“Arise, My children,” said a calm but firm voice. A voice clearly used to being obeyed. “Arise and attend to Me.”

     Resalintas found himself obeying the voice instinctively, as if he’d been obeying it all his life. He opened his eyes and found that he was standing on a parade ground. On one side of him stood a long line of buildings. Barracks and offices by the look of them and somehow as magnificent as cathedrals despite the fact that they were blocky and functional and built from common fired clay bricks. On the other three sides, a huge expanse of hard packed earth stretched as far as the eye could see. It might have been a desert, but somehow he knew it was a parade ground. Vaster than any he’d imagined possible and clearly intended for an army of uncounted millions.

     At first he thought he was alone, but then he was aware that the wizards and the other priests of Samnos who’d been with him in Arnor were there as well, standing in a line as if on parade. He nodded a greeting to them, wondering if they had any better idea than he where they were and what they were doing there. They were no longer raks, he noted. They all now had the appearance of living human beings once more, which supported the idea that they were now dead and that they were about to be judged. The male wizards all looked much as they had shortly before they’d undergone the rak transformation. Old and wise, stooped and wrinkled. Their power in their minds rather than in their bodies.

     The priests, on the other hand, almost all looked many years younger. They were all at the very peak of their physical fitness, in their late twenties or early thirties, even Resalintas himself, and he found it almost impossible to reconcile these young, powerful, athletic people with the crusty old warriors he’d come to know. Allissa, the sage wizardess whose knowledge of the natural world surpassed even that of the clerics of Ramthara, was also younger, with just enough grey in her hair to give her beauty the authority of age and experience.

     The most surprising change was in Aerethil, though. The only other female amongst them. Just before undergoing the transformation she’d been magnificent and intimidating in her old age, every wrinkle on her sagging face lending extra presence and authority. Now, though, that awesome person had been replaced by a lean, curvaceous nineteen year old; her eyes clear and bright, her body full and firm. Her hair dark and luxuriant and falling across her face in a way calculated to have every man within a hundred miles falling over themselves in their eagerness to pledge themselves to her.

     We’ve all been returned to the age at which our own particular skills were most effective, Resalintas realised, but at the same time we still have the knowledge and experience of age. It was just as Samnos had promised the next life would be, but if this was the afterlife reserved for faithful priests of Samnos, what were the wizards doing with them? He’d had the idea that they would be judged separately, by some other God. Maybe even by this Magister of theirs if he turned out to be a real God after all. He had to admit, though, that he’d only had the very sketchiest idea of what the next life would be like. He would just have to wait and see what happened.

     He saw that there were other figures standing on the huge parade ground, squinting against the light of the yellow sun as it beat mercilessly down on them. They didn’t seem to have just appeared. It was more as though they’d been there all along and he just hadn’t noticed them before. Some of them were priests of Samnos in full dress uniform, as if they were at some great state function, and even though he’d never seen any of them before he was surprised to find that he recognised them.

     He saw Rellinious the Righteous, who’d wielded the Sceptre of Samnos the last time it had been recovered, two hundred years before. Preemus the Pious, the very first human to be accepted as a priest of Samnos over three thousand years before, and Boldin the Bloodspiller, who’d sent the demon Tunganna back to the Pit after it had broken through into the world in the early days of the Agglemonian Empire. Stampander of Garon, who’d turned back an invasion of shologs and goblins almost single handedly in the days before the unification of the island continent in response to the rise of Agglemon, was talking with the Holy Brothers of Thoron who’d saved the priesthood of Samnos from almost certain extinction during the bad days of the Triumph of Skorvos, while across from them the storm giant Borla, the only giant ever to have been accepted as a priest by the God of Righteous Warfare, was sharpening an axe the size of a telegraph pole with long, slow strokes of a grindstone while glancing thoughtfully at the smaller figures all around him.

     Then he was delighted to see the tall and forbidding figure of Skava looking at them with great interest. Skava, the only other priest of Samnos in history to turn himself into a rak. His presence here, amongst all these heroes from all the ages of history, meant that he had escaped damnation after all, as Resalintas had hoped and prayed. The first version of the legend of Skava must be the correct one, therefore. Samnos had allowed him to become a rak on the condition that he end his undead existence the moment his enemies had been destroyed, and this he had done, voluntarily sending his soul to judgement. No wonder he appeared so interested in the new arrivals. He must have been curious to see with his own eyes what kind of people had dared to follow in his footsteps.

