Aichlan forced himself to his feet as Clarissa reached Séverin and embraced the light of dawn to perform a healing. His own armor and blessed tunic had saved him, being made of enchanted metals and fabric. Had it not, he may well not have survived. He looked for Eth but could not find him anywhere; he could only hope he was all right. He grabbed his sword from beneath a thin layer of ash and ran as best he could over to Clarissa.
“You should have stayed down knight.” Osric said with disinterest upon spotting him.
“Shut up.” Aichlan said as he kneeled to check Maleah.
She was bleeding profusely from the back of her head, and her breathing was labored. Aichlan gingerly felt her side and was shocked at how easily it gave way. She most likely had several broken ribs and internal bleeding.
“How is he?” Aichlan asked a frantic Clarissa.
“He won’t stop bleeding! Zee black magic thwarts any efforts to close zee wounds! I, I don’t know if I can—”
“Clarissa, take a breath.” Aichlan said as calmly as he could manage given his own pain. “You can and will. Signal for Emarosa, she will come.”
Clarissa bowed her head in prayer as her scepter began to glow. She thrust it skyward, sending a brilliant flare of white light into the sky overhead.
“You would aid them despite being the enemy?” The lunatic’s whimsy had returned to Osric’s voice. “How very odd.”
“No Osric, they are not the enemy, you are and you alone. They were your kin, people you grew up with.” Aichlan angrily swatted the air with his hand before him. “Séverin saw you as an infant and you saw your sister Maleah in the same light! No human being would be able to kill so callously given those circumstances.”
Osric chuckled and shook his head in disappointment. “Naïve child. Do you know not for whom you suffer and toil? You are a puppet for them, this half-existence you now lead at their behest is proof enough of that.”
Aichlan was silent; unsure of how much Osric knew about him. As far as he knew, they had never met before.
“What did they do, proposition you with the specter of a dead loved one? A parent perhaps?”
“How the fuck do you know this?” Aichlan murmured.
Osric held his hand up to his ear and leaned closer. “I’m sorry, could you repeat that? You wish to know how I know.”
Aichlan remained silent; his observations were too on the nose to be the simple ramblings of a madman. Aichlan knew his father lacked the means, and quite likely the desire, to set him upon this quest. He always had his suspicions that it was at the behest of the gods or some other such nonsense. Still, it was always strange that they chose him of all people. Surely, there were stronger and better men in the world capable of the task. Men who were not killed at the outset of this war. As curious as Aichlan was, however, he was not willing to give Osric the satisfaction.
“You are no different than the rest of The Order.” Osric said with a slow chuckle. “You fail to see the grand scheme of things, allowing such petty devices to sway your decision one way or another when such things are inconsequential. You are as blind as the rest and therefore should be spared the agony of your ignorance with death.”
“And you think you’ll be the one to commit me to the grave?” Aichlan sneered as he rose, making the sign of the Dawn before presenting arms and getting in a fighting stance.
“Yes, for I am kind.” Osric smiled a mischievous grin as he drew several intricate symbols in the air.
“You talk far too much.” Aichlan readied himself. “I prefer the sound of clashing steel.” He sprinted towards Osric at full speed, his eyes set upon his target with intent to kill. “I find its words far more meaningful!”
“Idiot…” Osric backpedaled away from Aichlan’s charge, dodging his wild swings, as he unleashed a steady stream of spells.
Aichlan barreled down upon him unhindered by the barrage of dark energies. He batted several exploding orbs of black light away as Osric drew a brown rune in the air and cut to the right.
The ground shot up and started to curve like a large wave; Aichlan ran up the curving side towards his foe and jumped as it went vertical, ready to bring his sword down on Osric. A large wall of stone shot out of the ground like a great shield before him. Contorted himself in the air, and collied into the wall of packed dirt, kicking off clumsily in an attempt to jump. Aichlan tumbled and landed hard on his feet. The impact jarred his insides violently and his bones cracked audibly. He grit his teeth, resolved to see this foe vanquished here and now. Aichlan charged around the obstacle, ignoring the pain shooting up his legs. Osric reached to the ground and pulled up a summoned dead warrior.
“You’re a necromancer huh?” Aichlan spun his sword in one hand as he caught his breath. “All it amounts to is cheap tricks and gimmicky diversions from your own inferiority.”
“You shall be force-fed those words by the time I am through with you.” Osric waved his hand in Aichlan’s direction, ordering the undead warrior to attack.
The warrior charged Aichlan and swung its blade; he grabbed its wrist and pulled, causing the wretch to stumble onto an awaiting knee to the face. Aichlan yanked again, dislodging the arm from its shoulder. Aichlan kicked the dead in its chest, caving in its sternum. He discarded the hand as the corpse reeled back, ending its existence with a stab to its face.
