“So, uh, you didn’t get any more secret messages or stuff about the Aesir?” Teddy asked. “More heat, please.”
“No messages.” Sirona looked up from her work and all she’d missed in her days away – Truce news and business problems and all the annual insanity of preparing for May Day. “I haven’t heard anything else.”
Teddy worked at a skillet suspended above a weak fire. It had faded almost to embers. April sat beside him, tablet on her lap, head drooping against her shoulder.
Sirona slid her work aside, so she could stand. All her notebooks had the mark of the tree in the crescent moon – black booklets for Truce matters, navy for inn business, yellow for May Day. She stacked them and raised her right hand toward the weak fire.
She made the air heat above her fingertips. She wanted fire, so her mind and body made fire, as natural as walking.
She positioned herself beside Teddy. When the red flash jumped from her fingers, the flame puffed away from him. The cooking fire rose until it almost licked the bottom of the skillet.
A cheer went up, outside the pavilion, and there was scattered applause. Sirona turned toward her audience and took a deep bow. Even past midnight, the tables set on the wide lawn were mostly full, lanterns lit above them. She couldn’t see everyone gathered there in the circles of dancing light.
“You’d use the grill if I couldn’t do that,” Sirona chuckled.
“I don’t get sick of magic, man,” Teddy said. “And it reminds the kids who’s boss.” He chortled, and he waved to the far end of the pavilion. “This’ll be the last batch of steak sandwiches! We’ll still have the snacks and the frozen treats for a little bit, but this is the last I’m cooking tonight. We’re gonna be back bright and early tomorrow!”
It was late enough that there were no grumbles from the crowd. A few figures stood from their circles of firelight and formed a short line.
Someone else walked through the pavilion and circled around the line, a young woman with platinum blond hair. She wore a black dress that flared out slightly as she moved and a choker with a sigil Sirona didn’t recognize – two hands, one holding a feather, the other a knife.
“Truce Master Birgham.” She held out her hand. “I’m Celeste Piren. I’m representing Truesilver Meeting for the festival moot.”
Sirona shook the younger woman’s hand. It was cold to the touch, but the grip was firm.
“I'm sorry,” Sirona said. “Do you mean Truesilver Station? I don’t think we’ll be organizing a full debate.” Some of the guests in line turned toward them. Sirona smiled.
“We hold the votes from Truesilver Station and the remnant of the Village at Dunn’s Crossing,” Celeste explained. “Can we speak in private?”
Sirona looked from the line to her stacks of unattended books. She knew the faces in the line, Karlytte, Gryff, Eissen... So she smiled again. “Of course. Right this way.” She guided Celeste from the pavilion and toward a free table.
Sirona touched her fingers to the lamp above the table until it lit. Then she sat and gestured for Celeste to do the same.
“We have concerns about this involvement with the Dreamside Road trove.” Celeste sat. “We were nearly destroyed for the relics we hid from the IHSA, and we’ll not be a party to repeating that with the Dreamside Road.”
“I’m sorry about what happened to you,” Sirona said. “We all faced immense danger in the days after destabilization. I don’t think anyone was prepared for the damage to the—”
“With all due respect,” Celeste interrupted. “The Truesilver Council is not interested in explanations. The fact remains that the Truce could not protect us then. We are not convinced you could protect us now. Our defense was primarily a deterrent through the knowledge of your mentor, but Master Ophion is gone. These are wilder times.”
“I think our mutual defense is just as important now.” Sirona spoke slowly. She studied the younger woman – sent as a representative from the other side of the continent. Was she chosen for the danger in crossing the broken remains of the United States? Or had she been sent because Truesilver had all but broken away, and they would no longer send their leadership to see the Truce Master?
“Before your efforts to shield the Key-holders can move forward...” Celeste began. She stopped short as another cheer went up from the tables nearest the pavilion.
Sirona looked back to the younger crowd. They were standing again, and the energy of their conversation had picked up. Even Teddy and the line under the pavilion were staring out at the sky.
She followed their attention and saw a band of golden light through a break in the clouds. Aurora glowed everywhere that the clouds parted or were thin enough to let through the light.
Sirona had seen it once before, in the south of the world, on her last night with the original Aesir crew, the last time they were all together.
She had no chance to consider this, the timing or the past years. A pressure fell across her face, her cheek. She felt a heartbeat, a familiar heartbeat – Orson's. She knew it was his as surely as if they were touching, skin-to-skin.
His pulse beat fast, not fearful but active. She knew his heartbeat better than she’d realized. She knew how it changed from fear or from passion or from danger.
He was in danger. He was fighting – fighting with her lantern. How could she know that? She’d laughed at that idea, just the night before. But heat raced along her arms and face and chest, heat that seemed to reach from inside her, like it always did when she bound her fire to rune and stone.
“That’s new,” she whispered to herself. She raised her hands as if she could feel him there, touch him back, but there was only the empty spring air. Still, the heartbeat pounded against her cheek.
She didn’t doubt that the Aesir crew had found full battle against the Hierarchia remnant, just as the original crew had fought them at their fullest strength. She wondered if the golden light also shined on Knightschurch and on the new Aesir crew, just as it had shined on the old at Isla de Manos.
“We’ll talk more about this later,” Celeste interrupted her racing thoughts. The feeling of the heartbeat vanished when Sirona turned back to face Celeste. “My leaders thought advance notice of our opposition was needed, but we don’t have to talk about everything now. I and a few traveling companions will be here until festival’s end.”
“Yes,” Sirona agreed. “We’ll talk later.” When she looked up again to the aurora, the sensation of the heartbeat did not return.
* * *
Orson let Harper and the shield-bearers take the lead at the stairs. The emerald Ignition lit the air ahead. It burned above the close line of defenders that pushed toward the church. The Liberty Corps raised their own blades and fell back, a row of defensive spikes.
Neon blue light flew down the stairs at the islanders, but whatever protections the old house had placed on their shields seemed to reflect blaster fire. The neon light scattered away.
And more defenders poured through the ice wall at all sides. A last band was charging from the right, where the wall met the church, directly into a straggling group of Liberty Corps Blades Troopers. The troopers fell to Dommik steel and to a heavy blackwood mallet that one defender swung wildly as he ran.
A chunk of solid metal fell from the air and bowled these new islanders aside. They screamed and one wailed above the rest. The perfect metal cube lay across his legs, and he scrabbled at the ground around him. The cube reflected aurora light except where it was marked with blood.
“Orson!” Someone yelled.
