Defying Destiny

by Andrew Rowe

  Chapter XXI – Velas V – The Second Silk

  Jonan had the hand of a vae’kes around his neck, which was never a good start to a fight.

  Still, Velas would work with what she had.

  Slowly...

  She had to remain undetected, and that was harder than usual. Using any sound sorcery to mask her movements would unveil her presence.

  Aladir moved first. “Unhand him.” The bracelet around his wrist flickered, and it vanished, a gleaming sword manifesting in his right hand.

  “If you insist.” The Shrouded One spun, hurling Jonan straight into Aladir. They crashed together on the floor in an unruly pile.

  The Shrouded One stalked closer as they tried to disentangle themselves and rise. She wasn’t even armed, but she didn’t need to be.

  She raised a hand and conjured a ball of flame. It grew larger — and hotter — with every passing moment. “I’m grateful, Kestrian. I’d always wanted to finish what I’d started, all those years ago. Now, you’ve given me a chance to tie up a loose end.”

  Jonan and Aladir rolled apart. Jonan was just pushing himself upward when the Shrouded One moved to hurl the globe of flame in his direction.

  Jonan snapped his fingers. The fireball exploded before it left the Shrouded One’s hand.

  She fell backward, screaming, as Jonan pushed himself to his feet. “I hate fire. You made me hate fire, Lavender. But that anger, that resentment — that drove me to learn.”

  The flames ignited the Shrouded One’s glove and veils. She snarled, hurling the glove and veil free. Beneath the veils were a black-haired woman. Velas didn’t recognize her, but she did note the presence of old burn scars all across the right side of the woman’s face.

  Lavender. So that’s her name. A flower name, meaning she works for Jacinth.

  Velas felt along the wood beneath her, searching, until she heard the ‘click’ of a switch and a compartment opened. Her hand grasped her weapon, and slowly, she began to rise.

  Jonan was on his feet now. He ran straight at Lavender, his hand wreathed in fire.

  Lavender shoved her hand straight through his chest...then snarled as Jonan vanished, and a blast of flame smashed into her from the side.

  “Illusions.” She waved a hand. Velas couldn’t see the real Jonan’s location, but she heard him fly backward as a blast of force from the Shrouded One smashed him backward into a nearby wall.

  Another wave of Lavender’s hand sent a blast of flame in the same direction of the sound of the crash. For a moment, she could see Jonan’s profile outlined in fire, then the flames faded.

  He managed to disperse her attack, but he got burned in the process, Velas realized. He’s not strong enough to repel her attacks directly. I need to help.

  Within those few moments, the burn wounds from the explosion and Jonan’s blast of fire had already healed.

  Oh, and she’s regenerating, too. Just perfect.

  Aladir was on her a moment later, swinging that gleaming sword of his. He was much faster than Velas would have expected from a healer, but Lavender still dodged his swing easily, then slammed a palm into his chest. He flew backward, then drove his sword into the ground to slow his movement. In a moment, he was up and swinging again, a crescent-shaped wave of light following his swing.

  Lavender side-stepped that attack as well, but it put her right where Velas needed.

  Enhance.

  Lavender began turning as soon as Velas activated the spell — she must have sensed it. But Velas was already moving, jabbing the Heartlance upward from her position in the coffin.

  The strike wasn’t perfect. She was aiming from the ground, with too little room to move a spear properly, and Lavender was fast enough to try to move out of the way.

  Those factors meant that rather than impaling Lavender outright, Velas had to settle for simply jabbing the Heartlance through Lavender’s right shoulder.

  Lavender screamed, stumbling back, her shoulder bleeding. She ripped herself free from the weapon as she fell backward, pressing a hand to the wound and staring at it in disbelief. “You...you weren’t supposed to be here.”

  Velas hopped out of the coffin, then tapped the end of the Heartlance against the floor. Gold flowed across the shaft of the spear and into her body, further increasing her speed.

