by Sam Ryder
~~~
Supper was similar to what we were used to, but the meat was warm and falling off the bone so I really couldn’t complain. Fong told stories as we ate, mostly about the Creed’s most famous battles in the Black. Most of them ended in the Creed leader being killed in a most glorious way. The final story was about the death of the Creed leader whom he’d succeeded.
“I’d say congratulations,” I said, “but it seems like the Creed leaders have a history of dying.”
Fong laughed harder than the joke warranted, even going so far as to slap his knee. “All the previous leaders made fatal mistakes. I’ve studied their lives and their deaths. I will not make their same mistakes. No, Sam Ryder, I’m not going to die until I am old and gray.”
There was something about his confidence that was so absolute it brooked no argument. He was either extremely dumb or hiding something from me. This close to the mountains, it was only a matter of time before he and everyone else in his tribe were killed. Surely he must know that. Which meant he was hiding something, and I had the feeling it had to do with that shadow-darkened corner. As we exchanged a look, I could tell Vrill was feeling uncomfortable here as well, her face tightened in concentration the way it had been earlier when we first met Fong.
Fong took a final bite of his leafrat and launched the bones over the wall. “The Black is upon us!” he roared, standing. “Who will stand and fight?”
He received thunderous roars in response as several men went to the galut to prepare them for battle. I noticed the only one not cheering was Silk. She stood with her back to the wall, one foot propped against it, knee bent. Her tail switched back and forth at her hip. Her pink lips were pursed and she seemed to be chewing the inside of her mouth. And she was staring.
At me.
I cocked my head to the side as if to say, “What is it?” but then she looked away. At the same time, Vrill took advantage of all the noise to secretly hiss in my ear, “Something is wrong.”
“Yeah, these people have a death wish,” I muttered.
“No,” Vrill said. “It’s worse than that.”
I studied her face, trying to make sense of her words. “Silk told you something,” I said, remembering the intense-looking conversation they’d been having when I was sneaking around.
“Yes,” she confirmed. “Something horrifying.”
“Tell me.”
Just then Fong appeared next to me. “Ready? This is a battle you won’t want to miss. We’ll be honored to have the famed warhammer on our side.”
“What’s in the shed in the dark corner, Fong?” I said, a note of challenge in my voice.
He laughed. “It’s no secret,” he said. “We have several of the Maluk’ori in there. The vicious bastards. Though we’ve trained them, we still can’t trust them to roam free during the daytime.”
What. The. Actual. Fuck.
“You have the demon horde locked in a shed?” I could hear the incredulity in my tone—for good reason.
“Not all of them. Just several that we’ve managed to capture and train. We hope to add to their number soon. As well as capture other sorts of monsters.”
Something wasn’t adding up. “And these monsters will fight against other monsters?”
“Depends on your definition of monster,” Fong said cryptically. “C’mon. I’ll show you.”
Vrill and I looked at each other, but then followed Fong out of camp. I really was curious, especially because we’d been theorizing ourselves about whether the monsters could be tamed and turned against the Morgoss. It seemed, perhaps, they could.
Outside of the camp’s walls, the Creed were gathered, each carrying a torch. Most rode the galut, but not all. I spotted Silk astride Shadowflash. She gestured for us to join her again, so we did. On the creature’s back, she whispered back to us. “Let me flee with you. Take me back to the Three. I’m ready to rejoin your cause.” There was something so foreign about her expression, the antithesis to everything this strong, capable woman had shown me so far: it was fear.
“I need to see what is happening here first,” I said.
“I can tell you,” she said.
“I want to see it.”
She shook her head but didn’t argue further, turning away. She whispered something into Shadowflash’s ear and the steed moved forward, joining the line of other galut. The Black fell like an executioner’s scythe. We rode out in a column. Before, the Black was so dense that I couldn’t see anything. Losing one’s direction was common. That was one of the reasons that our approach back at camp was to leave the safety of the ward shields at the same spot and walk perfectly straight out, fight, and then walk straight back. That way it was hard to get lost in the dark.
Now, however, my Demigod eyes had no trouble making out the gray outlines of the too-close mountains that were home to the demon overlords. Which was troubling. Because we weren’t riding toward them. No.
We were riding away.
“Where the hell are we going?” I asked to no one in particular.
Fong heard me and chuckled. “We’re riding into battle, Ryder. Isn’t this what your Warriors do? Fight in the Black? Die in the Black?”
Something was off about his tone. Something was off about this whole situation. There was a shriek and I saw several dark shapes streak from the walled camp’s gate.
The Maluk’ori had been released.
My hand tensed on my hammer’s shaft, but the demon horde didn’t attack us. No, to my utter surprise, they fell in beside the galut, sprinting in our midst in the same direction, like we were all part of the same army.