He couldn’t recognize the voice through all the others, but he noticed Harper when the green Ignition faded. Kol's blue light replaced it. He stayed with the defenders and their shields. They pushed together up the stairs, stepping over fallen bodies in white armor.
“Orson!” Harper yelled again as she ran to him. “Can you use your lantern on their giant?” She pointed to the top of the stairs where the knights were gathered. The massive one now stood nearly twelve feet tall. He’d set aside his sword and in his hands a new metal cube was growing. Orson didn’t need his HUD to recognize iron Shaping.
Bolts from crossbows and stolen blasters deflected away when they hit the giant knight‘s armor. A good lantern blast to the knight could likely topple him. Orson reached for it, but its surface felt hot even through his glove. Steam curled from its stone.
“No,” Orson answered. “It’s like I was afraid of. If I use it again...”
He stopped when he felt hands on his shoulders, not through the coat and armor but against his skin. He knew Sirona’s hands, soft against him, as if they stood close and she was just behind him.
“Yes, you warned me,” Harper said and broke the spell. The feeling disappeared. “But we must...”
The next cube flew from the giant knight’s hands, lobbed like a volleyball across the defenders. Four were thrown aside from the bottom of the stairs. The defenders' shield wall broke with another peal of screams.
Liberty Corps Shapers ran through the broken line. They ignored the remaining shields and Kol’s growing power. They ran between ice and fallen drones for Harper and Orson.
“We were told we would fight fire!” One shouted. The Shapers that advanced grew swords from iron, but visible electricity danced across the metal.
When they held their weapons in two-handed grips, Orson saw the heavy pauldrons that rose from their shoulders to the bottoms of their helmets.
IHSA was stamped across the cold weather gear. Helmont was dressing his forces with the old logo, still the Hierarchia, always the Hierarchia, even after all those years.
“Here’s your fire!” Orson hefted his sword. The power on the Shaper iron could withstand some of the sword’s fire, but the IHSA pauldrons could not. When the first Shaper’s attack fell wide, Orson brought the sword across the man’s shoulders. He sliced the letters clean in two as the fire burned through the man beneath. The two pieces fell apart.
The other three swordsmen disappeared behind green fire before they could join the attack.
“No trespassing!” Jim yelled, out of sight. “No trespassing!” He walked clear of the barriers. His blaster and crossbow were forgotten. He held two of the Swordsmen from behind, gauntleted fingers around their necks.
Harper howled and let her Ignition fade. She dove on the final swordsman and buried her dagger in his chest. The dagger could not reach all the way to the Shaper’s back, but he fell away from her with a smoking hole in his middle.
Kol joined the cries. He charged back to Orson and almost jumped on the outstretched sword. A new projection appeared above them both, a curved dome. At the same time, Orson’s proximity sensors began to beep into his ears.
A new iron cube hit the shield with an audible thud, but it fell away from the rounded projection and toppled to the ground.
“Thanks,” Orson said. “But try to give me a little more warning next time. It’d be a damn shame for you to go through your big redemption arc just to get impaled by accident.”
Kol breathed heavily. “We need to get to the knights.” Already, new metal was forming in the massive knight’s hands.
“Alright,” Orson said. “Enough with the shield advance. I’ve got an idea. One thing though, Harper, my new plan might be tough with the reach of your dagger. What kind of Ignitions can you do with that thing? Can you do any blade extensions?”
“I have little experience with the projectile Ignitions,” Harper said. “I use the greater power of the dirk mostly in defense. And...” She paused and glanced back along the courtyard. “I may be blinded by my own wants, but I must see to Taric and my classmates. They are aboard that other vessel.”
The drop ship still waited on its landing struts, seemingly abandoned at the far end of the courtyard.
Orson thought of the touch against his shoulders. “You know what, go get them. Take Jim. I’m not sure how he’ll be at the sword fighting, and my crew would be heartbroken if something happened to him.”
“The neighbors have taken hostages?” Jim asked.
“They did, Jim,” Orson said. “And our hosts need help.”
“I will help.” Jim nodded.
“Thank you!” Harper ran, and Jim joined her.
“What’s your idea?” Kol watched the cube forming in the knight’s hands. “We’ll be in trouble if they dedicate forces to forming new projectiles for Sir Mordecai and stop leaving him to craft his own.”
“My plan’s totally shot without Harper, but she had to go.” Orson reached to the lantern again, but there was no response, no touch, just hot stone.
“Are you alright?” Kol asked.
“Yeah, I’m good,” Orson said. “If you get your shield going, I can extend the sword. Then maybe we can cut our way up there.”
Kol raised his hands and formed a new projection. He charged ahead, toward the clash on the stairs.
Orson finally released the lantern. “Thanks, babe,” he whispered, and he followed after Kol.
* * *
Enoa watched Jaleel and Dr. Stan at work. The grass beside the Aesir was a mess of parts. There were spindly metal limbs, lengths of copper wire, and a pile of disks that were open in the center.
“If the air density sensors from the mail ships can fit the replacement valve from Orson’s storage,” Jaleel said. “That’s everything Cathy’s schematics show us.”
The ship sat beside one of the island’s raised mounds, except one side was open. The hill was hollow. Enoa saw the shapes of more of the message carriers’ ships – or at least recognizable chunks of them. There was a group of the ships’ wings, stacked along massive shelving. And two of the carrier ships’ chassis were shoved against the far side. Everything else was labelled storage, stacks of crates and transparent totes. It all looked very Hierarchia, very much like something at the Pinnacle.
“Except the humidity sensor.” Dr. Stan began to thread the wire through the disks. “We will still need all of the Aesir’s moisture systems to connect to this. And we will need this device to work inside the ship, unless you intend to somehow mount it on the hull without disrupting the shields.”
A crash sounded far away, loud enough to echo around the ice. Enoa followed the sound to the artillery that still stood on outstretched stone, where the islanders had remade their rampart. Solid rock, like hands, reached from the inner rampart and brought the artillery into range of the church.
Something from the courtyard had struck one of the trebuchets. A giant metal cube sat beside the splintered wood of the weapon. Figures ran from the outstretched stone. And beyond, the churchyard was all screams and explosions.
Lights flashed at the battle, the mental glow of Shaping. Enoa could see it, but tried not to follow the glows. So many of the lights faded or vanished, power that changed and died in rhythm with the battle cries.
Enoa saw some known forms at the church courtyard, like spotlights. She knew the lights that meant Harper and Kol and even Doug.
