A Clash of Demons

by Aleks Canard

  Only a handful of mages had ever been able to summon “mythical” creatures. And that was through all of magic’s recorded history.

  It looked as though Faedra de Morland was about to join their ranks.

  ‘Trix, get back,’ Altayr said, struggling to his feet. Faedra’s blow had him seeing stars. Lightning struck fifty metres away from him. The heat made him sweat through his robes.

  Hellhounds retreated into darkness.

  The mirrors were bursting with energy now. Both of them were exhibiting fully-fledged portals that led into unknown lands. Nadira was stuck in the middle. Only three of her thugs had survived Nadira’s onslaught. Even in her exo-suit, Nadira looked helpless. This was far from her typical field of expertise. The few times she had ever stepped into combat, it’d been against gangbangers who thought they could take advantage of her. On the rare occasions she hadn’t been able to talk them around, Nadira resorted to knives, bullets, or calling in hired muscle.

  Though Nadira didn’t think there was enough muscle in the world to bring down what was rising south of the crossroads.

  ‘Sif, belay my last order, don’t come low. Stay up high and hit that son of a bitch with everything you’ve got. Watch for its heads.’

  ‘No kidding.’

  A hydra had arisen from the rocks. Its scales were obsidian. Rocks covered what should’ve been soft underbelly. Six heads snaked around each other. Nadira’s pilots panicked. Yet instead of hauling ass, they pulled up park and unleased their entire payload on the hydra.

  Rocks flew off. Missiles shattered obsidian. Then the heads lunged. They had ridges which made the surrounding mountains look comparatively welcoming.

  The hydras sunk both Nadira’s ships, rending open the hulls and causing the thrusters to fail with devastating head-butts.

  Nadira made her way to Trix. It looked like Faedra was encapsulated in some kind of energy field. She was hanging limply in the air.

  ‘Trix, you’re the expert in these situations. What do we do?’

  ‘Leave. Quickly.’

  ‘Not without my mirrors.’

  ‘Then grab them.’

  Nadira motioned for two of her thugs to pick up the Uldarian mirrors. They obeyed without question. Started flailing as they approached the mirrors. They were being pulled in. They screamed as they fell into the south facing mirror, disappearing into oblivion.

  ‘What have I done?’ Nadira said. The hydra’s yawping drowned her out.

  Altayr joined Trix as Sif came in from overhead.

  ‘Railgun primed. Firing now.’

  The Fox’s primary weapon cleaved the hydra’s middle head all the way down its neck. Two more sprung up in its place. Sif let a plasma volley fly then banked upwards. She rose to a safe distance, swung the ship into park then let the cannons rip. The hydra was pounded mercilessly. Its serpent’s body pushed it forward. Sif’s onslaught stopped while the guns cooled.

  That was when the hydra advanced.

  Nadira’s last thug retracted his helmet, shoved his gun barrel in his mouth. Pulled the trigger. Blam. Dead.

  ‘Coward,’ Nadira said.

  Strife Squad — now comprised of Trix, Altayr, and Nadira — ran towards Faedra. Pretty much anywhere the hydra wasn’t.

  ‘Altayr, how do we stop this monster?’ Trix said.

  ‘You’re the huntress.’

  ‘Mythical beasts aren’t covered in extensive detail.’

  ‘It isn’t mythical. It’s a manifestation of magical energy.’

  Trix fired her pistol at Faedra until she ran out of bullets. None of them made an impact. Something similar had happened when Trix fought Vaende Ithli on Xardiassant. He’d had a nearly impassable magic barrier. It’d taken a direct hit from the Fox to put him down, and even that hadn’t killed him.

  Nadira fired the remaining ammo from her gatling gun. Nothing happened. Altayr cast light magic. Same result.

  ‘Railgun primed for round two,’ Sif said.

  ‘Aim it at Faedra.’

  ‘Copy that.’

  The Fox locked-on to Faedra. The railgun fired at maximum capacity. Strife Squad hit the deck.

  Faedra snapped into action. She twirled her spear. Caught the railgun blast, stopping it right before her body.

  ‘That’s bullshit,’ Trix said.

  ‘She’s drawing power from the mirrors,’ Altayr said, careful to stay away from their immediate area lest he be sucked in.

