Free Trail Of The Torean (Book 2) by Ron Collins

were now down, and yet still the dragons carried a river of freshly wounded animals to him.
    “Make it stop,” he pleaded.
    But a dragon placed another horse before him. The animal screamed in pain and lay on its side. Its eyes were black pools of panic. All four legs were broken.
    He healed it, but several more dragons wheeled about in the pink sky above.
    The Lectodinian mage laughed as he lowered his hand farther.
    “Faster,” he said. “You’ll never catch up at this rate.”
    Garrick was empty now. The undeniable essence of hunger crushed him. It was a burning blackness inside the pit of his stomach. He had to feed.
    Another dragon landed—this one carrying a unicorn, bright and pure with a coat gleaming of opalescent glory. Its horn was a swirl of blue and silver. Its eyes were filled with intelligence.
    Life force within the animal called to him.
    No, he thought. Please, no.
    Garrick’s fingertips grazed its mane, and the unicorn screamed in agony.
    He tried to pull away, but his hand wouldn’t let go.
    He inhaled the animal in great gulps. It filled him, its magic rushing through his body.
    Then the unicorn was a withered husk on the ground, its mottled fur covered with maggots, its horn charred and broken.
    Bile rose in Garrick’s throat.
    The judges’ arms rose, and smiles appeared on their thin lips.
    Above him, a hundred dragons circled, carrying horses that dripped with fresh blood.

    Garrick woke in a cold sweat.
    Suni slept on her bedroll. Darien lay slumped over the ring of stones, clearly in a sorcery-laden daze. Empty coils of rope lay where the Lectodinian had been, the knots still tied.
    The mage was gone.

Chapter 14

    “This is very good work, Elman. Thank you for your research. We shall speak again soon.”
    “You are most welcome, Lord Superior. I look forward to it.”
    Zutrian Esta shut down the communication spell, and gave a frustrated sigh.
    He gazed around his laboratory.
    He had just finished grounding a mixture of cobalt and eagle feathers that he had planned to boil into a solution of pure spring water. Then he would have added the marrow of the underplane demon that sat in the flask nearby and that smelled so strongly of tar.
    The components were ruined now. Elman’s call had broken his experimentation. At least this time, however, the news had been worth the loss.
    Zutrian gathered the braziers he needed.
    After months of negotiations and planning, he could now do this magic in his sleep, though the lack of sophistication of the Koradictines’ casting still annoyed him. He found Ettril Dor-Entfar’s magic to be undisciplined and wasteful, no different from any other Koradictine, really. They had no foresight, these mages. Their castings lacked elegance, and they used the magestuff of Talin as if it would last forever.
    It made him angry when he thought about it.
    He made the proper artwork and set the necessary components in their places.
    When the work was done, the Koradictine’s face appeared in the liquid circle.
    “To what do I owe this
unanticipated
pleasure?” Ettril said.
    “We have an
unanticipated
problem,” Zutrian replied, ignoring the distaste that rose into his throat at the mere sound of the Koradictine’s voice.
    “Tell on, my friend.”
    “One of my order has discovered a Torean with unaccountable powers.”
    Ettril’s lips pursed.
    “Such as?”
    “He has healed, and he has killed. He is said to have destroyed two of our mages with a single spell.”
    “Interesting.”
    “It gets more so when you learn that the Torean in question is said to be an untriggered apprentice. And one’s interest grows even deeper when you find that his path has crossed with that of the leader of the Torean vagabonds we have been searching for.”
    A cloud crossed the Koradictine’s face. Zutrian waited for the other mage to come to the most obvious conclusion.
    “The Torean House has a god-touched mage.”
    “That is what my scout has