When she relaxed her mind, she knew two other presences in the fighting, two that were not Shapers and wielded no secret or Enigma. One was steady and constant in a way the others were not. The other flickered more than the rest, sometimes dim, sometimes blazing up like stoked flame.
Orson and Jim? Could she sense someone who couldn’t Shape, who wielded nothing that might be called magic? Could she sense someone who might not even be alive?
“We don’t really have time to mount it.” Jaleel had continued working while Enoa’s mind was distant. He coiled the wire around the ends of the spindly limbs. “We’ll fly close enough to see if we can make some condensation on the Eye wall. If we can, we’ll do the attack.”
“And if we can’t?” Max was back in his wheelchair, positioned in the Aesir’s doorway. “Our next move relies very heavily on these secondhand schematics.”
“First of all.” Jaleel didn’t look up. “It’s like my mom always told me. If you know enough, the whole world is basically made of LEGOs, all interchangeable. Secondly, almost all of the ship tech that we have floating around had some tie to the Hierarchia, so a lot of stuff is more interactive on purpose. And lastly...” He looked up, but toward Enoa.
“Enoa might have to help us if everything else fails.” He returned to the wiring.
“Jaleel,” she said. “I’m really, uh, I’m flattered, but making dew on a little shield like Kol’s and fighting that thing out there – it's not the same. There’s no way it’s the same.” She imagined how she’d fought for months to maintain even a small transmutation, forcing the Bullet Rain to explode.
“You do the fog thing,” Jaleel said. “Sometimes you’re totally okay with huge scale stuff. You did that months ago already, with the battle on Route Sixty-six.”
“That is true.” She reached to the sea air outside, sensed where the moisture of the air and ocean met the light from the Eye of Balor.
“There is a very real difference between theory and execution,” Max said. “Is it possible that you can overwhelm the projection from that weapon enough to disrupt it? Maybe. Is it possible that our lone missile could damage their lead vessel, if the hull is vulnerable from the weapon? Maybe. But how many maybes do you think will turn in our favor? How much can we hope for?”
“Are you worried about fighting the naval ships?” Jaleel asked. “I’m sorry if I pushed you into attacking ships like the ones you used to work with.”
“No,” Max said with finality. “Not at all. That isn’t it. Those vessels are... I believe them to be betrayals of everything we fought for, the trust that should have existed between our intelligence services, and all of us in the military, and all our people.
“I helped with analytics for the Malacca Conflict and the humanitarian work after the Averna oil disaster. Do you know how many lives we could have saved if the IHSA had not hoarded their technology or their knowledge, troops saved, allies and civilians saved? Can you imagine the safety we might really have in this world?” He shook his head bitterly.
“No, I feel no remorse about the destruction of those ships, not now that I have seen them. They and their masters need to be defeated. Helmont and his knights, every action they took was illegal. Article One, Section Nine of the US Constitution said that ‘no title of nobility shall be granted by the United States’. No knights, no lords, no king or czar in America. Our Constitution might be dead with our nation. It might have been abused even in its time, but I keep to my oath. Helmont’s attack force here is a failure that should have been corrected a long time ago. No, I am worried about...”
He fell silent at the sounds of new engines. All looked up to find the message carriers approaching, flying just above the level of the hills. Both ships came to hovering stops, beside the Aesir and the construction project.
A hatch on the nearer vehicle’s cockpit slid aside. A torso in helmet and jumpsuit came into view.
“Harper told us you were almost ready for an attack against their ships,” the pilot called. “What’s this mess? We’re needed at the church if you aren’t ready.”
“We’re almost there.” Jaleel lifted one of his splindly limbs. The wire trailed from it, all the way across the ground to where Dr. Stan now sat beside a raised tower of the disks, wired together. “If you’re ready for us, we’ll talk over the plan while we finish. We can launch in ten minutes.”
* * *
Harper knew every death under the sanctuary roof. Some she knew by name, her neighbors, her countrymen. She felt the enemy deaths too, as she sensed all the energy of life on Knightschurch.
There were only two lives she could not set aside from her focus.
Uncle Merrill was hurt. Something attacked him and left a thousand unseen wounds, using some power that Harper did not know. Even the ancestors’ sword that burned beside him did not seem to protect him.
And she sensed Taric, alive but more mentally distant even than in sleep. What had they done to him, to all of them? All six from the nexus were aboard the remaining enemy ship.
The enemy craft sat ahead on black, curved legs. There was no one outside the vehicle, but there were guns on the sides like those on the Liberty Corps tanks.
One of the cannons moved, as she approached with James the automaton. It spun toward them. So, the ship was fighting only to defend itself.
Harper raised her dirk. It was true what she’d told Captain Gregory. She’d had little experience with the offensive Ignitions. She’d seen as much practice that night as she’d known in her whole life before, combined.
She did not alter the weapon’s blade, but she threw it. She sent it with body and mind. It arced along the ship’s skin, making a red-hot line on its hull.
The dirk sliced the moving cannon in half and spun back to her hand.
James joined her in the attack. He’d produced his borrowed blaster and crossbow from wherever they’d been hidden. He fired both at the ship’s other weapons. One cannon smoked where neon blue light had taken it. Another had a long metal crossbow bolt lodged in its barrel.
“You are a fine shot, James,” she said.
“Thank you!” He raised his face guard with the side of his hand to show his broad smile.
They arrived in the shadow of the ship. The vehicle stood more than half as tall as the church’s outer walls. It was solid and shut. There were complex shapes across the hull, small bump and lines that she did not understand. Nothing looked like any kind of opening.
“I suppose I may be forced to cut our way inside.” She raised the dirk up towards the metal, but even on tiptoe she would not be able to burn a wide enough opening. She would need to control the blade from a distance, another new feat.
“Two can play at this game!” James set down his weapons and gauntlets, revealing his white nail-less fingers. He raised his arms, and they stretched out of his armor and clothing until he gripped the body of the ship.
His fingers found some purchase on the hull. He made an odd groaning sound that seemed to echo inside him. He stepped away from the ship, and slowly, an opening revealed itself in the metal.
“Look out!” James called.
The ship hissed and steam shot out from the opening. With a last heave, James pulled a long ramp from the vehicle. It slammed to the ground between them.
“I will go first and guard us.” Harper waited for James to gather his armor and weapons. Then she formed the Ignition of Defense, her one formal lesson in the great Aether.
They boarded the ship. The only illumination was from the green fire and a pale glow that emanated from the end of James’s gun.
