Read The Halfblood King: Book 1 of the Chronicles of Aertu Online
Authors: Julian Benoit
In the year thirty-two fifty-one, elvish ships once again landed on our shores, making the thirteen-hundred league journey from their homeport across open seas. We found that we could still understand their tongue, as it had only been two generations of our kings since our peoples had been parted. They told us that a great evil was afoot in the world and that elves and men would need to stand together against it, lest it gain control over all of creation. We agreed to ally ourselves with them, as we knew the gods were departed, never to return. We helped the elves to establish two colonies northwest of our kingdom, along the coast. We pushed the crude savages of the jungle back from the coast, deeper into the forest. They were men who had shunned the wisdom of the gods, as they were already thrall to the evil spirits abounding in their homeland. They knew not of steel, for they had rejected the gods, so they were easily brushed aside. For nearly fifteen centuries, our kingdom and the elvish provinces coexisted in peace, as the elves slowly expanded their borders eastward, heavily fortifying against incursions of the wild jungle tribes. During this period, our kingdom became the most powerful of all the kingdoms of men. Combined with the might of the elvish kingdom, we were a force unstoppable.
Throughout these years, our traders received reports of the Adversary moving among the lands of men, claiming to herald the return of the old gods. Always, our statesmen were at work, convincing the foreign kings of his fraud, intending only to enslave the world under his dark dominion. He found a ready ear among the already corrupt savages of the jungle tribes and from there was eventually able to sway the mysterious central kingdom, Kolixtlan, to his ends. Next to fall, was the kingdom of Adar, west of the Great Northeastern Desert and our ships were no longer welcome to ply the northern inlet to the great lake beyond. Rumors abounded of neighboring peoples being waylaid and carried off by raiders loyal to the Adversary, bound for slavery, or worse, offered up during inhuman sacrifices to their new god. Those few who escaped told of flat topped pyramids in Kolixtlan, topped with bloody stone altars, where the hearts were cut, still beating, from the living victims. It was as though the heart of our land was rotten and the rot was slowly spreading outward. Eventually he managed to bring the Thallasians of the northeast coast under his sway and our ships no longer found safe harbor there. The Adversary also began to gather sorcerers to his kingdom, recruiting them with promises of wealth and power and using their greed as an avenue to poison their minds fully. The weaponry and tactics of the jungle men became more advanced under their new master and incursions against the elves became more frequent. During these raids, males were killed outright, but females were abducted whenever possible. We wondered at the sinister designs of the enemy, until the day that one elf maiden escaped her captors. She feigned drowning and made her way out the inlet, washing up on the shores of the westmen. They rescued her and nursed her back to health, at which time she told her harrowing tale. She and the other elf maidens were penned up as animals. They were visited daily by the sorcerers of the Adversary. None left the pens unless they became pregnant, then they were moved and not seen again. The Adversary’s plan was now made clear, to breed Halfblood sorcerers of his own, twisting them to his own designs. She told of other, more ghastly things as well. Maidens of both men and westmen and even some few dwarf maidens were penned up alongside the elves. These were regularly visited by goblins and other monsters. Many did not survive the abuses of their captors, but some did, becoming pregnant and leaving the pens. Obviously, the Adversary was trying to perfect his dark creations by breeding them to the children of the Creator. Our hearts became darkened at the thought of what new monsters he would unleash upon the world.