  “Turns out it’s very hard for oracles to see my future. Don’t know why, but Jonan and I knew we could use it. See, we knew you’d predict him coming up here. And we knew, being the arrogant monologuing villain type, you’d probably let him.” Velas smirked. “Thanks. Fate might not be very predictable, but you certainly are.”

  “Eru volar proter taris.” Phantasmal armor solidified around her. “Tell us what you’ve done with Rialla, and maybe I’ll be merciful, just this once.”

  The Shrouded One laughed. “Rialla Dianis? You’re here for her? You’re far too late.”

  Velas snarled. “Thought so. Guess it’s just time for some old fashioned revenge, then.” She leveled her spear, then jabbed again, this time aiming for Lavender’s leg.

  Lavender blasted herself backward with a burst of kinetic energy, no different from the type Velas used herself.

  Aladir launched another crescent of light at Lavender as she moved, but she raised a hand and formed a sphere of blackness, which spread out into a shield that nullified the attack.

  A blast of flame hit Lavender from behind a moment later. She snarled and spun again, swinging a fist at the empty air. There was a grunt from an invisible Jonan as a crushing burst of force slammed into him, then he went silent.

  Velas lunged at Lavender from behind.

  Lavender blurred and vanished.

  A moment later, Velas felt something smash into her jaw. She stumbled backward, nearly losing her grip on her spear. Then something hit her again, too fast for her to get her guard up. A sharp pain spread through her chest, and she knew that without her armor spell, a strike with that level of force might have pierced straight through her body.

  Listen.

  Instinctively, she enhanced her hearing to try to trace her invisible attacker, but it didn’t matter. She realized too late that as another sound sorcerer, Lavender must have already have silenced her own movements. Lavender struck her again, this time in the throat.

  She fell, gasping, and her grip on the Heartlance slipped.

  The moment the spear hit the floor, it vanished.

  Velas reached for the spot that it had been, but she felt only solid ground. A moment later, she blasted herself backward, growling. “You stole some of Jonan’s sight sorcery.”

  “I admit, it always irritated me that he’d been able to hide from me as a child.” The voice came from her right.

  ...But that was an obvious trick. She could sense the sound sorcery that had thrown the voice, and she could sense the path it came from.

  Push.

  She shoved herself in the direction the sorcery had emanated from as hard as she could, swinging her fist.

  Her swing caught resistance. Lavender flickered for an instant, but didn’t appear completely.

  Velas missed that momentary window, but Aladir didn’t.

  Roots burst from the stone below Lavender, wrapping around her leg and pulling downward.

  Lavender vanished entirely again a moment later, but Velas could still see the roots moving — Lavender was still there.

  Velas jumped backward, avoiding a swipe from the Heartlance that she’d seen coming in the moment when Lavender had been visible, then pulled her fist back and called as much force as she could muster.

  “You can’t hurt me with that,” came Lavender’s voice from behind her.

  Velas ignored it. The roots were still moving, snapping apart as Lavender struggled.

  Aladir slashed the air again, creating another shockwave. A shadow shield appeared to block it again, but that meant Lavender was distracted.

  Velas launched her blast of force. Not at Lavender herself, but at the floor beneath her, already dama
ged by Aladir’s roots.

  The floor beneath Lavender collapsed.

  The fall wouldn’t do much harm, but Velas had accurately assessed Lavender’s instincts. Lavender released her grip on the Heartlance and grabbed onto the side of the hole as it appeared to stop herself from falling.

  In that moment, the Heartlance reappeared, and Velas threw a smaller blast of force from her other hand to send it across the room. It flew until it cracked into the side of the second coffin, still unopened.

  There was the sound of someone — presumably Jonan — snapping their fingers. Lavender reappeared, fully visible. Her invisibility had been dispelled.

  Lavender hurled herself upward from the side of the hole, flying into the air.

  With a whisper carried by sound sorcery, Velas sent a message.

  Now.

  The second coffin exploded.

  And before Lavender had even landed, the figure within that coffin had grabbed the Heartlance and hurled it at her with tremendous force.

  Lavender blasted herself backward. The Heartlance crashed into the ceiling, embedding itself deeply into the stone.

