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In Karellon, at Magister Serrio’s eerily silent fair, Alexion faced a bitter decision. Was rocked by waves of sickening personal turmoil. His father stood swaying before him, held up by two young princes… transfixed by a glowing and powerful sword. Ildarion had sheathed the blade within his own body by standing up under its point, pushing it through his bent back and out the other side. The elusive sword was completely solid, now. Having claimed a sacrifice, it was open to whoever took hold of its hilt and drew it out of the former emperor. His task, apparently.
…Except that he didn’t want to. He hated this place and most of these people. There weren’t enough disasters and poxes to bury them in, and if the realm was in peril, it could save itself or collapse. Arvendahl had spat his last curse at it? Good for him. Stout lad. Vernax was dead? Free at last. Nothing but trouble, anyhow. The world and its fragile gods were dying, drained of their manna? Thus ended all things, and good riddance.
He would not be moved around like a game piece to fight, the way he’d been forced to, down in the drow arena. Alexion shuddered, recalling blood he could never seem to wash off. Hearing screams, jeering laughter and spiraling bets. Back then, he’d tried many times to escape, at last ending up in the mines. Now, he looked directly into his father’s pleading green eyes and said,
“No. I will not.”
The blond princeling… his great-grandson, Valerian… turned from pouring the last of his own manna into the fading emperor. Shifted his gaze to Alexion, instead. Then, as though that divinely spiked potion had opened the past like a scroll, Valerian said,
“I also refused, Sir. I did not strike down the Mother, when the task was before me.”
Alexion snorted, shaking tousled brown hair from his face and lifting his head like a skittish horse.
“That was your choice, and this one is mine. I will not be used. Fate can find somebody else. I’ve been her plaything long enough.”
Perhaps his snarled words were permission. Encouragement. At any rate, a sort of rift opened up in the air near Alexion. Lined in fire, curling and burnt at the edges like paper, it yawned from crack to gate-sized in moments. Through it, they glimpsed extra-dimensional machinery; gears nested and churning in many directions at once. Saw an oily-dark silhouette flitting across that rumbling metal like a bird’s swooping shadow. It seemed to be coming their way.
Fate did nothing at all. Nor did Magister Serrio or the dwindling gods. They were constrained. Could only watch as She-once-a-goddess, Prince Korvin, Valerian’s griffin and comrades, Sheraza and Lady Solara rushed forward. Here and now, every decision was theirs alone, while the future teetered on the edge of a blade that would cut either way.
“I have been chosen before and failed in my duty, Sir,” said Val. Signaling Filimar and Cinda to block Sheraza’s advance, he added, “I think I am here as a target, this time. Not as a champion of Order. Yon dark thing is… was… my former master, Sherazedan. With him is Arvendahl’s spite and a bit of the Mother, who has lain by the heart of my other self. She spoke truly.” Knowledge of sorts, but nothing especially helpful.
A scruffy mortal wizard stalked up, then, staff in hand. Rather than wood, his magical focus was made of telescoping brass segments and topped by a large black ball full of fluid. A marked and faceted gem bobbed around inside of it, flashing statements through a round window every time the staff’s end slammed on the ground. A curious sigil like “8” was written in white on the ball’s other side. The odd fellow glanced at his 8-ball’s window then addressed himself to Valerian, saying,
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“If I read the situation right, Buddy, this system is stuck in a program loop it can’t fully run. Gets up to a certain point in the calculation, then freezes and has to start over, again and again. Killing you or slick, over there, will most likely just trigger another attempt. Won't solve the main problem.”
“What are we to do then, Wizard,” asked Valerian, shifting his grip on the smoldering emperor. (Who could not die because Fate wouldn’t let him. Not yet.)
“We must prevent the sword’s use for evil,” insisted a big, husky paladin, pushing between Val and the wizard. “Slay me with the blade if you must, but don’t let it be taken by Chaos.”
“Down, boy!” grumped the wizard, tugging his wispy dark beard. “I’m trying to think. What we need,” he mused, “is a patch. Spells in this place are like algorithms in mine. They just control reality more completely, is all. Never was much of a coder, myself, but I know my way around big, fancy equipment.”
No one was particularly surprised when a vampyre and a banshee materialized on the plaza beside Val and that muttering wizard. A male and a female, the one had been elvish, the other, tabaxi. He was ice cold; she, pallid, haunted and scarred. No more than a broken, tormented kitten. They were assassins, sent to dispose of Val and Filimar, after helping to slay Lord Arvendahl. Weren’t especially interested in following orders, though.
“Any spell that you write will need to be brought through the rift to alter reality, wizard,” said the well-dressed and handsome vampyre.
“Murchison. Achilles Murchison, Stanford University physics department and, yeah… I figured. Not sure I’d last long enough there to draw a deep breath, though, much less enter my code.”
“You would not,” the vampyre assured him. “Only a true immortal could survive in that place.”
“Or one who is already dead, yet undying,” cut in the banshee. “Two, rather, for you will not face this trial alone, Mandor.”
The auburn-haired vampyre adjusted a bit of lace at his cuff, frowning lightly.
“Tiresome,” he remarked, yawning. “What good is noble sacrifice, if one cannot buy freedom and life for another? I’ve spent too long in Karellon to care much what happens to these warm-bloods, Fallon. Only you, I would face the last death for.”
He shifted his luminous eyes to Murchison, then, ignoring three very agitated and scowling paladins. Maybe they didn’t trust him. Maybe he didn’t care.
“The offer stands,” said Mandor. “Craft your spell. I… alone, hopefully… will take it within and invoke it.”
The wizard tugged at his beard once again, glanced at the 8-ball’s window, then started to speak.
“Whatev, Bro,” he muttered, using enchanted and cryptic language. “Writing and debugging code isn’t…”
They never found out what it wasn’t. Reality lurched once again, bringing three worlds closer still. In that moment of ringing confusion, disaster struck. The shadowy figure projected a tentacle out through the rift. Blistered and oozing, braided of hatred and vengeance, the tentacle whipped forth to seize the hilt of that fated sword. Yanked it right out of Ildarion’s burnt and crackling flesh.
The former emperor gasped, collapsing to his knees with a loud thud as the blade was torn out of him. Ashes and smoke and a vile, greasy stench came boiling up through the wound, rather than blood. Ildarion’s soul turned visible, struggling to free itself from the sword, which had gone fully black.
Something snapped inside of Alexion, then. Reacting, not thinking, he tried to conjure a weapon, but only his childhood practice blade, Sparrow, would come to his hand. Small, but still very sharp, Sparrow sliced the air with a keening hum. Alexion pivoted, chopping his father’s head clean off at the shoulders. There was no more resistance than breaking a charred, brittle twig. Just snap, and then Ildarion’s head went flying, caught by a red-haired young ship-captain.
Korvin sprang forward and uttered a fire-spell, burning their father’s corpse to cinders and freeing its grieving soul. Next, he rushed to Alexi, wanting to say so much, but having no time at all. Just hauled out his own sword and stave, turning to plant his thin back firmly against his older brother’s. (A thing he’d wanted so badly to do, on that terrible day, long before.)
Meanwhile, the fated blade swung through the air high above them, having blended right into the long, flailing thing that wielded it.
‘At last…’ something hissed in three very cold, awful voices. ‘There will be fury and blood and release.’
“They’ll go after the northerner,” Alexion roared, too confused to examine his own shifting motives. “Defend Valerian!”
And then absolute mayhem descended.