In the year forty-seven forty-five, also the year six-thousand by the elvish calendar, the Adversary chose to attack. He had massed his forces, secreting them in the depths of the western jungle. It was springtime in our lands when the enemy attacked the elvish colonies, attempting to push them into the sea. He also made war with the westmen of Sunjib. The Blue Mountains dividing us from the north are impassable, except at the coasts and through the tunnels of the dwarves, so he made war also upon the dwarves and Castia on the inland sea. Ships from the Thallasian Coast harried our shores. In the end, the Adversary spread his forces to thin, fighting on too many fronts. Our forces landed armies on the west coast to bolster the elvish defense. Soon the armies of Elvenholm joined us. Our forces combined with the armies of the westmen, Sultea, Mittea and Waban joining their Sunjibi brethren. We pushed the Adversary deep into the jungle. The dwarves held the mountains. Castia, aided from the south by Coptia and from the east by Chu, pushed back against Kolixtlan, crushing them and tearing down their temples. Our navy destroyed the ships of Thallasia, while Chebek horsemen subjugated the land. The lightning cavalry of the Taliks swarmed across Adar, laying that kingdom to waste. By forty-seven forty-nine, deep in the jungle, we discovered a great lake, Lake Bul, possibly the largest in the world. On the shores of this lake, the Adversary built his towering fortress of seamless obsidian, Immin Bul, surrounded by a sprawling city. The forest was cleared for many miles from the shores of the lake for fields, tilled by slave labor, to feed his armies. The battle fought at the walls of the Adversary’s city was the bloodiest of the entire war. Multitudes of foul creatures issued forth from the gates, trolls and goblins by the thousands and monsters of diverse types. Then the Adversary himself strode out upon the field of battle. His personal retinue consisted of 100 dark Halfblood sorcerers. Accompanying him as well were goblins and trolls of types never before seen by the eyes of men and elves. The goblins being larger and stronger than those we had fought previously and the trolls smaller, faster and far more cunning. We believed these to be the product of his breeding his creatures to men. They bore magical weapons, like unto our own, but charged with dark, malicious power. The Adversary wielded a great axe, its blade glowing red with malevolent energy. Simple men at arms quaked in fear in his terrible presence, but the elven warriors and halfblood knights pressed on. Eventually the armies of men and westmen rallied at the sight of the courageous Sudeans and elves, turning the tide against the enemy. The westmen, being fierce warriors, many times stronger than men, crushed the hosts of goblins in their path. Our sorcerers focused their will and the dark sorcerers fell by the score, as magical energy crackled in the air about both groups. Finally, King Aleron of Sudea and Crown Prince Aelwynn of Elvenholm stood shoulder to shoulder, facing the Dark Lord in all his terrible majesty. The Prince of Elves held his massive halberd, while the King of Men wielded his greatsword, fully as long as a man is tall. Both weapons glowed with cold blue radiance, as the greatest sorcerer of Elvenholm had forged them, for the sole purpose of defeating the Dark Lord. The Adversary proclaimed, “Behold, Zadehmal, Cleaver of Souls, the instrument of your undoing.” Aleron and Aelwynn said nothing in reply, their faces set in grim determination. Blows rained and were parried, sparking like lightning when blue nimbus met red. The King of Men swung low, his great blade cleaving the greave of the Adversary, sinking deeply into his calf. Howling in pain, the Dark Lord swung his axe overhand. The King, his blade jammed in the thick steel, was unable to parry the blow and was split asunder by the great axe. Unable to save his comrade, the Prince of Elves swung his halberd, cleaving the Adversary’s arms, above the wrists. The great red axe tumbled to the ground, as the Dark Lord screamed, the stumps of his arms spurting black blood. The halberd swung once again, chopping through the gorget protecting the Adversary’s throat. The Dark Lord toppled, his lifeblood pouring out on the muddy ground.
With the fall of the Adversary, his army faltered and broke under our assault. The elves brought forth chains forged of high sorcery and bound the Adversary hand and foot. It being understood that no one, save the Creator, had the power to actually kill a God, the Dark Lord would have to be imprisoned for all eternity. He was dragged to his black fortress and even into his own throne room, resplendent in gold, silver and electrum. The elvish sorcerers chained him to his massive throne of obsidian, guarding his locks with diverse powerful wards. Even as they finished, they saw that the flesh had already grown over the stumps of his arms and his throat had knit itself together. The Adversary was far from dead and was only now sleeping, regaining his strength. The gates of the dark fortress were barred and locked with sigils of great power. None would be able to break the bonds securing the Dark Lord in his imprisonment, save that they held more power than that of the combined sorcerers of Elvenholm and Sudea.