But Harper did not need sight to feel the lives aboard. There were three gathered above them, on some unseen level of the vehicle.
And the six students waited ahead, as if abandoned. Harper raised the dirk, so she could see them. They were bound and seated in chairs that were built into the walls. Their eyes were closed and they took only slow breaths. Harper advanced toward them.
She found Taric on the end of the line. She sheathed her dirk so she could stand beside him, find his pulse, and run her fingers through his hair and along his face.
“Is he your road trip buddy?” James asked.
“Yes,” she said. “I suppose you could say that.” Taric let out a long shushing sound as she touched him.
Something crashed above. Harper wheeled back in the darkness. James also raised his weapons.
“My cousin drove a tour bus like this one,” James said. “I can talk to the intruding neighbors. This is a no parking zone. You can look after your road trip buddy.” He wandered off into the darkness, and she did not stop him.
“Did the ancestors do this to you?” Harper asked of the room. “Or was it that baron?” None responded. She felt no recognition from them, none of the reactions that the trained minds shared with each other. Worse than sleep – nearer to death.
If you come across this story on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen from Royal Road. Please report it.
A new noise started outside, a sound almost like heavy rain drumming against the ice. But the sounds were wet and heavy. They were accompanied by a wave of screaming.
Harper kissed Taric quickly. His lips were cold, and he still gave no reaction. He did not move his lips, did not kiss her back the way he always did, even in his sleep.
She had lost him, had lost him the way she was losing her uncle, the way she was losing her home. She did not even try to seek out her parents where they should be hidden. It was all falling away, all dying, when everything had been whole just hours before.
Harper looked back out of the ship and saw one of the knights standing at the top of the cathedral steps with his arms raised. Light glinted around him, and he sent a storm of objects down at her friends. She bit her lip to avoid the recognition, so she could avoid the knowledge of where and how everyone was being hurt.
Three shots sounded above her, and James reappeared from the ceiling. His pale face hung upside down out of some opening. Smoke billowed out around him.
“I have talked to the drivers,” he announced.
“Thank you,” she said. She looked to the battle, where the knight with the small shapes and the massive man with his cubes were still sending their power down at people she had known her entire life.
The fire from the enemy blasters began again too. When one of the blue blasts grazed Doug in the calf, she could not ignore his pain.
“James,” she said. “Will you take my road trip buddy and my fellow students from this vessel? There will be an opening in the outer wall on the other side of this ship. Will you take them there where all of you can be safe?”
“I will keep them safe!” James said. “Your buddies are my buddies, nice hostess Harper!”
“Thank you.” She looked back at Taric and then to James as he dropped down beside her. Then she drew her dirk again and returned to the battle.
* * *
Kol was already on the church steps when he saw the blue glow of Orson’s sword in his peripheral vision.
“Keep left,” Orson said. “I’m gonna try something to gain us a little ground. Leave your shield as is, and I’ll stay behind it.”
The sword’s fire grew as it had when it’d burned out the belly of Helmont’s frigate. Orson held the distorted blade so it reached around Kol’s shield, two conflicting shades of blue. The sword was like a raised lance, and the Liberty Corps shield line scattered. They parted around it, shrinking away from the fire and the rising defenders.
“I get why the Hierarchia was so jealous of this sword.” Orson’s voice deepened through his microphone. “It’s even good for crowd control. Left or right! Left or right! Wayfarer coming through!”
Light reflected off the cloud of Sir Tolem’s metal shards. They spun in the air toward Kol and Orson as they advanced. Kol wrapped his shield above them, bolstered it with his mind, braced for impact.
The shards hit the projection with weight like a collapsing ceiling. Kol’s legs gave out. He fell to his knees. The metal of his borrowed armor scraped against the stairs.
Shard after shard struck the shield, each one a knife to his shoulder or stomach or spine. The whole air filled with the swarm, until the shield wrapped around everything but the sword of fire.
With Tolem’s focus fixed on them, the fighting around them turned to chaos. The islanders moved in, beating at the scattered Liberty Corps force with blades and the edges of their shields. Kol caught sight of the defender with the blackwood mallet strike and shatter the helmet of a fallen iron Shaper.
“Orson Gregory!” Sir Mordecai’s voice had gone strange through his transformation. It was deeper from his size, but it was also warped, like a shout through a long tunnel. “How much weight can your stolen armor resist? How much to break your body?”
“Stand up if you can,” Orson ordered in his normal voice. He kept his sword outstretched. It burned all the way to the top of the stairs.
Any thought of broad tactics had ended. The battle devolved into personal fighting, one-on-one, blade and fist.
“My armor can take most of that guy’s little bits,” Orson continued. “Just protect yourself. I’m gonna cut big guy’s cube when he throws it.”
“Right.” Kol forced his feet under him. He found the strength he’d won at the Pinnacle, protecting Max. He was strong from their torture, and he focused on his body, not his pain. Even as one shard and the next and the next burst against his defense, Kol began to walk again.
Mordecai yelled and raised his hands above his head, solid iron held high to crush them.
But a dark shape shot down from the cathedral wall behind the knight. It was small, human, and running straight down the complex ice surface. The shape ran vertically at the massive knight.
Mordecai wheeled around, but not fast enough. There was a flash of green to the knight’s neck, and the huge man when limp.
Sir Mordecai fell to his side. He toppled down onto the stairs, solid iron falling free from his grip and tumbling down to the courtyard. The knight shrank as he fell, smaller than his armor and tunic beneath. Nothing of his body could be seen when he hit the stairs, only the empty clothes of a dead giant.
“Run!” Orson yelled. Kol charged.
The barrage of metal shards paused. Tolem had halted his attack, in surprise or distraction. Kol and Orson didn’t wait to see how Mordecai had fallen, who had been harmed in his death, whether friend or foe had been crushed.
Kol’s feet found the top of the stairs before Tolem’s metal storm could reform.
Harper already waited for them there. She caught her dagger from the knight-killing throw as they came to stand by her side, just outside the cathedral entryway.
“Good one flanking him with your wall-running,” Orson said, his sword returned to normal. “He was pretty fast for somebody that big, but he was also a big target.”
Sirs Vergil, Zarag, and Tolem were the last to stand between them and the sanctuary. The rest of the fighting had fallen away, a bloody melee on the stairs.
“Three of you and three of us.” Orson walked away from Kol’s shield, far enough to spin the sword around his wrist. The blade flashed as it turned, and it crackled at the edges when he caught the hilt again. “I like it.”
