Chaos Rises Read Online Free

and
ran gracefully back into the darkness and the woods.
    Kreg's breath no longer came in ragged
gasps.
    It no longer came at all. But his lips had
curved into a smile of awe.
    Hala lay her head on his chest and cried,
huddled there with his mother and father, as Kreg's essence slipped
away through the night, carried on the back of the stag she had
summoned.
    They buried him, along with four others, in a
dawn laced with scarlet, while the village still smoldered. Beetle
and Stinky were dead too, and many of the villagers couldn't yet
breathe normally. The healer wasn't sure they ever would. Burns and
cuts scored swaths of exposed skin, and several people's heads
remained in a fog that went beyond the fear and the grief and the
thinning smoke.
    The villagers said their words of goodbye,
and then began drifting away into silence.
    The healer laid her hands on Hala's
shoulders. "You found your essence. You used it for good. We all
owe you our lives."
    Hala stared numbly at the graves. "I couldn't
help them ."
    "Oh, but I think you did. Easing death is a
gift too."
    Hala wished she could blot out the
beekeeper's tears of relief that her children were safe, even as
she lay dying. She wished she wouldn't see Kreg's face everywhere
she turned, even if he had smiled, there at the end. She
wished the stag had stayed, because if it had, maybe she could have
remained forever in that moment with Kreg. Hala wished many things
that could never be.
    "What of the man who did this?" she
whispered. "What if he tries it again?"
    "I don't know." The healer pulled Hala close.
"Maybe the baron's men can find him. Stop him." Smoke floated into
the sky, just like her maybe .
    "Hala?" Her brother had appeared out of
nowhere, his voice small, lost.
    Hala shook herself and focused on her
brother.
    "Tell it to me again," he said. "The story of
the hill tiger."
    Hala held her brother's hand and took a deep
breath. "I was picking rumpelberries that day. I had two buckets,
almost full…"
    * * *
    Far away in the capital, in the King's great
palace, in the houses of mages and soldiers and commoners, in the
streets busy with life, people began speaking of a mage so
powerful, so dark-hearted, that he would burn an entire village
with mage fire while he trapped the people inside.
    Within that city, two young apprentice mages
studied their art and heard the rumors. While one cried for the
victims and begged her mistress to begin teaching the healing
transmutations, the other plotted and schemed how the kingdom's
army could bring this man to justice. But neither imagined that
they would one day face him in all his deadly power.
     
     
     
    THE END
     
     
     
     
Read On

    Don't wait to find out more about the two young
apprentices and the ruthless mage who burned Hala's village, whose
dark magic has earned him the name of Chaos Mage.
    Read the first chapter of Far-Knowing below.
     
     
     

About the
Author

    Melinda Brasher loves the sound of autumn leaves
crunching beneath her feet and the smell of brownies baking. She
has lived abroad in Spain, Poland, Mexico, and the Czech Republic,
studying or teaching English as a second language. Her short
fiction appears in Ellipsis Literature and Art, Enchanted
Conversation, On the Premises, and others. To see more of her
work or contact her online, go to melindabrasher.com
    If you liked this story, please show your support by
recommending it to friends or writing a review on Goodreads,
Amazon, or Smashwords. Thank you.
    And now, for a sneak peek of Far-Knowing:
     
     
     
Far-Knowing
    By Melinda
Brasher
     
     
     

Chapter I
     
    I
    Kallinesha
     
    The silence was alive, the way stalker
spiders are alive even if you never see them, the way their fangs
feel real even if they're gone by the time you reach down to swat
them away. Kallinesha could just make out the flicker of
candlelight under the door, but the silence stood guard and she
dared not disturb it.
    This was probably just her guilt playing
tricks on her. It