     “Lexandros!” he heard Tragius gasp beside him. “That’s Lexandros himself! The founder of Lexandria University!”

     Resalintas followed the wizard’s gaze and saw a rather ordinary looking grey bearded man dressed in crimson robes sewn with silver runes and sigils. He wouldn’t have known who it was if Tragius hadn’t named him. We recognise our own heroes, he realised. We recognise the people we’ve revered all our lives.

     “And that’s Okkran Starblazer!” the wizard continued, awe and delight in his voice. “There’s Hume the Diviner, one of my old teachers, and that’s Iconos the Protector, one of the first immortal wizards.” He chuckled. “Not quite as immortal as he thought, it seems.” Then he frowned, searching the faces surrounding them. “I don’t see Perlandros anywhere. I’d have thought he’d have been sure to be here.”

     “Perlandros still lives,” said a voice. The same voice they’d heard immediately after their arrival. “When his soul arrives for judgement, however, be sure that he shall have a place amongst all these mighty and righteous heroes, as shall you.”

     Once again they became aware of a figure who had been there all along, but whom, for some reason, they hadn’t noticed until that moment. The figure of a mighty warrior, head and shoulders taller than any of the other figures present (including, by some strange trick of perspective, the giant). He carried a sword and a shield bearing the design of the golden griffin, wore a shining steel helmet and was dressed in knee length blood red robes over a suit of chain mail armour. He was surrounded by a pure, pearly radiance that seemed to emanate from his body and which made him shine out amongst the other figures like a diamond amongst lumps of coal. How they could possibly have missed him, Resalintas had no idea, but he knew immediately who it was and he fell to his knees before him. All the other priests of Samnos, new arrivals and ancient heroes alike, did the same, expressions of awe and rapture on their faces.

     After a moment of uncertainty, the wizards dropped to one knee as well, fearful in case their hesitation had angered Him. Samnos didn’t seem at all annoyed by their hesitation, though. Instead, he wore an expression of deep satisfaction. The kind of satisfaction that a blacksmith might have worn after having wrought a particularly fine piece of metalwork.

     “You have done well,” he said, his voice rich and deep. “Your courage and resourcefulness have exceeded even My expectations. Your efforts are not yet at an end, however. I have more work for you to do in the worlds of the living before you go to your final rest.”

     “What do you mean?” asked Adantus in confusion. “Aren’t we dead?”

     The priests of Samnos stared at him in shock. He dared to question Samnos? You never question Samnos! You just obey!

     The WarGod didn’t seem to be offended, though. Indeed, the corner of his thin, tight mouth twitched in the tiniest hint of a smile. “No, you are not dead,” he replied. “You are undead, you are raks, but like no other raks that have ever existed. I have freed your souls from the force that pulls them to the immortal realms, so that you no longer need arks to remain in the worlds of the living. Also, I have restored your physical forms so that you once again appear as you did before you underwent the transformation. Your hearts beat. Your flesh is warm. Your touch will no longer kill the living, unless you wish it to. You may return to the worlds of the living any time you wish and continue your fight against evil, as you have all your lives."

     “Return to Tharia?” asked Resalintas, accepting the WarGod’s words without hesitation.

     “No,” replied Samnos, though. “There are enough priests on Tharia doing My work already. Your task will be to continue the fight against the Shadowlord. You have destroyed the Shadow on Tharia, but there are many other worlds threatened by the Prince of the Undead. It is My wish that you go to one of them; a world that I judge will soon lose the fight if they are left to their own resources, and you will aid them in their struggle. If you are destroyed your souls will return to Me and I will give you the peace I have promised you. If you are victorious, or if you fail to prevent that world from being consumed by the Shadow, then you will go to another world, and then another after that, and then another. You will continue the fight until the Shadowlord has been defeated on all the worlds he threatens, or you are destroyed.”