“It doesn’t matter how many of us die to keep you out,” Sir Vergil said. “You will never reach Baron Helmont. Your old knight is doomed. Knightschurch is doomed.”
“Harper, you’re faster than them.” Orson ignored the knights. “Kol, you’ve got a power they don’t understand. And they’re damned scared of me. So Harper, be fast, stay out of reach, and hit them when you can. Kol, defend yourself, and make new shields when I say so. Let’s stay out of each other’s way.”
“And what will you do?” Harper formed her Ignition.
Orson turned back and smiled innocently at her. Then he waved to the knights. “You pricks have been going on forever about getting to fight me. Well, here’s your shot.” He motioned to them with curling fingers, the classic ‘bring it on’ gesture. Kol had never imagined someone would actually do that in real life, but Orson Gregory had exceeded real life in countless ways.
“Have at me.” Orson advanced, until he stood well ahead of Kol and Harper.
All three knights watched Orson and only Orson, the man who had led the riot at their Pinnacle, who’d fought their Hierarchia before its fall and after, who’d beat the Thunderworks general who’d orchestrated their end.
Zarag moved first and alone. He shot from the entryway and sent a shockwave in his wake. The blades he held in each fist grew, steaming, as he went.
The knight appeared above Orson and dropped like a brick, swords down.
Orson sidestepped the attack. He swung his sword once as he leaped away.
Zarag’s blades hit the pavement with another shockwave through the ground. One of the sword blades fell from its hilt. It shook the ground again when it crashed, smoking, to the walkway.
“Not a bad trick.” Orson flourished his sword again. “But the big problem with you guys is you haven’t fought anybody. I mean, where did Helmont send you, to scare townspeople into helping the Liberty Corps? How many real showdowns like this have you had? It’s the same problem the Hierarchia faced at the end. Their Administrators were real scary when I was just some guy, but I lived long enough to see them go out like chumps against Thunderworks.”
“Lunatic!” Harper jumped to Kol, behind his shield. “He’s really enjoying this. He’s playing with them.”
Kol remembered Orson’s behavior in Nimauk, the buffoonery, the jokes. “His attitude is a weapon, to keep people off guard,” Kol explained.
Zarag struck again. His launched himself from the ground with another tremor. He rocketed above Orson as if he wore his own repulsors. Then the knight fell, remaining sword pointed at Orson’s head.
Zarag found only the empty air. The knight hit the ground, soft this time, and he skidded several feet after landing.
Orson returned to a simple stance, suddenly far to the left. He regarded Zarag and the other knights at the cathedral door. Runes were alive and dancing on Vergil’s sword. Tolem’s metal flitted in front of the church doorway, as if blocking a surprise dash for the building. All three were still focused on Orson.
Harper shifted her stance beside Kol. Was this the kind of opening Orson had meant? Was this her time to enter the battle, to strike at Zarag while he faced away from them?
“Word to the wise, buddy,” Orson said. “You showed me your weight-changing trick already. I knocked you out of the park at Crystal Dune, and I've got way more room now. You need some actual technique. Heavy hammer isn’t the solve it all trick you think it is.”
Harper glanced at Kol. “That’s right. You’ve been on the other side of his taunts. How, precisely, are you still alive?”
“I’m alive because he didn’t want to kill me.” Kol knew it was the truth. Orson alone had faced half of Newtown Division, and left nothing more permanent than a scar on any of them. No deaths. Even Tucker had been tranquilized, beaten but spared and saved. “He worked three times as hard to spare us.”
“You’ll have to come up with something better.” Orson held his sword one-handed. He edged closer to Zarag, his eyes fixed on the nearest knight.
Kol caught a new flash of light at the cathedral wall. Sir Vergil flew from the entryway. He lifted from the ground without blast or shockwave, and he glided like Helmont with his massive sword ready, its runes blazing. Vergil fell at Orson too, with sword’s tip aimed at his hooded face. Zarag joined in. He struck with his remaining blade, cutting fast, striking heavy.
But Orson was already gone.
Zarag’s blade landed with a boom against the side of Vergil’s downward sword. The flying knight staggered away, his sword glowing. Zarag fell too. He landed with a crash on the ground.
“Wow, Grover would be embarrassed by that.” Orson was still standing, the fire sword raised in defense. “Doesn’t he have you guys training together at all? Or are you always off with your own dumb little losers?” The knights found their footing but did not reply.
Orson turned his head sideways and gave Sir Vergil’s great sword an appraising look. “That’s an impresive-looking weapon. Too bad you can’t actually use it. Swinging it around alone – that isn’t the same as a fight. Sir Vergil, right? More like Sir Virgin. Sir never used his sword before.”
“Juvenile jokes?” Sir Vergil asked. “This is your famous humor?”
“Yeah,” Orson said. “It does a good job pissing you off, doesn’t it?”
Vergil and Zarag struck together, either guided by some training or through conversation inside their helmets. Orson dodged them both. He was just as smooth at evading the oncoming blades as he was at swordplay. The runes of Vergil’s weapon flashed when they met the sword of fire. Orson danced around Zarag’s heavy strikes altogether.
“Now you’re doing a little better!” Orson cheered. His footwork was perfect, fluent motion, second-nature to him. Kol remembered how Orson had moved in his sparring with Sirona, how they’d mirrored each other. Whatever their relationship was or had been, he’d learned some deadly practicality from her.
And his sword work was an everchanging thing. Kol had seen him fight but never this close, never with such grounded attacks. Orson wielded some bizarre blended martial art that was his and only his.
When Sir Vergil made swift lightning of his great sword, Gregory batted the strikes aside. He met speed with steady patience and precise motion. This wasn’t the swordsmanship of the Hierarchia or their Covenant forebears. This was nearer to the black and white duels Kol had seen in the old Jidaigeki Samurai movies.
When Zarag returned with a new second blade he’d drawn from his armor, his attacks remained hammer strokes, fast and heavy, but without nuance. Against him, Gregory moved like a brazen toreador, man against beast, finesse against brute might.
When both attacked at once, Orson got out of their way. He left them stumbling, confused.
“Shield!” Orson yelled. “My left! Shield now!”
Kol was almost caught unprepared, watching the fight like some abstract match. But his reaction time returned to him in their danger. He made a second projection, in time to block Tolem’s addition to the frenzy. The knight’s metal shards broke and burned against the new shield. Kol felt them like daggers, but if Orson could fight two knights at once, he would hold off the third.
“Shield above me!” Orson commanded.
