Rise Of The Scourge

Prologue

Prologue

Dimitri held his breath as he watched the dark phantom wrapped in a ragged cloak of an archmage fly overhead. He was sure Thael's invisibility cloak shrouded them from the spirit, but he dared not make a sound, even breathing, while the creature flew so close to them. Though the woods were thick where they ventured, the twisting grey-brown trees of the Shade Wood never seemed to produce a leaf, only sporadic branches above, which gave them virtually no cover from above.

"It has to be a patrol wraith," Jannel said.

Thanks for the obvious statement, Dimitri wanted to say, but he held his tongue.

"Perhaps we should follow it, let it lead us to its master," Thael suggested.

When the wraith was further away they continued moving, slower now than before.

Dimitri sighed. No wonder the guild had given him an escort of these two archmages, they were idiots! How they were granted the title of archmage baffled him, but they had it for a reason and by all accounts should be far better sorcerers' than himself. Looking back at the wraith still flying away he was suddenly glad to have them with him.

If whoever had taken the kids was strong enough to control a wraith then there'd be little he could do on his own. It was bad enough that only he was searching for these kids, but he wasn't surprised. They disappeared away from the academy's grounds and so the headmaster wouldn't sanction an official search for them because that would somehow imply the academy's involvement with the disappearances.

It seemed no one cared enough about the kids to look for them besides their families. He too was content to let it all go, but his dreams haunted him for it. All four of them were his students, he knew their faces and names well, they were good kids, and he was terrified to go looking for them alone.

So he petitioned the regional guild about it and he was granted the escort of the two arch mages with him now. Their trail led them to the Shade Woods and he wanted to turn back there and be content with a job well half done. But courage compelled him to push forward, he'd already come that far, and with a pair of archmages, he shouldn't fear the tales of what lay inside those woods.

Dimitri lowered his voice and said, "No its patrol route would take us further away from whatever it's guarding. But it does prove that we're getting close to finding whoever took those kids."

Though he was sure that he tracked the kids properly, now that they were in the heart of the woods he wanted to doubt even more. That wraith proved nothing, it could be a stray wandered out from the Haunted Lands and drawn into the woods. It would be even more likely, they had already encountered wandering spirits in these woods along their way.

But these were passive spirits, they ignored it, and it ignored them in return. That dark spirit they saw was different, though, master or no, had it spotted them it would have attacked. Dark spirits were volatile and attacked any living creature.

As they continued they eventually saw a dim light ahead. Though it was day the light came from a small fire. He knew because even during the day these woods were, as the name implied: shaded and thus always dark.

Cautiously they moved to the source of the light and were led into a small clearing where a base fire sat in the center. Bound to the trees was the four students stripped naked and their heads hung low. There was no one and nothing else around. They approached the kids.

"Please..." one of the kids said, barely audible. Her voice was so hoarse it sounded like she hadn't had any water for days.

Jannel and Thael gasped at seeing the kids up close and whispered some sort of prayer. Dimitri turned to them confused; they continued staring at the students in horror.