  When she landed, she was forced to dodge immediately. Dozens of floating swords were whipping at her from all directions, each burning with blue-green flames.

  “Harvester,” Lavender hissed.

  The Wandering War stood among the ruins of the coffin, brushing himself off with one hand while controlling his floating swords with the other. “God-child. I will be your opponent.”

  As one of the blazing swords flew at her, Lavender stepped beyond it, then grabbed the hilt. The sword vanished, then she had conjured one of her own in her hands a moment later, using it to deflect the rapid strikes of the others.

  Velas launched herself upward, ignoring the growing pain in her chest.

  Surge.

  She flew toward the ceiling, but a blast of flame from Lavender forced her to adjust her trajectory before she could reach the Heartlance.

  “Touch of Life.” Aladir’s hand glowed as he briefly touched someone Velas couldn’t see.

  Jonan must be badly hurt from those blasts that hit him earlier, she realized. And he must have excluded Aladir from his invisibility. Wish I could see him, it’d be easier to coordinate.

  Lavender burst through a growing tide of conjured blades, aiming her own conjured weapon straight at the Wandering War’s chest.

  He drew a gleaming greatsword from his side, red runes shimmering on the black surface of the blade.

  “You made a mistake coming here, Harvester.” She brought her sword down, but he parried the strike easily.

  Lavender’s conjured weapon shattered, and War countered with a slice aimed at her chest.

  She blocked with one arm. His attack drew a bloody line, but stopped before cutting deeper.

  And with her other arm, Lavender reached forward and grabbed War’s wrist. “You’re the worst possible match against someone like me.”

  War trembled. His shoulders sagged as essence rapidly flowed from him into Lavender’s hand.

  He pulled back, opening his mouth—

  A conjured dagger appeared in Lavender’s other hand, just like the kind War used. She slashed it across his throat, and blood flowed freely from the wound.

  War let out a gasp, clutching his neck feebly, and collapsed to the ground.

  “Fool.” Lavender kicked the fallen Harvester’s body, then picked up his greatsword.

  “No!” Aladir screamed, sending a shockwave in Lavender’s direction before she could raise her sword to bring it down on the Harvester’s fallen form.

  Lavender swept the Harvester’s sword through Aladir’s projectile, cutting it in half.

  Velas landed a moment later, swinging a punch at Lavender. She barely managed to pull herself back as Lavender swung upward, nearly cutting off Velas’ hand at the wrist.

  As Lavender swung the greatsword at Velas’ chest, Velas flung herself backward, aiming for the ceiling again.

  A hail of swords glowing with blue-green fire appeared around her.

  “Oh, resh—”

  With a motion of her hand, Lavender brought the swords down.

  Velas was cut a dozen times in a moment. Her phantasmal armor offered some protection, turning deadly blows into shallow cuts, but the force of the barrage still drove her back to the ground.

  She pulled a knife and hurled it as Lavender stepped closer, but Lavender deflected it effortlessly.

  “Spirit, give me strength!” A soft glow surrounded Aladir’s body as he charged into sword range again, swinging his glittering blade. In the rapid exchange of strikes and parries that followed, Aladir came inches from landing a blow to Lavender’s wrist, only to have it deflected with a floating sword that appeared in the way.

  A second floating sword hit him in the back of the arm a moment later, then a third pierced through his shoulder. The blades pressed downward, pinning Aladir to the ground.

  Velas had to jump backward to dodge several more floating swords. They were pursuing her now, seemingly of their own accord.

  I...can’t keep this up much longer. I have to end it here.

  Velas surged in.

  She didn’t aim for a punch this time.

  Instead, she simply slammed straight into Lavender and wrapped her arms around her in an attempted grapple. Velas was bleeding badly, and didn’t have the strength to hold her for very long. In a moment, Lavender had slipped an arm free, and she was maneuvering it to grab Velas’ throat.

  Fortunately, that moment was all she needed.

  Her injuries were ebbing at her strength, but Velas hadn’t forgotten her last encounter with Lavender.

  Expulse.

  Every bleeding wound was a place where the strange power living inside Velas could escape.