  Trix started thinking of possibilities. The mirrors were made from Uldarian metal. Destroying them wasn’t an option. And you couldn’t move too close or they’d suck you in. However, the rocks that were being pulled into the portals were only those immediately ahead of them. The pull wasn’t affecting anything above or to the side.

  That gave Trix an idea.

  Faedra returned fire. Sif evaded. The hydra reached the crossroads. It had grown so many heads that they blotted out the sky. Not even the lightning was visible now. Strife Squad became enveloped in a half dome under its countless arched necks. So gargantuan was its body that the mirrors’ pull had no effect on it at all.

  The new situation made Trix’s plan a lot more difficult.

  ‘Forget Faedra,’ Trix said. ‘Focus on the hydra.’

  ‘I can use my ship,’ Nadira said, activating her exo-suit’s thrusters.

  ‘You’d better not flee.’

  ‘I’m not leaving those mirrors here. Not after all this.’

  Nadira charged for her ship. She didn’t bother firing at the hydra. It would be like trying to blow up a moon with a bow and arrow.

  Even though the hydra was made of magic, Trix saw that its body still resembled a serpent in a lot of ways. The necks, for instance, weren’t all that wide. She reckoned her sword could cut through them easy enough, but that would be pointless since its heads just grew back.

  ‘Altayr, I need you to draw its attention.’

  ‘What’re you going to do?’

  ‘Show Faedra the stars in the sky.’

  Trix broke left, heading towards the mirrors at an angle. Hydra heads dove for her position. Trix dodged their strikes with increasing difficulty. She drew her utility cannon as she neared the mirrors. Fired one disc on the top of the north facing mirror. It landed. More importantly, it held.

  ‘Sif, ignore what I said about not going low. I need you right over the mirrors, then rip a 180 and head towards Faedra. If the hydra tries blindsiding you, hit it with the thrusters.’

  ‘On your mark.’

  ‘Now.’

  On the western path, Altayr was drawing on the mirrors’ energy, hurling gigantic fire lances. He speared the hydra at the bases of its many necks. So intense were the flames that no heads were able to grow back. That was when Nadira took off, keeping her ship as low to the ground as possible. Roof mounted cannons aimed for the heads so they couldn’t harass Trix or Altayr.

  Blue plasma. Orange fire. All against a backdrop of black stones and clouds like ink in water. Colours mixed together with blazing heat. Magic sizzled in the air like fatty meat on a barbecue. Trix’s medallion was jumping uncontrollably.

  There was so much energy ripe for the taking. Had the Valkyrie known how to harness it, she could’ve reversed Orix’s gravity planet wide. Made herself so dense that she acquired her own gravitational pull.

  Trix couldn’t believe what she was seeing. It was almost more surreal than the Riddling Arena.

  That was when Sif came in. All guns blazing. Trix levelled her utility cannon. Sif slammed the brakes. Gunned the thrusters. Trix had to time it right.

  She fired.

  The utility cannon’s second disc was propelled through the air. It magnetised to the Fox’s underside. A tractor beam was established. The north facing Uldarian mirror was lifted off the ground.

  That was when Nadira Vega’s cannons screamed to a halt. They needed to cool.

  The remaining hydra heads lunged at the largest target they could find. The Fox.

  Sif’s computing powe
r couldn’t comprehend the angle of attack since the hydra was made from magic. However, the Fox possessed a lot of external cameras. She used their footage to determine her next move.

  Thousands of possibilities were run in less than a second. One of Griff’s macros was executed. The Fox banked in a zig-zag pattern, avoiding the staggered, bloody, hydra heads. The sudden movement caused the mirror to swing dangerously close to Altayr. He saw it coming. Planted his staff into the ground. Altayr’s olive knuckles went bone white, like his skeleton wanted to escape.

  The mirror swung away from Altayr due to Sif’s manoeuvrer.

  It swallowed the south facing mirror. Nadira cursed. With one of the mirrors gone, Faedra’s power was halved. So was Altayr’s.

  Sif kept on course. The mirror attached to the Fox.

  It moved straight for Faedra de Morland.