     “Don’t we get a choice?” demanded Adantus, and again the priests reacted in shock. Had the man no fear? No respect?”

     “Yes,” replied Samnos. “You may voluntarily end your existence any time you wish, as did the worthy Skava, and come to me for judgement, or you may remain raks and serve your own ends in any way you wish. It is My wish, though, that you continue to fight the Shadowlord, and if you do this you will be judged more favourably when the day comes that you stand before Me once again.”

     Resalintas saw Tragius frown as if wondering whether the God had threatened them, but then the wizard straightened and the priest saw a new gleam in his eye. Good, he thought. He likes the idea of continuing to fight the Prince of the Undead as much as I do. Resalintas knew that the wizard would be remembering the attempt made by the University to strike at the Shadowlord directly, by opening a portal into the Pit and shooting a volley of death spells through it. He would be remembering the awful consequences of that attack, the wizards and priests whose minds had been utterly destroyed by their momentary contact with the Bone Prince. Many of those wizards and priests had been his friends, Resalintas knew, and he must still felt a burning need to avenge what had been done to them.

     “All right,” the wizard said, confirming the priest's deduction. “I’ll do it. I’ll go on fighting him any way I can.”

     One by one the other wizards agreed as well, including Adantus, who maintained that he was only anxious that he wasn’t being shoehorned into anything. So long as he was being asked to volunteer and he had the option of refusing, he was game. “If there are other worlds out there suffering the same thing we’ve suffered, then we’ve got to help them,” he said, boldly staring the God straight in the eye. “I merely have to think how grateful we’d have been to have had help from veterans from other worlds in our own struggle.”

     The priests were now staring at him in barely restrained anger. This implied criticism of the being they revered was almost more than they could stand! Only the fact that he dared to speak to the God’s face held them back and made them feel a certain grudging admiration for the undead wizard.

     Samnos frowned, but he allowed the words to wash over him. Adantus paled when he saw that frown, though, realising that there was only so far you could push a God. And a God of War at that! “Of course, we had the benefit of Your personal assistance,” he said therefore. “It was the power You sent Your priests and the strength and courage You gave us all that allowed us to triumph.”

     Samnos nodded, accepting the credit, and the priests relaxed in relief.

     “If we’re still raks,” said Kharsh, anxious to change the subject, “aren’t we still doomed to turn to evil? We might go to a world on which a Shadowwar is being waged and end up taking the side of the enemy.”

     “You will not turn to evil,” replied the WarGod. “Pure souls remain pure unless impurity from outside touches them. The reason most raks are evil is because it is mostly evil creatures who choose to undergo the transformation. The evil fear death because they fear judgement, but the good do not fear judgement and so feel no need to avoid death.”

     “So we didn’t need to arrange for our arks to be destroyed!” cried Vasta, half laughing. “We could have remained on Tharia as raks.”

     “I would have summoned you in any case,” said Samnos. “Warriors as powerful as you are needed more elsewhere. I understand that My brother feels the same way. He is anxious that warfare does not come to an end on any world.”

     The raks stared in astonishment. “You mean the Skorvosian raks?” asked Resalintas. “They will also be fighting the Shadow on other worlds?”

     “So I understand,” replied the WarGod. “And it is likely that they will be sent to the same worlds as you. He will not want My followers to gain an advantage over His on any particular world.”

     “And the gl hugzi?” asked Tragius. “And the Eeii? Will their Gods send them as well?”

     “Even I cannot see the future,” replied Samnos. “But you should be prepared to meet them again. There may even come a time when you will be glad of their assistance. The Shadowlord will not soon forget you. You did more than rescue a world from his grasp when you closed the Puncturium. When the energy it contained was released, it created as great an explosion on his side of the rift as on your side. His palace suffered a substantial amount of damage, as did the Shadowlord himself, and he will be keen to pay you back for it.”

     “So we hurt him!” declared Tragius with savage satisfaction. “Good. He had it coming.”

     “Do not think you will be able to do the same on other worlds, however,” warned the WarGod. “In the first place, different universes have different natural laws, and the form the Shadow takes depends on the natural laws that prevail there. Each different form will have different weaknesses, which you will have to divine when you arrive, and not all of them include a Shadowbeast or a Puncturium. Secondly, even if the Shadow is similar in form to the one on Tharia, the Shadowlord will take steps to remove the weaknesses you exploited. He will not want to be hit the same way twice.”

