The Pogrom of Mages: The Healers of Glastamear: Volume One Read Online Free PDF

not outshoot the caravan guards who used double-reflex horn bows, and many men were killed without the tribe ever taking a prize.
    In the fourth desperate winter after the sheep were killed, a child was born. He was huge, killing his mother as he forced his way from her belly. Perry they called him and by the time he could crawl, he grabbed food from every other child and the weaker adults to feed his insatiable appetite.
    By the time Perry was six he was as tall as an adult, and the Bagger tribe had shrunk to fifty adults and a dozen children. Perry lorded over the children and even the adults were afraid of his temper and his skill with a flint knife. He knew no fear and was especially quick to cut if offended.
    When Perry was thirteen, he fashioned a huge ax from flint. One end was knapped to a point and the other was rounded. It was so heavy that Perry, who was twice the weight of any other Bagger, was the only one who could lift it. The same day he finished the new weapon he killed the Bagger chief, Coal Face, and two other strong men and assumed leadership of the clan. He organized the Baggers as never before, forcing them, even the children, to gather coal and carry it to nearby villages for trade all through the spring, summer, and autumn. Because of their grueling toil, more grain was stockpiled and the population grew that winter for the first time since the sheep were killed.
    Now the naiads’ tone changed from mocking to serious. They formed a circle with Michael in the center and held hands as they walked slowly around Michael while singing in perfect harmony.
    Hating their brutal chieftain, the men of the tribe conspired to eliminate him. Because he was both a giant in size and dim of wit, they decided it was safer not to fight him directly. In the early spring, the Bagger men organized a hunting party in the high mountains to look for mountain goats to add meat to their diet.
    High in the icy peaks Perry woke to find the rest of the hunting party gone. They had snuck away during the night following a trail of cairns they had left behind as they climbed to the highest peak in the whole of the Mountains of Min. As they retreated, the Baggers dismantled each rock pile they passed so there would be no trail home for the dimwitted Perry to follow.
    Perry the Bagger chieftain wandered that high place for three days until he came upon the hidden nest of the immense Red Dragon. She was returning from a hunting trip to the great plains of the east. Perry gasped when he saw a huge scarlet egg alone in the hidden nest. He did not know that it was the first she had laid in eleven centuries.
    Perry was starving because his tribesmen had taken all the food when they abandoned him, and he was about to open the egg to eat the dragon embryo within. As he raised his giant ax, Firebreath the Red Dragon returned. Although she’d promised not to hurt any of the elf’s children, a threat to her egg was beyond the power of her promise. She was about to immolate Perry, but there was still a chance he would drop the ax and destroy her egg. She hesitated.
    “Stinky Bagger chieftain, I will give you a gift beyond value if you lay down that ax.” She had thought of a way to create some havoc among the humans, to save her egg, and to still not violate her commitment to her friends the elves.
    “What gift? How do I know you won’t kill me as soon as I put the ax down?”
    “Foolish man, dragons don’t know how to lie. I will never kill you if I promise. I will give you the gift of fire magic. You and all of your male children will be the only humans who can perform powerful fire spells. You’ll soon be king among your kind and be treated as a god, and your sons will rule the world of men.”
    Perry put down his ax and the Red Dragon laughed. What better revenge upon the humans she despised than to put the foulest, stupidest, and most evil man among them as their leader. He would foment wars and destruction and pass the fire manna