  Stones were devoured with frightening alacrity. The mirror’s power intensified as it approached Faedra. Maybe because it’d ingested its pair. The very ground was being ripped up like peeling a hangnail off in one go. Faedra saw what was coming for her. Went to open a portal, but the loss of her power source was too disorientating. The rage she felt about being tricked by Gauthier. The fury of it all made her try anyway.

  Faedra was thrown upwards by the ripped earth as she was about to cast her spell. Then the mirror collided with her. She disappeared. The hydra flailed wildly with her gone. Trix had hoped it would vanish. It didn’t look like that was going to happen.

  Trix doubted the hydra could regenerate without Faedra feeding it power. Though she had a plan regardless. And it was a real humdinger.

  One of the hydra’s heads smacked into Nadira’s ship. It yawed, spun, and tumbled towards the ridge. Skidding along the stones. It finally came to a stop. Broken circuitry crackled with pathetic flames.

  The Uldarian mirror shut off underneath the Fox. There wasn’t enough energy to sustain it without constant magic casting. Or maybe the mirrors had wanted Faedra all along? Though they were just objects. That meant maybe someone else, in some other world, might’ve wanted the sorceress.

  ‘Sif, bring the ship around, and prime the railgun but don’t fire until my mark.’

  ‘Trix, we have to leave.’

  ‘Not yet.’

  The Fox banked wide. Trix grabbed onto the Uldarian mirror as it passed.

  ‘Alright, Sif. Head east then come back around.’

  Trix set the tractor beam to become rigid, meaning that she could hold onto the mirror without being slammed into the thrusters. This caused the discs to burn out quicker than usual, but hopefully she wouldn’t need to use them for much longer.

  Altayr was now by himself, underneath the enraged hydra. He emptied his pistol. Protected himself with barriers to the point of near unconsciousness.

  Trix was approaching the hydra from the east.

  ‘Sif, fire the railgun now.’

  A concentrated beam screamed towards the monster. From this angle — and without Faedra’s power feeding it — most of its heads were sliced clean off. That was when the discs holding the mirror to the Fox overheated. They gave out. Trix fell, still clutching the mirror, and moving damn fast.

  The hydra head closest to Trix tried to eat her. Trix repositioned herself so that the monster’s face struck the Uldarian metal. Strange sludge erupted from its scaled nose. Trix leapt off the mirror. Onto the hydra’s serpentine body. She drew her sword. Plunged it downwards.

  Then Trix ran. The hydra’s body was torn asunder. Its heads fell limp. All the hydra’s heads had hit the ground once Trix fully crossed its body. Parts of it were still smoking from Sif’s railgun blast, and Altayr’s fire lances.

  Aside from the thunder, Orix was quiet.

  2

  The machina fell to her knees.

  Everything that’d just happened hit her in the relative quiet. Old wounds raged like reignited fires. Fresh memories of the Riddling Arena collided in her head like bumper cars with spikes instead of rubber. All of it was played to the less than dulcet tones of Gauthier Nadim’s laughter.

  Altayr walked to her. He was functioning on autopilot. Faedra was gone. Somewhere in the portals. In the Betwixt. He had loved her once. And only a day ago he’d loved her again. But the pull he felt from Trix was undeniable, especially when she was beaten down. Conflicting emotions did battle in the sorcerer’s heart. Trix had killed Faedra. Faedra was going to kill all of them. Not because she was crazy. Her mind had been manipulated by Gauthier’s. Who knew what summoning him had done to her sanity.

  Mostly, Altayr blamed himself. The healing he performed on Zilvia hadn’t been as extensive as he’d hoped.

  The Valkyrie’s eyes were fixed on Nadira’s crashed ship. If the Duchess of Dark’s Hide was dead, then they had bigger problems. Dark’s Hide was a fortress with enemy forces constantly banging on the door. If one ruler died, then they were usurped almost immediately.

  Altayr offered Trix his hand. She took it. They stood together, beneath the stormy sky, saying nothing, feeling everything. The hydra was beginning accelerated decomposition. Unlike other monsters, it wasn’t close to being natural.

  ‘Sif, you can land now.’

  ‘I’ve scanned Nadira’s ship for lifeforms.’

  ‘And?’

  ‘She’s alive.’

  Trix breathed a sigh of relief then faced Altayr. ‘I need you to retrieve the mirror.’

  ‘What about Nadira? You said you were giving the mirrors to me? She’s going to be furious.’

