The Pinnacle Of Empire (Book 6) Read Online Free PDF Page A

kingdom picked up on the approaching dark energy.
    “The thing isn’t dead,” Mendentak said to his mother.
    “Memlatec said he destroyed the Dard Lord,” Merritak responded. “I feared no living being can destroy evil, just diminish it. It’s always waiting for pain and suffering to renew it. The thing waits for greed, envy, and selfishness to nurture it and grow once again.”
    “Memlatec must have suspected it survived in some form,” Mendentak said. “I’m sure he was hoping the evil was broken. We must send word to the wizard that the thing is regenerating. We must warn him and Emperor Saxthor as well that it’s moving south. Mankind is so susceptible to greed, envy, and the like. Perhaps the Crown of Yensupov can shield man from this evil once again. We elves, the dwarves, and other primal beings born of the elements and interwoven with them understand our relationship to the planet. We know, as the caretakers and partners of it, the need to live in harmony with it. Mortality and the need to leave his mark drive mankind. That vitality is a double edged sword. Out of balance, it leads to arrogance and an unhealthy sense of superiority, divorcing man from the world that nurtures him. As men move off their farms and into their cities, they increasingly see themselves as controllers of, rather than partners with, nature. This evil will quickly find sympathetic victims among them.”
    “You must send word to the dwarf kings Ormadese and Bordabrundese,” the dowager said. “They likely know of the presence, but we must warn them, nonetheless. And then there’s King Ahkenspec of the forest elves in the Memtahhamin Kingdom.”
    Mendentak clutched his sword hilt. “Ahkenspec has probably sensed this evil moving to his east. I’ll send a warning to him as well.”
    Merritak shook her head. “More and more elves are despairing. Many are going west, leaving these lands, sensing a threat as man’s need for dominance grows with his spreading presence. He hews down the ancient forest wherever he goes, burning and upturning the earth, eradicating the native plants and destroying the harmony of diversity crucial to the forests. Man will spread over the earth until he uses up its resources if he continues. Nature’s resources are finite.”
    “I understand the dwarves too are abandoning hope,” Mendentak said. “They first admired the vitality and creativity of man. They took on human form as best they could replicate it from the elements they understood. Now many are abandoning their physical, human forms and slipping back into the stone elements from which they came.”
    “Soon there’ll be no place for us among the men of Powteros.” Merritak shook her head and Mendentak noted some of her silvery glow had faded, ever so slightly but noticeably. “You must take measures to ward off this evil, Mendentak. It’ll sense us if it gets too close. We’re hidden from mankind, but energy recognizes energy.”
    “We can invoke our invisibility shield, energized and sustained by the intersection of planetary energy gradients.”
    “Be cautious, Mendentak, remember the Chowzenshwang. It won’t abide interference or intrusion. It’s primal and not concerned with the creatures of the mantle. It must not sense a threat.”
    “I’ll invoke its presence if the evil approaches too closely. That should be sufficient to drive aside the foul presence. For now, let’s hope the upwelling of primal energy beneath us will mask our own energy trace.”
    * * *
    High in the mountain forests of Zenobia on the southeastern edge of Powteros, King Zirkin hunted near the border with the Powterosian Empire. The king was thirty years old, slender, and handsome with full, classically elegant features, and medium blond hair. Reserved in his actions and reactions yet open to advice and suggestions, the king wasn’t easily swayed in his decisions.
    Separated from his hunting party, King Zirkin aimed his arrow at a stag racing down the