The King of Sudea was burned upon a massive pyre, as is the custom of our people and our dead were cared for in a like manner. His greatsword was born back to his throne in Sudea, to serve as the symbol of the royal office from that time on. The other men and westmen reclaimed their dead and treated them, as was the manner of each their own people. The dead of the elves were born away by their people, to be burned in Elvenholm, across the sea. The dead of the enemy were left to rot where they lay. The Adversary was left imprisoned in his own throne room, in his indestructible fortress of solid black obsidian. It is said that his howls of rage echo through the depths of the western jungle to this very day. The elvish Prince and his chief sorcerer Goromir, took up the great red ax of the Adversary. A furnace was erected and they cast the massive weapon into the white-hot coals, as the bellows were pumped and still more charcoal layered atop it. Clean yellow flame roared from the chimney, as the furnace burned itself out. Once cool enough to approach, the furnace was opened and there the axe sat, totally unscathed. It was cool enough even to touch, though its blade glowed red as fresh blood. It was plain to them that this weapon would not be unmade by mortal hands. Some said that it should be cast into the sea, but wiser heads prevailed, reasoning that this was a thing of great power and could possibly find its way even from the depths of the sea. They sensed that the Adversary had tied much of his being into the weapon and it may still be subject to his will. Because of this, they ruled against safeguarding it anywhere in the lands of elves or men, else it may work to sway them to its master’s purpose. The elves took up the cursed blade and bore it into hiding, saying only that it would be safely hidden away in a dark corner of the world, where no living beings tread. Beldan, the young prince of Sudea, yet only ten years of age, received the sword of his father. In his hand, its blade shone with the same blue radiance it had when in the hand of the king, signifying that he was the rightful heir of the throne of Sudea. From that time after, it became known as Andhanimwhid, Sign of the King. He took the sword, its glowing blade forged from a fallen star by Goromir, the greatest sorcerer of the elves and sunk it into the stone of the back of his granite throne. Only the hilt, bound in bright electrum and set with glittering sapphires, remained above the surface of the rock. None other but the rightful heir could ever remove the sword, thus providing a sign to verify future claims. The young prince was crowned King of Sudea in the summer of forty-seven fifty and ruled more than five centuries.
In the years following the cataclysmic war, the world went about rebuilding itself. The men of the jungle returned to savagery and the kingdoms of men attempted to return to their normal state. The golden age that was prior to the domination of a quarter of the world by the Adversary was past. The three kingdoms that fell under His sway maintained their enmity toward the other kingdoms of men. Lake Kolixtla, to the south of the northern inlet, remained closed to us, all its shores unfriendly. Pirates sailed out of the harbors of Thallasia, harassing all shipping. The Halfblood families of Sudea were decimated, unable to maintain their viability. The royal line weakened as the noble families slowly dwindled. The prohibition against intermarriage between Halfbloods and common men was lifted and the purity of the strain diluted. Soon, our kings lived no longer than the average commoner, though the sword would still release for the rightful king and a faint blue nimbus remained to indicate his right to rule.
In the year seventy-seven forty-nine, exactly three-thousand years after the defeat of the Adversary and the death of the King at his hand, Alagric IV, the last king of Sudea, died leaving no heir. Many pretenders to the throne came forth, bearing their credentials, but none could draw Andhanimwhid from its granite scabbard. The line of Stewards was established to oversee the affairs of the kingdom and no king has sat upon the throne of Sudea for nearly a millennium. Ten years after the death of Alagric IV, civil war broke out among our people. After five years of bloody strife, a pretender to the throne established himself as king over our northern lands of Ebareiza, though he had no rightful claim to the title and our border became once more, parallel the southern reaches of the desert. Thus weakened, we soon lost control of Elmenia, on our northeast coast, the highlanders there recognizing no king. Thus, it stands, six-thousand years after the founding of our fair kingdom; our borders are reduced to nearly the same extent as then.
Table of Contents
Prologue Gurlachday, Day 7, Harvest Moon, 8747, Sudean Calendar
Chapter 1 Carpathday, Day 4, Sowing Moon, 8757, Sudean Calendar
Chapter 2 Zorekday, Day 18, Squash Moon, 8759 Sudean Calendar
Chapter 3 Corballday, Day 21, Sowing Moon, 8760 Sudean Calendar
Chapter 4 Gurlachday, Day 25, Sowing Moon. 8760 Sudean Calendar
Chapter 5 Gurlachday, Day 25, Sowing Moon. 8760 Sudean Calendar