  ‘I can handle her fine.’

  Trix walked towards Nadira’s ship without any further discussion. Altayr went to find the mirror which was somewhere in the middle of a decomposing hydra throat.

  Nadira Vega escaped from the wreckage before Trix had reached the crash site. She started walking towards the machina in long strides. Her exo-suit had saved her from the impact. But there was no way the ship would be flying again.

  ‘What made you side with me?’ Nadira said.

  ‘I gave you my word that you would have the mirrors.’

  ‘And now one of them is gone. Into another dimension, or whatever hellish plane to which those portals lead.’

  ‘Is one not going to be enough for your plans?’

  ‘Not my plans, machina. The Guild’s.’

  ‘But Faedra was working for the Guild.’

  ‘No, she was working independent of them. Despite her natural talent, she didn’t command the respect she felt that she deserved. She thought the mirrors were her way to gaining that respect.’

  ‘So why would the Guild want to betray her?’

  ‘I don’t know. I didn’t ask. They offered me a substantial amount of money to deliver them the mirrors. And as for an added bonus, deliver them Faedra… in cuffs. I suppose being in another dimension will have to suffice, unless her trip through the looking glass killed her.’

  ‘Where was this exchange to take place?’

  ‘On Dark’s Hide. I wasn’t about to partake in important business elsewhere. I wanted to have full control.’

  ‘You know, I’m in an interesting position here, Nadira. I have a ship. You don’t. I could kill you quicker than you were able to think about pulling the trigger on me. And I could take over Dark’s Hide.’

  ‘Fortunately for me, I know you detest business unless it’s as simple as cash in hand, go thither and kill this monster, et cetera.’

  ‘Hmm.’

  ‘You don’t really have a thermobaric bomb on Dark’s Hide.’

  ‘Don’t act so clever. You only know that because I sided with you.’

  ‘I knew you wouldn’t dare even before you sent me that message. More weapons pass through Dark’s Hide than anywhere else in the galaxy. Even Thyria. The only market they have is drugs, and that’s petty compared to what sifts through my alleyways and shops. People like you need Dark’s Hide to survive.’

  ‘Dark’s Hide’s the only reason I’m still here.’

  ‘I remember our first
meeting like it was yesterday. We were so young.’

  ‘This was before you were an all-powerful information broker. I’m surprised you’re willing to venture that far into your memories.’

  ‘You make me nostalgic, machina. Others seldom do.’

  ‘Will the Guild pay you for only one mirror?’

  ‘I expect they’ll pay half price, plus extra for ridding the world of Faedra de Morland.’

  ‘It’s unlike the Guild to do business in person.’

  ‘I never said they were. They were sending a platoon from an army of hired thugs to make the trade. In fact, last I heard, they were in the public docks. But since my long-range comms were taken out by a mythical creature, I’m unable to contact Dark’s Hide at all.’

  ‘Is that you asking for permission to use my ship’s communications network?’

  ‘Mages aren’t the only ones who enjoy subtlety, machina.’

  ‘I’m curious.’

  ‘That doesn’t happen often outside your typical line of work.’

  ‘Why do business with the Guild at all when you could’ve wished for anything from Gauthier Nadim?’

  Nadira retracted her helmet. Trix had never seen her shaken before. This was a close as she was ever going to get.

  ‘In all my years accumulating rare goods, I’ve learned more than a few pieces of useful information regarding the occult.’

  ‘Yet you were foolish enough to enter a devil’s threesome. And risk having the Xardiassian army at your doorstep for what you did to Iglessia Vialle.’

  ‘Going to turn me in?’

  ‘No. What you did caused no real harm. I would’ve taken justice upon myself had you injured Sia.’

  ‘What the sorcerer said before, about a lie only being a lie if it is discovered. I think that worked against Gauthier as much as it worked for him.’

  ‘How so?’

  ‘There’s no concrete proof that Iglessia is the child of which Siella’s prophecy heralds. Yes, I know of the prophecy. As I said, I’ve dealt with many rare goods in my time. There is every chance that Iglessia’s blood wouldn’t have freed Gauthier at all.’

  ‘But then you would’ve been marked for the rest of your life. Gauthier’s shadow would’ve become yours. What could’ve been worth that?’