The Wizard

Lighthouse of Verina Luki

The road to Verina Luki improved the closer he got to the sea. When the city's spires came into view his feet enjoyed a well-maintained cobblestone avenue. Mevner summited the last of the rolling hills and the great metropolis stood out across the shoreline; it was not its normal sparkling self. 

Smoke rose from multiple points across the skyline. All but two of the towers that accent the city's walls were tumbled or burning. The great library of Luki smoldered with its roof visibly missing and beyond the city of the coast, the lighthouse did not shine. Its rotating beacon hadn't been extinguished in over a hundred years. 

"When I feel the bricks beneath my feet and smell the sea, I always felt home. Safe."

"Not so much today," said Grimble as he took in the destructive aftermath. 

Farming villages on the way to town were unharmed but with no people about. Houses appeared recently and hastily abandoned. As they crossed the last farms before the city they came to the horribly misplaced iron gate of Luki. It protruded from the middle of a barley field, twisted, bent, and jammed into the earth as if dropped from the sky by a giant. 

The once impenetrable gateway was wide open with its two pillars reduced to piles of rubble. They passed through a clearing in the broken stones and entered the city. Inside the walls, the smell of death and fire filled the emptied streets. They made their way toward the port. The shipyards had been burned to the ground and only one ship stood untouched out on the harbor. Every dock was smashed and burned. Half sunk scorched hulls dotted the bay. 

Mevner followed the path to the lighthouse. The once brown and white striped stone tower was blackened by fire damage. The top had been torn clear off and the sides partially caved in. The tower sat on a large rock outcrop at the edge of the sea. 

Strewn across the shoreline were chunks of brick torn from the lighthouse walls and mixed in among the rubble was what was left of Øregård. A boot here, a green muscular arm there, half his torso lay exposed in the sun with dark green guts hanging out. Seagulls milled around but had no taste for his bizarre mangled corpse. His jagged sword was broken in two and his severed right arm still held its hilt. His head sat decapitated on its back, mouth hanging open, tongue protruding over big square teeth. Øregård's bulging wide-open eyes stared vacantly as wispy clouds drifted across the pale blue sky. 

"We're too late." Mevner squatted down next to his dead friend and placed Grimble on the lawn beside the head. 

"Luhng really did a number on old Øregård. He's going to be endlessly angry about this. He'll want revenge," said Grimble a matter-of-factly. 

"What do you mean he's going to be angry? He's dead."

"Well, he's mostly dead, that's for certain. But ogres are strange creatures, you know. We could put him back together." Grimble poked at the loose flesh hanging off his torn face. 

"Put him back together?" 

"We fixed your hands, didn't we?" 

Mevner looked at the crooked scars wrapping around his fingers.

"We can reconstruct him too." Grimble's attitude was absurdly optimistic. 

"I don't know the resurrection spell. I don't have the power to create life from death." Mevner crossed his arms and looked down at the gnome. 

"That's just it, Øregård is really hard to kill. Why do you think Luhng tore him into so many pieces? Remember, they've fought before. This time Luhng meant him to stay down. And he might've stayed down too. Maybe even forever? That is if we hadn't a come along."