     “We will find a way,” promised Resalintas confidently. “We will not betray the trust You are placing in us.”

     “Good,” replied Samnos.

     He then looked them over again, giving each of them a close, critical examination that made even the boldest of them quiver a little. Then he nodded in satisfaction. “You may remain here for as long as you feel the need to prepare yourselves, and then a simple act of will will carry you to the first world suffering from the Shadow. You will not then be able to leave until the Shadow has been destroyed on that world, or you are destroyed, or that world falls irreversibly to the Shadow, but when you do leave you will again be given a choice between accepting eternal rest or going on to another world. It is My hope, however, and My wish, that you shall free many worlds from the curse of the Shadow before the day comes that you stand before Me again.”

     Suddenly Samnos and the ancient heroes were gone, leaving the raks all alone in the vast, empty parade ground. “By the Gods!” whispered Aerethil breathlessly.

     “Well, it seems we have our work cut out for us,” added Tragius. “And I, for one, don't need any time to prepare myself.” His face was set in an expression of eager anticipation. “Shall we go?”

     The priests were all standing ready, looking at Resalintas, waiting for him to lead them. There was no question of any of them refusing their God's call. The wizards, on the other hand, were glancing at each other uncertainly. For a moment Resalintas thought they might back out, but then Adantus nodded. "What the hell," he said. I'm in."

     The other wizards also agreed, one after the other, and Aerethil grinned with delight. "Good!" she said. "So, what are we waiting for?"

     A simple act of will, Samnos had said. Resalintas willed himself to go, therefore, and a moment later they were gone, leaving only a whispering breeze to scatter the dust and erase the footprints they’d left behind.

This marks the end of the History of the Fourth Shadowwar,
but the Legend of the Blue Wizard continues in the six volume series collectively titled 'The Last Perfect Days'

The Rossem project

     Twenty years after the end of the Fourth Shadowwar, Thomas Gown is a happily married family man with a beautiful wife and a perfect son, but when he takes his son back to Lexandria University to arrange for his wizardly education he learns that another threat to the world has arisen, and that the perfect life he’s come to enjoy could soon be nothing more than a fading memory…

The Flight of the Dragonfly

     Lexandria University becomes the hub of a gigantic research project in an attempt to find a way to counter the new threat facing the planet Tharia, but spies and saboteurs are everywhere, and  one of their key men, responsible for one of the most important elements of the Rossem Project, dies with his work uncompleted. Without his contribution the project will fail, but to complete his work an expedition must go all the way to the dreaded Southern Continent, from which few people have ever returned...

The Rings of Salammis

     The immortal wizards were the most powerful humans ever to walk the planet Tharia, but the wars between them devastated the planet and the whole world breathed a sigh of relief when the last of them was killed, but one of the greatest of them created a pair of atifacts of awesome power in an attempt to cheat death, and if he succeeds there will be no-one in the world able to stand against him...

Tak

     Thomas Gown has become an important part of the Rossem Project and his contribution may be vital to its eventual success, but he has also become a pawn in a desperate struggle between ancient powers who care nothing for the civilisation Thomas has sworn to protect, and he gradually learns that his importance to them has roots reaching back to a peasant boy whose parents scratched out a living on the very edges of civilisation eight thousand years ago...

The Worlds of the Sheaf

     The Rossem Project is close to success, and will allow a hand picked expedition to explore other worlds, searching for the threat that faces the planet Tharia, but as they begin their mission they discover that there are many other threats out there, and that the one they originally feared may be the very least of them...

The Gem Lords

     Thomas Gown’s connection to a group of powerful wizards who lived thousands of years ago is finally revealed, and he learns that he may be able to save his world and his civilisation, along with others beyond number, from a threat that will manifest itself in the far distant future. The only way he can do this is by accepting a destiny that has been chosen for him by ancient, implacable powers centuries ago, but if he does this it would mean sacrificing any hope for a normal life and leaving his home, his wife and his child forever...