The First Lich Lord - Chapter 122

I had just looked away from the prompts when I felt a sudden presence, the sheer power drawing my attention. “We need to get inside!”

Just as I began to step to the edge, a blinding light struck the top of the pergola. It did no physical damage, but the moment it faded I found myself bound in silver chains.

Raven was struggling, and I began to flex my own power to break the chains, but before I could, a man strode to the top of the stairs leading up the ziggurat. He smiled up at me—it was not kind.

He leapt to the top of the pergola, landing right in front of me. He looked between me to Maxwell and then Raven. “So, you’re the problematic asshole who’s been killing my people.” His voice was deep and gravelly. “I do thank you for helping us find this place, but I think it’s time we got rid of you.” His gaze fixed on Raven. “And your pet.”

He stretched his hand out toward Raven and the chains pulled her over. She shifted into her cat form trying to escape, but the chains adapted with her. He grabbed me by my throat and her by the scruff of her neck. His hands were like a vice.

“Don’t worry, you only have to die once,” he sneered. “Neither your dungeon nor your phylactery will protect you from me.”

I heard a yell of pain escape Raven, and silver light enveloped her. It wasn’t just magic, there was something else in it, soul energy. I felt the intrusion into my very being a moment later and it surged through me, finding the connection that led back to my phylactery. A connection I was only dimly aware of myself. That power traveled down the thread and I began to panic. If he destroyed my phylactery, nothing would save me.

I began to gain awareness of my phylactery, as if part of my consciousness was traveling down the thread with his power. Then it all stopped. The power didn’t go away, but it stopped moving and my awareness came back to my body. I blinked in surprise, a man in familiar brown robes with a big belly and kind face before me. But his kind face wasn’t so kind at the moment.

A simple wooden staff was held next to this unknowing man’s head. “Enough of that, Theonis,” Friar Brown said with steel in his voice. “You and I both know he does not deserve your wrath, nor the Inquisition.”

“Brown,” Theonis sneered. “You gave up your authority to tell me what to do when you walked away from your position.”

“A regret I now carry,” Brown said. “I did not expect such hypocrisy to have seeped so deeply into Olattee as it has.”

“Hypocrisy,” Theonis scoffed. “You are ignorant. We follow the true will of Olattee, confirmed by the god himself.”

“Let them go,” Brown snarled. “I refuse to believe that Olattee himself is on board with what is going on. But nonetheless, I will continue to walk the path my feet have sent me on, and right now that path leads me to protecting this man.”

Theonis dropped me and Raven, the silver chains fading. The sound of fighting drew my attention as I was no longer under immediate threat. The camp was embroiled in some kind of conflict.

“I don’t know what you think you’re doing,” Theonis said, noticing the conflict as well. “But you’ve overplayed your hand, Friar.”

“We shall see,” Friar Brown said a moment before Theonis vanished in a flash of silver magic.

“Okay,” Maxwell was the first to recover. “What the fuck just happened?”