Kol shifted his second projection, curved it in the air above Orson. He hadn’t even noticed Zarag move, but the knight hit the projection and bounced away as if he were filled with helium. He flew high and crashed up against the cathedral’s ornate outer wall.
Harper was on him. She ran up the side of the building before he could raise either blade. Her dagger bit into his shoulder, and when he finally caught his bearings, he ran. Zarag charged higher up the church wall, weightless, Harper on his heels, Ignition burning ahead of her and blocking his wild hammer-strike defense.
“Shield yourself!” Orson yelled. “Behind!”
Kol raised a projection at his back before he could turn around. And when he did, Kol found an iron Shaper with a dagger in one hand and a raised blaster in the other. The new attacker climbed the stairs from the melee, unseen behind him.
Kol met both blaster bolts and Tolem’s iron. He lost focus of everything but his own shield defense and the sudden onslaught from both sides. He’d gotten stronger since escaping the Pinnacle, but the long battle was wearing him down. Each strike hit like a nail to the temple. Pain seemed to radiate all through him.
“Try something!” Orson blocked a high trust from Vergil as he spoke. “Trap that guy behind you. Smack him with a shield and push him down the stairs! I want to see what happens.”
“That’s really difficult!” Kol crouched low, metal and light bursting against his projection. “I can’t make a third!”
The man behind him was moving now, shifting from side to side as he approached, firing. The closer he came the more the blaster shots seemed to burn. Kol felt heat against his skin.
Making a third projection was pain, but less than the constant barrage. The third field only flickered to life for a moment. Kol slammed it into the gunman. He felt the weight of the man when the projection hit him and drove him over the edge of the stairs. The man yelled, and no more blaster shots came from behind.
“I knew you could do it!” Orson called. “You did a thing like that on the beach earlier. Hang onto that trick. We might use that again in a minute.”
Sir Vergil backpedaled away from Orson, angling toward the cathedral doors. Tolem followed him. His metal shards swirled close, total defense.
“Hey, Harper!” Orson activated his mic and shouted up toward the cathedral. “Harper!” Harper and Zarag could not be seen, but there were unseen crashes from the building’s roof. Someone was fighting up there. “Looks like we’re having a midgame huddle. Get rid of your guy, or send him down to me to finish him.”
Orson closed the distance between himself and Kol, all while Vergil and Tolem continued their retreat.
“Listen,” Orson said. “If Harper plays along, and who knows if she will, we’ll get a little breather. I’m gonna make a move, and I’ll need you to do your shield thing like you did it a minute ago, but totally trap one guy, okay?”
“Right.” Kol did not look away from the knights. Both watched them in return, both probably engaged with their helmet comms.
“Here we go.” Orson got a better grip on his sword, as Harper chased Zarag into view above them, her dirk flashing as the knight ran.
With another burst of green, the knight fell from the roof. He dropped like a stone toward the ground, and Orson ran to meet him.
Kol caught a reflection of light on metal as something fell from Orson’s hand and tumbled across the floor toward the entryway doors.
The light of the aurora also caught a new swarm of metal shards that flew from Tolem’s reach and gathered at Orson.
“Shield around Tolem!” Orson shouted, but he didn’t turn aside. He met the falling Sir Zarag with his sword raised.
Kol followed the command. A blue dome formed around Tolem, containing him as he’d tried to contain Sir Rowan in the Pinnacle.
The metal shards immediately turned back to their master, and more stirred inside the shield, but not enough.
Kol sensed the little orb inside his shield before he saw it. It had come to rest between the knight’s booted feet.
It was one of Orson’s fire grenades.
Sir Tolem howled. Kol felt the man’s voice, even though he could not hear it. Tolem raised his hands and all his metal rallied to him.
Too late. The grenade exploded.
Kol lost both projections and fell onto his hands and knees. He felt a wash of heat everywhere. His body beaded in cold sweat. His vision swam and tunneled, and he saw nothing but a narrow space of paved walkway. He was left dizzy, retching inside his borrowed helmet, senses overloaded.
He heard approaching steps, running to him. Kol tried to reel back and see who was coming, but everything spun, and he stayed as he was.
“I’m really sorry about that.” Orson rested a gloved hand on his shoulder. “Are you okay? I didn’t know it would affect you that way. That was the fastest way I could think of to get around him.”
“Zarag?” Kol asked.
“Gone,” Orson said. “It’s three on one now, or two on one. You’ve done way more than enough, if you’re done for the rest of this thing.”
Kol almost lay right down with his head on the pavement. But with his eyes downcast, he sensed the warring powers around him. He sensed Sir Merrill and the Shaping that acted against him – one knight had not joined in with the battle. Sir Geber and his students were alive and attacking the old man.
“Geber’s here,” Kol said. “I have to face him.” Orson offered him a hand and Kol let himself be guided back to his feet. His dizziness faded, but the world still wobbled around him.
“Well.” Orson clapped him on the shoulder. “I’m gonna have a talk with Vergil. Take a minute or two, see how you feel then.”
Kol blinked away his dizziness until he could clearly see the wreckage at the doorway. The entryway was damaged. Some enchantment of the ice was broken, and it was melting in rivulets onto the ground. What remained of Zarag and Tolem waited on either side of the door.
Orson led them on. Harper finished her run from the roof to join them. Kol took up the rear. He gathered no shield. No more attackers climbed from the stairs to fight them.
Sir Vergil stood alone.
“So you’re the right hand man, huh?” Orson asked. “No wonder Grover is so set on finding the Dreamside Road. He sure couldn’t rely on you losers to get anything done, could he?”
“You dishonor my brothers.” Sir Vergil aimed his sword at Orson. “You dishonor my students.” More swords joined the first. They lifted from the floor, where other bodies had been gathered. There were seven more blades, all that danced with the same runic writing as the knight’s.
“You can barely keep up with me with just the one,” Orson said. “What the hell do you think you’ll manage with all those? Or are you just gonna lob them at us like spears?”
“You will see soon enough,” Vergil said.
Orson pointed to the bodies, gathered on the floor. “You killed everyone who fought here to defend their home and church.” He took up a wide stance, sword ready again.
“Jendring...” Harper said. “All of them gone. You will die for them, knight.”
“He was a friend of yours?” Vergil asked. “Everyone here is a traitor, as are you. All of you will die by my hand or my master’s or by the Eye of Balor. This man?” He nodded to a fallen body in the uniform of the Knightschurch guards. “I killed him with my own hand.”