“You'll need to send more than corpses wizard.” Aichlan called defiantly as he pulled his sword out.
Osric “enchanted” the blades of the fallen scattered about with a wave of his hand. They began to levitate and circle around him as he himself levitated several feet off the ground. Osric launched a sword like a missile, and Aichlan deflected it as he advanced. The mage continued to launch several swords at once at Aichlan, who was forced to deflect them all, taking several nicks and cuts from those that he missed. Osric laughed riotously and kept sending more swords and weapons of the fallen.
“What happened to all of your boasting knight? You’ve not said a word in quite some time!”
“I needn’t waste any more words on you Osric!”
The swords kept coming and he could not contend as those that he deflected doubled back upon him. With no other options, he fled, attempting to outmaneuver them. Osric laughed rioutsly and easily tracked him as Aichlan bounded over corpses and rock formations that littered the battlefield. Changing tact again, he charged Osric in desperation. At the last second, faced with a fast approaching and unavoidable sword before him and behind, Aichlan dropped into a slide. The swords overshot him and Osric quickly dispelled them, sending them off in random directions to keep from being impaled.
“Now who is resorting to cheap tricks?” Osric spat as he floated to the ground.
Aichlan skidded to a stop and rolled over on his stomach. As Osric dusted himself off, he scrambled to his feet and charged him again. Aichlan swung and Osric slid back out of the way unharmed. Osric summoned another sword and sliced Aichlan across the chest. He fell to the ground, checked himself briefly, and then vaulted off a raised slab of rock to try again. He managed to swing several times but Osric dodged all of them. As he fell, Aichlan grabbed Osric’s leg and dragged him down, slamming him to the ground with the last of his strength.
Osric rose from a horizontal to vertical position. “I’ve had about enough of this!”
Osric summoned a long staff with aggressive spikes and an amber orb on the tip. Several orbs of dark energy formed from smoke around him. Aichlan rushed Osric and knocked the staff out of the way with his sword, following with a left cross to the jaw with his buckler. Osric stumbled back, a look of pure rage on his face.
“Instead of empty threats and boasting, you should focus more on the fight at hand.” Aichlan gasped as he tried to catch his breath. “You sorry excuse for a magician.”
The orbs circled Aichlan, closing in before they darted away and hurled themselves at him with greater velocity. He batted away several, but the rest impacted with the force of a sledgehammer, exploding like fireworks filled with ink and acidic sludge. Aichlan forced himself to stand, his ears rung, and his vision began to blacken. He shook off the attack as best he could and staggered into a run at Osric again. He slashed drunkenly, but Osric blocked with his staff and kicked him in the solar plexus. Aichlan stumbled back gasping for air. Osric quickly jabbed him in the temple with the butt of the staff, knocking Aichlan flat and robbing him of his sight in one eye.
Aichlan managed to instinctively roll out of the way, as Osric swung his staff down. He lay on the ground for several moments, taking in no breath as light pulsed in his peripheral vision and slowly consumed all he saw. Aichlan rolled back to his feet using sheer force of will and lunged; his sword trained at Osric’s neck. The mage managed to dodge Aichlan’s haphazard attack by disappearing in a puff of grey smoke and reappear behind him.
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Osric slashed madly at the air with two fingers, sending blades of black magic at Aichlan, who turned and barely knocked them out of the air with his sword.
The light continued to glow around Aichlan; it brought with its numbness and a sense of weightlessness. The pain he should have felt was gone, in its place new focus and clarity. Aichlan attempted to close the distance once more while dodging the flurry of spells. The mage bobbed and weaved just out of his grasp, not ceasing his barrage of spells. Aichlan ducked a spell and took a desperate leap forward, just barely able grab his opponent’s cloak. Aichlan wrenched on the cloak with all his might as he fell, dragging the mage to the ground with a thud and the sound of tearing fabric. Not wasting a moment, he scrambled to his feet and prepared to plant his sword in his foe’s chest. Osric raised his hands, breathlessly muttered his incantation, and countered with a blast of black lightning from his fingers. The impact launched Aichlan into the air and slammed back to the ground; all air forcibly expelled from his lungs as several bones broke audibly. Shock and pain paralyzed him, preventing him from sitting up again. As Aichlan lay motionless, on the edge of consciousness and struggling to draw breath, Osric slowly stood and angrily brushed the dirt from his clothes.
“Foolish puppet of a man! Not you, not Séverin, or anyone else can stop me from reaching my goals!” He flicked his hair from his face and spoke in a barely audible tone. “Now die.”
