A Joust of Knights (Book #16 in the Sorcerer's Ring)

CHAPTER ONE Thorgrin stood at the bow of the sleek ship, gripping the rail, his hair pushed back by the wind, and he stared into the horizon with a deepening sense of foreboding. Their ship, taken from the pirates, was sailing as fast as the winds could carry it, Elden, O’Connor, Matus, Reece, Indra, and Selese working the sails, Angel standing by his side, and Thor, as eager as he was, knew they could not go any faster. Yet still, he willed it to be so. After all this time, he finally felt with certainty that Guwayne lay just ahead, just past the horizon, on the Isle of Light. And with equal certainty, he sensed that Guwayne was in danger. Thor did not understand how it could be so. After all, the last time he had left them, Guwayne had been safely on the Isle of Light, under Ragon’s protection, a sorcerer as powerful as his brother. Argon was the most powerful sorcerer Thorgrin had ever known—had even protected the entire Ring—and Thor did not know how any harm could ever come to Guwayne while under Ragon’s protection. Unless there was some power out there that Thorgrin had never heard of, a power of a dark sorcerer’s which could match even Ragon’s. Could it be that some realm existed, some dark force, some evil sorcerer, of which he knew nothing? But why would they target his son? Thor thought back to the day he had fled the Isle of Light in such a hurry, under the spell of his dream, so driven to leave the place at the c***k of dawn. Looking back, Thor realized he had been deceived by some dark force trying to lure him away from his son. It was only thanks to Lycoples, who still circled his ship, screeching, disappearing on the horizon and coming back again, that he had turned back for the Isle, was finally heading in the right direction. The signs, Thor realized, had been in front of his face the whole time. How had he ignored them? What dark force was leading him astray to begin with? Thor recalled the price he’d had to pay: the demons released from hell, the dark lord’s curse that each would mean a curse on his head. He knew that more curses, more trials lay before him, and he felt certain this had been one of them. What other tests, he wondered, lay before him? Would he ever get his son back? “Don’t worry,” came a sweet voice. Thor turned and looked down to see Angel tugging on his shirt. “Everything will be okay,” she added with a smile. Thor smiled down at her and laid a hand on her head, reassured by her presence as always. He had come to love Angel as he would a daughter, the daughter he never had. He took reassurance in her presence. “And if it’s not,” she added with a smile, “I’ll take care of them!” She proudly raised the small bow that O’Connor had carved for her, and showed Thor how she could pull back the arrow. Thor smiled, amused, as she raised the bow to her chest, shakily placed a small wooden arrow on it, and began to pull back the string. She released the bow, and her small wooden arrow went flying, shakily, overboard and out into the ocean. “Did I kill a fish!?” she asked excitedly as she ran to the rail and looked over with glee. Thor stood there, looking down into the foaming waters of the sea, and was not so sure. But he smiled all the same. “I am sure you did,” he said, reassuringly. “Perhaps even a shark.” Thor heard a distant screech, and he was suddenly on alert again. His entire body froze as he grabbed the hilt of his sword and looked out over the water, studying the horizon. The thick gray clouds slowly cleared, and as they did, they revealed a horizon which made Thor’s heart drop: in the distance, black plumes of smoke rose into the sky. As more clouds cleared, Thor could see that they arose from a distant isle—not just any isle, but an island with steep cliffs, rising right up to the sky, a broad plateau at its top. An isle he could mistake for no other. The Isle of Light. Thor felt a pain in his chest as he saw a sky black with evil creatures, resembling gargoyles, circling what remained of the isle, like vultures, their screeches filling the air. There was an army of them, and below them, the entire isle was up in flames. Not a corner of it was left unscathed. “FASTER!” Thor shouted, yelling at the wind, knowing it was futile. It was the most helpless feeling of his life. But there was nothing more he could do. He watched the flames, the smoke, the monsters departing, heard Lycoples screeching above, and he knew it was too late. Nothing could have survived. Anything left on the isle—Ragon, Guwayne, anything at all—would surely, without a doubt, be dead. “NO!” Thorgrin screamed, cursing the heavens, the ocean spray hitting his face as it carried him, too late, to the isle of death.