“Then let me return the favor.” Orson gave no instructions, no plans. He stepped forward, toward the last defending knight and his gathered, floating swords. The weapons formed a line of spikes around Vergil. They swarmed, glowing, in the empty air.
Orson broke into a run, and he slid his thumb to the disruptor on his sword’s hilt. Vergil’s blades flew toward Orson like missiles. They flashed white as the fire sword’s blue light burned past them toward their master.
* * *
“You’ve failed, my lord.” Sir Merrill’s voice sounded hoarse. He laughed and wheezed. “They’re almost here.” The words seemed to choke in the back of his throat. “Your knights are falling. They die for your ambition. They die in vain.”
Operative Divenoll looked between the laughing old man and the force that faced him. Sir Geber and his students had their hands and helmet antennae pointed at the knight. The green fire of the great sword flickered constantly, as if hit by rain.
Operative Larks and the Ledgerman, Greenley, had their attentions back toward the sealed doors, and the booms and shouts that broke through the contained environment of the sanctuary.
“No one will be rescuing you, sir knight,” Baron Helmont said. If he sensed anything from the noise outside, he did not show it. “I have you under my power, and there you will remain until your end.”
“You see clearly enough to sense what’s happening.” Sir Merrill descended toward the floor, until he sat on the strange ice. “Rather than fight, you allow your forces to die.” He imitated Helmont in a high, lilting voice. “If you’ll make your play for the key, do it now, my lord. You have only moments remaining.”
“Are you so eager to die?” Helmont raised his rapier.
A third fire breached the room before the old knight could speak. A sword blade of trapped blue flame stabbed through the sanctuary doors. Then there was a flash of green so bright that the ice all around glowed with the color.
The sanctuary doors fell inward and crashed to the floor. Helmont wheeled back to the opening.
There was a headless shape resting across the doors, a figure in white with a massive great sword. Sir Vergil’s helmet and whatever might remain beneath rolled from his body and from the door.
Orson Gregory stepped around the body and entered the sanctuary, his sword drawn. Kol Maros entered behind him, along with a young woman in the Dommik armor. She held a burning green dagger in her hands.
“Sorry we’re late,” Orson Gregory said. “There was a helluva long line to get in here.”
Helmont raised his rapier and sent an arc of violet fire back toward the doors.
Violet and emerald burst together. The light was so intense that Divenoll’s helmet glare filter kicked on. He saw only the shapes of heat. The new trio stood in the doorway with a wall of fire protecting them.
Bands of fire reached from the far side of the sanctuary room toward the energy wall, twisting like the distant solar flare that fueled the aurora burning across the sky.
This light came from the Dommik ancestral sword, and the sword moved from its floating place before the altar. It flew above all, a burning flash that fought to join its new wielder.
Divenoll watched the Dommik girl with her hand outstretched to receive it. Was she controlling the Ignition and performing the summoning, at once? Was there a trained heir in the Dommik line?
“Stop the sword!” Divenoll shouted. He found his own will, niccolum and chromium and the fire of his making. Geber’s class and Larks looked away from the knight. “Whatever you can do, stop that sword!” Divenoll sent a crimson gout toward the ceiling and the moving blade.
“Wait!” Helmont raised his hand. “You have--”
The sword fought back. Divenoll saw the solar-like flame bands of the sword flash at him. Suddenly, the floor was gone beneath him, and he felt something behind him – hit him hard! And he lost his control of his niccolum and chromium. He lost his focus and his rule over mind and power.
Clashing light filled the sanctuary. Divenoll fought to find his bearings. He was pressed at the far wall, upright, sitting on the floor.
There was a crouching shape beside him. The glare in his helmet was too intense to see the markings on the man’s armor, but he was clutching a large tablet as he cowered away from the fighting.
“Operative Divenoll,” Lieutenant Greenley whispered. “I’m sorry, sir. I have nothing but a blaster--”
“Be quiet,” Divenoll hissed. He crawled back toward the fighting. There were several new shapes on the floor, bodies in antennaed helmets. One of Geber’s pupils was still on his feet and facing Kol Maros. The apprentice’s gauntlets glowed, and he pressed them against Maros’s blue shield in some psychic grapple. But there was no sign of the knight himself.
“Sir,” Orson Gregory said. “Walk around the side there. You’re gonna leave with Harper.”
“I will kill you and Dommik’s heir.” Helmont held the rapier, tip outward. “I will face the rising destiny and your unworthy trickery, both.”
“Nope,” Orson said. “Just me. If you try to stop that man from leaving this room, you’ll see some of my unworthy trickery.” He advanced between the pews toward the baron.
Divenoll found the old knight had risen to his feet. Sir Merrill wobbled slightly, but now stood between the front two pews. He looked between the battle and the altar behind him, and he went no farther.
“The key...” Sir Merrill began.
“The key is mine,” Helmont said. “All the keys are mine – the keys of Lucas and Cloud and Ophion. I will have them all before this brief night ends. My map of times yet to be showed me the end of these events, and all my other previews of the path have proven true. I will hold the key of Ascendant Fire. If you are also so quick to perish, Orson Gregory, your key may be mine first.”
“I’ll protect your key, sir.” Orson nodded to Sir Merrill with his eyes still on the baron. “I’ll hold the key only for protection. Don’t worry. I remember the whole thing. I’ve got a good memory when it counts.”
This seemed to relieve Sir Merrill. He shot a last look toward the altar. The box that had floated beside him was nowhere to be seen, and Sir Merrill took the pew toward the far wall – toward the side where Divenoll and Greenley waited, hidden.
The Ledgerman lay flat between pews, the tablet beside him.
“A warrior of the Liberty Corps playing possum to avoid an old man,” Divenoll spat. “I will finish him myself.” He looked inward to his control, the energized reactions he’d studied to make a fire power for the new world. All his years of study in the Quiet Zone while the great forces of Hierarchia and Liberty Corps fell and then rose again around him. He had not practiced all that time for nothing. He had not won that power for nothing.
There was a strangled cry from the sanctuary doors. Divenoll found Kol Maros with his fist through the helmet of Geber’s pupil. The student fell, leaving behind only residue on the traitor’s prosthetic hand.
“That wasn’t the last of them,” Orson Gregory said. “I think your friend their boss is trying to grab at us.” The Dommik girl was gripping the back of the nearest pew. Her legs were shaking. Yes, Geber would have his grip on them all. Knight and heir, traitor and mercenary, none could escape the iron of their own bodies.
