valley floor the land heaved and bulged among the roots. Small stone walls wound across the valley, enclosing empty fields and ruined shade gardens.

Near the valley’s perimeter, stone houses were clustered into homesteads. But the closer the buildings stood to the valley’s center, the greater they became in number and size. Around the Heaven Tree’s trunk stood a small abandoned city bristling with diminutive towers.

But it was the Heaven Tree itself that most impressed the eye.

From top leaf to taproot, it was easily as tall as most Starhaven towers. From the great trunk grew six limbs at varying heights, all of which hosted leafy canopies the size of rainclouds. Save for the two at its zenith, each massive bough reached out to rest its end on a plateau of the valley’s steep walls. Around these landings stood the ruins of small villages.

Narrow bridges connected the plateau villages to the boughs. And along each massive limb ran a cobblestone road that tunneled into the trunk.

High above them, the cold autumn wind was blowing. It set the uppermost canopies to swaying and so filled the valley with a dappled wash of shifting shade and sunlight.

“So, Nicodemus Weal,” Boann asked, “do you think this will make a sufficient home?”

“Home?” He laughed. “It’s paradise.”

They hiked onto the nearest bough, where exploration revealed that the tunnels carved into the trunk led down to the valley floor. There they found the overgrown gardens teeming with rabbits and the lake filled with trout. In the small city, they claimed a sturdy building as their new home.

The next day brought a thunderstorm that swelled the stream and filled the lake with muddy mountain runoff. For days afterward, the Heaven Tree’s leaves continued dripping fat raindrops across the valley.

Most mornings Nicodemus spent with Boann. She lectured on history, theology, and politics. Afternoons were for spelling drills in the wizardly languages with Shannon. After dark, he studied the Chthonic languages alone.