Shadowblade by Tom Bielawski Read Free Book Online

after this portion of his plan was complete.
    Shalthazar nodded, as though he were agreeing with the man’s request. But instead of leaving he ambled closer to the villager, the man’s own horse was pranced nervously as it sensed the approach of the predator animal that was the nightmare. The man tried to urge his mount backward but the horse would not heed him. Finally when Shalthazar was close enough, he casually pointed his staff at the scared man and hissed a word of power.
    A black shadow darted from the end of his staff and into the man’s open mouth. The leader of the watch began to gasp and choke and his eyes bulged from the effects of the spell that now choked the life from his body. That was the cue that the men had agreed upon and Shalthazar’s apprentices went to work. The three horsemen charged toward the group. Sensing that nothing but death awaited the villagers, the men turned their frightened horses toward home, they were only too willing to flee from their approaching doom; the apprentices pursued.
    Shalthazar followed his apprentices down the hill. The four dark horsemen blazed a trail through the snow toward the village, which would now be in a panic as news of their arrival spread. Panic and fear would be flowing through the village as mothers and babes cowered and men tried to summon the courage to protect them.
    Within seconds every one of the other nine men who had ridden out to meet ghastly apparitions of death, were laying in blood soaked snow. The horsemen stopped at the puny wall that surrounded the village and allowed the fear of their existence and their dark deed to pervade the populace. He would let them wonder what he intended to do, and doubtless there were messengers being dispatched to other villages to spread word of the four strange horsemen.
    When he thought that the fear of their presence had infiltrated every nook and cranny of the village, Shalthazar and his apprentices stormed onto the streets, sending sheets of darkfire from their weapons to blast into homes and buildings. Anyone who dared come out to meet them was cut down mercilessly by a wicked scythe. A few resistors attempted to attack with arrows from afar, but the missiles always flew harmlessly wide due to the protective enchantments the powerful men used.
    Finally Shalthazar ordered his men to disperse. There would be no organized resistance among this rabble. His men were not going forth with the purpose of wreaking havoc, although that certainly appeared to be the case to the frightened villagers, but to recover the bodies of the dead. There were enough dead now, the elf wizard reckoned, to suit his purposes. Slaughtering the entire village would simply be a waste of time. Doubtless today’s attack had the benefit of weakening any resolve the village might have had against joining his empire; they would be begging the Nashians to protect them.
    Shalthazar’s apprentices dismounted and gathered a number of corpses from the ground. Then, they drew the Shadow Sigil on each corpse’s head in its own blood. Once they had prepared each corpse, the four horsemen withdrew from the village and returned to the hilltop.
    There, the four men aligned their horses and together they chanted the words of the Shadow Sigil that would enact the next step. Some frightened villagers dared to peak from the windows of the homes that had not been destroyed to see if the carnage was over. Slowly, one by one, each of the corpses struggled to its feet leaving their life’s blood lying upon the snow covered ground where they had died. The dead men shuffled through the snow, as if unsure how to walk, and made their way to the one road that wound its way through the small village. There they assembled in a line and turned toward Shalthazar and his apprentices, and began to march. In all, the wizard counted thirty men that had been slain and resurrected by the dark power of the Shadow Sigil.
    As the small platoon of dead men lined up before him,