“Don’t make me come over there,” Orson Gregory said. “You’re not getting at me with that body iron shit. This isn’t normal armor I’m wearing. This metal has all kinds of freaky, higher-dimensional, non-Euclidean geometries goin’ on.”
“Like Ruhland and his pets,” Helmont said. The baron stood sideways, keeping both Sir Merrill and Orson Gregory in view. There were flashes of color at the edges of the rapier’s trapped energy. Helmont was ready with some power of the blade.
“No,” Gregory corrected. “This never belonged to him. An old friend of mine made this. Well...” He wiggled his gloved fingers, even as they gripped the sword’s hilt. “Some of it was a later souvenir, but not most of it. Anyway, Kol, you’ve been after the lead antenna guy for a while. Are you feeling up to finding him? I think that big blast from the sword left him somewhere over thataway.” He angled his head toward the far side of the sanctuary without looking away from Helmont. “We don’t want him grabbing at our friends.”
“You can correct your failure at the Pinnacle, Geber,” Helmont called. “Mr. Maros learned from your torment. We can’t have knowledge spreading uncontrolled. Prune him.”
“I have taken the key, my lord!” Larks rose from behind the altar before Geber could answer. The heavy box that had floated beside the knight was now hovering above the operative’s raised fingertips. An aura of the green fire filled the air around the box and Larks’s gauntlet glowed white beneath it. “My Shaping can keep the fire at bay.”
“Release it, Larks,” Helmont said. “You don’t know--”
The light from Lark’s gauntlet spread. The glow grew from his fingers to his shoulders and his chest. His armor shone white, and his tunic beneath burned. Larks moaned, and the air filled with a cooking smell.
“Release it!” Helmont commanded.
“I can’t!” Larks wailed. “I can’t!” The light spread over his armor and body. He burned, screaming, and the fire took on a greenish tinge.
Then the box flew from his hand and clattered to the floor, out of sight. Larks was fried, his clothing charred, his armor blackened. His body collapsed to the floor.
Kol Maros took this as his signal. He crossed the rear of the sanctuary and drew the sword from his hip as he ran. A new shield appeared at his side.
“Geber!” Maros yelled. “We have a good deal to talk about. Where are you, Geber? Where do you have Duncan?”
Wherever Geber was, his grip was gone from the Dommik girl. She straightened and ran around the back of the room. She held the great sword above her, and far ahead, the old knight passed through the pews to meet her.
Greenley did not rise. The man only pressed himself flatter to the floor. Divenoll looked away from the Ledgerman. He found his fire again. His red fire against the flashing green. The Dommik girl had not fully recovered from whatever silent attack Geber had sent against her or whatever toll the use of the ancestral power had taken on her. She stumbled as she ran.
Divenoll caught sight of another flash of green fire that was not bound to any blade.
The box that held the key lay at the step below the altar. It burned green only above the box, but the heat was melting the ice all around and sent lines of water running down the walls and pooling across the floor.
What sense was there in fighting two weary sorcerers, people with powers he may have never seen before? No sense – not when the real prize waited so close at hand. Better to puzzle his way through the box’s fire. He could learn from Larks’s mistake. He could learn from his own. Survive to learn, that was the way.
Divenoll also lay flat. He let Sir Merrill and the girl meet. They sagged against one another. They spoke brief words and clasped hands and began a staggering retreat toward the door.
Violet fire shot through the air toward them. The heat passed close over the pews, and over Divenoll and Greenley, where they hid.
The rapier’s Ignition exploded before it could reach its mark. Divenoll pressed his helmeted face to the floor, but there was a new light above him, a powerful, sustained blue. He looked up to find Gregory’s sword extended, filling the air and reaching across the room.
“Yeah, I've got some tricks you haven’t seen.” Orson Gregory returned the sword to his two-handed grip and to its normal length. “Can you say the same?” The Dommik girl and Sir Merrill reached the far side of the pews. Gregory now stood between them and the baron, though they still struggled to walk. Their pace seemed to be weakening.
Helmont flew down the aisle, his cape billowing behind him. His blade aimed at Gregory’s face. Surely, once the mercenary was dead, the old knight and the girl would be no match for the baron.
Divenoll rose to watch. Orson Gregory stood sideways, with sword outward. Gregory struck twice, all wrist. The swords met with a flash of many colors. The rapier was deflected right, and Helmont veered aside. He landed between two of the pews. He slid to a stop, and his helmet aimed back toward Gregory.
The eagle on the left shoulder of Helmont’s armor fell away and clattered to the floor. Gregory had scored a hit on the baron’s armor! When had he done it? Those brief, simple motions – Gregory had total control of his sword’s perfect cutting edge. Had he truly come that close to cutting Helmont’s body? Had the baron’s last-second twist saved him from feeling the heat of Thousand Destiny?
“Harper, if you see Jim,” Gregory called after the Dommiks as they passed back through the sanctuary door. “James.” He laughed. “Tell him that I’ll say ‘en garde’ before the big sword fight really begins.” He turned the blade toward Helmont’s new position.
“Thank you, Captain,” Sir Merrill spoke. His voice was even weaker, a croak.
“Carry your legend, Orson Gregory,” Harper called.
“I think I will,” he said. “Thank you both. Get safe.” He stepped into the center of the main aisle.
“You are unworthy of the fyrsang,” Helmont said. “Fire rose us from the muck and made us men, not mere apes, not mere animals. All religions, all traditions, all the legioned mythologies know its power. And the greatest of our stories show us the clash of ideas through fire. You defile that ancient dance by your very presence, the way you defile that sword by your touch.”
He brushed at his armor’s damaged shoulder. Then he raised the rapier, point out. The weapon seemed to grow – no, it did grow, until its royal violet fire burned four or five feet from the hilt. That same royal violet fire spread, until an aura of Ignition-light glittered in the air around the baron.
“Yet, perhaps this is the best way,” Helmont continued. “In this heathen time, the unworthy present must be destroyed to make way for the future of the all-worthy path. Today I remove a blight on this world.”
“Right back at ya.” Orson Gregory stretched his shoulders and his neck. He braced his feet. He returned to his standard two-handed ready stance. “Oh yeah, I just made that promise and I still almost forgot.” A smile tugged at the corner of his mouth. “En garde.”
Helmont flew at Orson Gregory for the second time, and the two fires met again in the ancient dance. The light of their clashing blades joined the aurora and the Eye of Balor. They joined legend and reborn tradition. Everything came alight with the power of their swords.