Osric summoned several orbs and launched them with a flick of his wrist. They coalesced and disappeared, then reappeared circling Aichlan’s limp body. He watched helplessly as the orbs circled like buzzards before rising into the air. Dredging up his last shred of will and adrenaline, Aichlan forced himself to his roll and tumble away. Stones and abandoned weapons dug into his sides, yet he managed to evade the orbs as they exploded upon impacting the ground, one after the other. His tumble was halted by Taryn’s outstretched foot, as the huntress nocked an arrow and took aim.
Osric took control of the two remaining orbs, directing them to veer off to the left and right, hoping to flank her before she could fire. The orbs turned into black spears at his wordless command and hurtled towards Taryn as she let the arrow fly. Before she could even raise her hands in a feeble defense, a glowing celestial light, a woman made of light with fiery wings, appeared before her and shielded them both. The spears hit and were deflected by the radiant wings, shimmering like diamonds in the light. As quickly as it came, the being disappeared, just as the arrow struck Osric in the shoulder. He fell to the ground with a horrified yelp. A mask of rage and terror replaced the mages previous look of smug superiority. He touched the wound gingerly as blood trickled from his now immobile shoulder.
Taryn spun in confusion to find the source of her savior, just in time to spot Clarissa’s scepter fizzle and fall from the air, its wielder collapsed in a heap over Séverin’s body.
Aichlan tried three times before he could clamber to his feet, and half jogged, half limped as best his battered body could manage over to where Osric had fallen, his resolve to kill giving him motion. A swirling cloud of smoke appeared before him suddenly, halting him.
“Now what…”
An ebony rider leapt from a black vortex that appeared before him and struck Aichlan with the butt of his two-handed battle-axe. The strike did not seem intended to kill yet was enough to send him skidding on his back into a pile of rubble. Two skeletal hands shot up from the ground and dragged him back to the rider’s feet. Aichlan’s vision doubled and blurred as he looked up at the demon in disbelief. It glared back at him with eyes like burning coal. The creature dismounted and slowly approached, each footstep leaving blackened soil and wafts of frigid smoke.
“What in Dusk are you?” Aichlan slurred as the image began to coalesce.
The rider raised its axe and struck the ground in a fluid motion. Aichlan just barely managed to roll out of the way with a pained cry. He wrenched his axe free of the dirt and calmly strolled over to Aichlan. Exhausted, Aichlan propped himself up on his sword. The motion caused him to clutch at his ribs and spit up blood. A fit of shaking threatened to overtake him. He forced himself to endure as the rider approached.
Aichlan rallied the last iota of his strength as he choked back the rising sick in his throat and arbitrarily stabbed in what appeared to be a weak spot on the creature’s armor; his blade went in, but the demon was unharmed. Incensed at his audacity, the demon kicked Aichlan, sending him tumbling head over heels. Aichlan rose to one knee and barely deflected an oncoming blow from the wicked looking axe that no man should be able to even lift. His sword knocked from his grasp, his arms numb and throbbing with pain, he dropped to the dirt once more. There would have been no way he could lift his blade to counter another strike regardless.
Eth tore across the field from behind riding a jet of fire and jumped up. With a feral scream, he loped off one of the demon’s horns with his blade. The blade, glowing orange and white from the heat wafting from its wielder, dug into the rider’s shoulder and started to melt through its armor. Eth had succumbed to the berserker tendencies of his race, his tattoos flowed like magma across his body, and both of his eyes opened with only the whites showing.
“Bastard! You’re gonna fooking burn!”
The sword caught fire and flames swirled around Eth as he hung suspended in the air, cantilevered against his blade dug into the demon’s flesh. Eth’s muscles strained and bulged as he pressed the sword into the demon, the steel melted and dripped to the ground as more flames erupted around his body and encircled the blade. The demon reached over its shoulder and grabbed Eth by the throat. As one would swat away an insect, it slammed him to the ground, and stomped its spurred and booted foot into the elf’s chest. The impact shook the ground and a shallow crater formed around Eth’s body. With the same casual indifference, the demon brushed away the slag that once was Eth’s sword like road dust.
An inferno exploded around Eth, the pillar of fire beneath him lifting him high into the air. As he reached his apex, Eth drew back a flaming fist, blasted off on a plume of fire, riding it like a wave to crash into the demon. The punch connected with a violent explosion and powerful backdraft. The demon stood in place as flames washed over it, unmoved by the attack.