  In the moment of Velas’ command, she was bathed in a flood of light as power escaped from every wound in her body.

  Lavender screamed, struggling with great strength. Velas pulled her tighter.

  Expulse.

  Another flash of light. Another scream. Then an elbow buried itself in Velas’ chest, and she fell backward with a gasp.

  Lavender’s body was covered with burns. And, unlike the burns caused by ordinary flame sorcery earlier in the fight, these weren’t healing closed.

  Velas didn’t have a chance to celebrate. A moment later, Lavender slashed War’s greatsword straight across her chest.

  There was a moment of shock as the wound spread. Then Velas felt herself falling, her legs no longer capable of holding her.

  She hit the ground hard, a pool of blood rapidly spreading around her.

  No...it can’t...

  Her vision blurred. She strained to lift her hand.

  The greatsword came down, aiming for her neck.

  A blast of force carried Lavender out of the way. The greatsword cut into the floor next to her, briefly getting stuck.

  Then Jonan was there, fully visible. His shirt was torn and bloodied, and his skin was badly burned. A glowing rune was visible on his arm, the one he’d used to conjure that force.

  And as his eyes narrowed, a new rune appeared on his arm, flashing with a crimson glow.

  Flames ignited around both of his hands. Red, orange, then brilliant white.

  She’d never seen fire glow that brightly.

  A dominion mark for flame sorcery? When did he get that? And how is he using it without speaking?

  Jonan stepped toward Lavender, the runes on his skin and the flames around his hands growing ever brighter. “Lavender. You—”

  Lavender ran him through.

  “—always fall for the same tricks.”

  The false Jonan vanished.

  White flames crashed into Lavender from behind, then engulfed her entirely. The stone beneath her melted, and Velas’ skin cracked and broke just from proximity to the heat.

  Seconds passed. Then she heard a grunt, and her fading vision turned to where Jonan materialized nearby.

 
; A floating sword had pierced through his back.

  The white fire faded.

  Jonan collapsed to the ground, the sword still embedded in his back.

  Aladir was still pinned to the stone, other conjured weapons piercing through his arm and shoulder.

  Lavender was standing right where she had been, encased in armor of half-melted ice. She was badly burned beneath that ice, presumably from the first few moments of the attack, but those burns were rapidly healing.

  No...that’s...

  The remains of the ice armor fell away. Lavender smiled, striding forward, resting War’s sword against her shoulder. “I suppose I should be grateful your friend came to rescue you, Velas. Without her ice sorcery, I might not have survived that.”

  “You...” Velas clenched her fist, but she couldn’t find the strength to even raise it.

  “I confess, you gave me more of a fight than I expected. As a sign of respect to another Silk, I’ll make it quick.” Lavender raised War’s greatsword.

  Velas tried to call on the power within her again.

  Please. One last time. Even if I die, let me do something. Let me avenge the others.

  Please...

  But her body, and the power within it, didn’t care about sentiment.

  Nothing happened.

  Lavender’s sword came down.

  Roots burst from the ground beneath Lavender, catching her wrist. She glared at Aladir on the ground, waving her other hand.

  “Lissari, take my breath to heal those who need it,” Aladir whispered. With Velas’ still-enhanced hearing, she could just barely make out the words.

  She felt the slightest rustle in the air, then her wounds began to close. It didn’t heal her much — it was too difficult to properly channel energy without physical contact, even for a veteran like Aladir. Still, some of the pain from her injuries diminished.

  A moment later, two more swords shot downward and pierced through Aladir’s body. He shuddered for a moment, then his eyes closed.

  No...

  Lavender pulled free of the roots. She didn’t bother saying anything else, she simply raised her sword again.

  The sound of a voice made her pause.

  “Open...the...other...door...” Jonan mumbled, barely audible. He was still on the ground, a phantasmal sword pinning him to the floor, and his words were pained. “I...get it now.” He let out the slightest chuckle, then broke into a cough. His hand extended upward from the ground, pointing. There was a burst of motion sorcery from his hand, then a crack as wood splintered.