Eth launched into a flurry of kicks, held aloft by flames and heat radiating from his body. The demon advanced, ignoring the onslaught, it reached out with unwarranted speed and grabbed Eth by the leg and arm. Eth thrashed and swore like an animal in a snare, as the demon slowly, gleefully, lifted him into the air. Eth’s arm, slick with blood, managed to slip from the demon’s grasp, and he promptly buried his fangs into the demon’s wrist. The crack of tooth or armor echoed across the near silent field, as Eth continued to thrash. Its patience spent, the demon struck at the elf’s exposed midsection, the concussive force of the blow caused him to instantly release his bite. The demon dangled Eth by his leg and took several more methodical jabs at his midsection. Each blow started Eth flapping about like laundry in a stiff breeze. The assault continued until the elf fell still and his aura of fire dissipated. Satisfied, the demon discarded his captive and turned his sights back on Aichlan.
Clarissa raised her scepter and shot a flare into the being’s eyes. It roared in blinded fury and stumbled back a step. Aichlan grabbed his sword and dragged his own broken body over to where his friend lay to carry or drag Eth away for healing. The demon reached down and snatched Aichlan up by the collar. The force at which he was yanked up into the air nearly caused Aichlan to black out. The demon rubbed its eyes, as sight returned, while Aichlan vainly kicked and tore at the collar that choked him.
“Pray to your impotent god children, who are more concerned with song and dance than your pitiful life.” The demons voice boomed in Aichlan’s mind. “I want to watch your faith drain from your eyes as I squeeze the life breath from your body.”
Aichlan held onto his sword with his injured hand, but his grip started to weaken as the chokehold continued. As his vision darkened, a red skull upon the demon’s chest caught Aichlan’s attention, standing out against its flat black carapace-like armor. A viscous black liquid stains his blade from the last attempt to slay the creature. Aichlan pokes the skull, barely scratching against it. The action causes the demon to relax its grip just enough for Aichlan to draw a quarter of a breath. With the last of his strength, he jams the blade into the hollow eye socket of the skull.
The demon dropped him and stumbled back; its armor denting and bulging inwards as if struck by invisible blows. The broken skull, cracked, then shattered, becoming a vortex. The demon dropped Aichlan as it fingers cracked and bent into themselves. The creature stumbled backwards as its body distorted, being drawn into the void that was the skull.
The rider strained against the force, dropping to one knee as the other was blown out against the joint and sucked up into its torso. The creature shrieked, an ear-piercing cry that rattled the very soul. Moments later, it vanished, consumed by the void.
With the threat gone, Aichlan was tempted to embrace the threat of unconsciousness that beckoned him, allowing his head to lull to the side. As his vision darkened, he spotted a mass of black fabric and violet hair dragging itself through the dirt. Recognizing his work was not yet through, Aichlan took a breath to brace himself, and propped himself up with his sword.
“Now Osric, we finish…”
His legs were unsteady, the searing pain sent red flashes to blind him with each shambling step. The ordeal reminded him of the nameless wood he found himself in following the fall of Arlien. Osric turned over onto his back, clutching the wound, his arm hanging limply at his side. His face was pallid, more so than before, and a sheen of perspiration covered his face. His golden eyes, once full of a lunatic’s bravado, was now scared, weak. He was a child in over his head.
Aichlan raised his sword as his legs gave out beneath him. Crawling on his knees, drew closer to his foe, ready to plunge his sword into his heart.
* * *
The sickening crack of stone against bone caused the knight to freeze in place, another crack and he crumpled into a heap. A nude woman with alabaster skin and hair black as the void stood, clutching a bloody rock the size of her head. Osric quickly took the blood from his wound and drew a summoning sign in the dirt. A corpse rose from the dirt, shaking off a blanket of ash. Osric held out his hand and allowed the undead Xanavien to lift him to his feet. The nude woman watched on with innocent wonder. Her glacial blue eyes seemed to hold both infinite knowledge and none at all.
“Are you one of mine?” Osric coughed and scanned the battlefield; all that remained were corpses.
The woman smiled an idiot’s grin, drooling as she played with her hair. “Mah!”
She frightened him, though he could not place why. Her presence filled him with a primal dread. He shook it off, unsure if the sense of fear were from his recent brush with death or something sinister about the woman before him. She seemed to be an idiot, but something in her eyes…
Osric weakly held out his hand to her. “Do you want to come with me?”
The woman giggled and took several steps forward, reaching up to touch her fingers to his. “Ah!”
She smiled and took his hand. Osric noticed blood dripping to her feet and pulled her close to examine her back. The flesh from her back was torn away, leaving red muscle and bone exposed, though it did not appear to cause the woman pain.
“Spread out. Find the egg and bring it to the forest.” He looked at Aichlan with a mixture of pity and disgust. “And do so before it arrives. We wouldn’t want any of these brutes waking before we are through.”
Osric leaned upon his undead servant and ordered it towards the city of Rhode. The woman skipped happily along beside him.