We rode for the better part of an hour without event, and I was finally beginning to think I’d been worried for no reason. So the Creed liked roaming around in the Black with their Maluk’ori and galut pets—so what? It was strange but not overly concerning.
Of course, that’s when I heard the shouts, screams and roars pierce the night.
In the distance I saw firelight and could make out shapes.
Men, women, monsters. Fighting.
Another tribe, I realized instantly. It seemed I might have the opportunity to speak to a second tribe leader while I was still trying to convince Fong to ally with us. Maybe I’d been wrong about Fong and the weirdness of the situation. After all, he was racing across the flats to aid another tribe. That showed good strength of character.
Until it didn’t.
We reached the battle in full stride, our galut growling low in their throats in anticipation. Except it was hardly a battle. More like a bloodbath. On the Morgoss’s side there were hellhounds, their bodies the size of bulls, gouts of fire erupting from their mouths. There were also bludgeons, the huge stone-like creatures with sledgehammer fists that were remarkably stupid and yet it didn’t take brains to smash your bones into a thousand bits. There was even one troll, the enormous creature rising thrice the size of any of the other fighters. It wielded a club, swooping it low and back and forth, like it was trying to chop through a field of wheat. Except the fighters—comprised of various races from human to Oceanian to Protoan—were the wheat. I watched as it sent one blue lion soaring through the air. I didn’t watch as the body, which was now a corpse, thumped down fifty feet away.
This is where things got really fucked up.
“Prepare yourselves,” Silk said, her teeth gritted. Valencia’s Locket was glowing brighter now in anticipation of something.
“For what?” I asked, but we were now in the midst of the battle and my words were cut off by war cries and screams of agony.
Fong was the first Creed member to attack, swinging his blade from high above where he remained astride his galut.
He hacked off a head. A human head.
Bile rose in my throat as I finally understood what should’ve been obvious if my brain hadn’t been so conditioned to think of the monsters as the enemy. Fong and the Creed had already made an alliance.
With the Morgoss.
Something snapped inside me as I watched the
nameless human’s head bounce and then roll away until it came to a stop, sightless eyes still open, falling right on me, staring through my skin and into my soul. Help us, it seemed to say.
With a roar of my own, I leapt from Shadowflash and landed in a crouch, shoving back up and bringing my hammer to bear, whipping it around with such speed and accuracy it smashed into one hellhound’s skull and kept going, cracking into a bludgeon’s arm, just as it was chopping it down to smash open the skull of an Oceanian who was being overwhelmed by her opposition.
My hammer flashed twice from the two impacts, twin concussive whumps issuing forth. The hellhound’s body contorted as its bones broke, while the bludgeon’s arm shattered, stone shrapnel stinging my face. My momentum carried me toward the bludgeon, which was exceptionally pissed off at having its arm broken, but I was not to be denied. I kicked it with a heavy boot, snapping its head back and sending it toppling over.
Vrill’s righteous anger echoed my own as she leapt down to join me, blade singing as she cut down a hellhound and then one of the Creed members who was about to stab a spear through the heart of one of the other tribesmen.
I spotted Fong in the fray, hacking and killing at will. He fought alongside a trio of Maluk’ori, the demons snarling and gnashing their teeth as they jumped onto a woman, clawing and biting at her throat.
Fong had brought us here to shock us, but did he think we would just sit here and do nothing while he and his Creed massacred this other tribe?
Maybe he didn’t care. Maybe all he wanted was chaos, just like the Morgoss.
That’s what Vrill had sensed in him as she’d stared at him in concentration: the chaos. The darkness. Perhaps it had something to do with the fact that she’d once been connected to the demon overlords too. Maybe she understood Fong better than anyone. Except he wasn’t strong enough to overcome the power they had over him. His character was weak. He deserved to die.
I charged toward him, a raging bull with my sights set on him, the matador. He turned and saw me coming, a sneer rising to his lips. He threw his leg over his steed and dismounted, preferring to fight me on solid ground, which was fine by me. Bring it the fuck on, asshole.
There was no saving this other, nameless tribe, not any of them. The numbers were simply against them. But that didn’t mean I couldn’t save future tribes like them from falling victim to the Creed’s alliance with the enemy.
Fong had been so confident he wouldn’t die in battle, not with the power of the Morgoss behind him. But he hadn’t included me in his calculations.
We strode toward each other, stopping in unison when the gap was about ten feet. “Fight with us and live, Sam Ryder,” Fong said.
I couldn’t believe he was still trying to recruit me. He was delusional, which I guess made sense given he’d been brainwashed beyond recognition. “I’ll live, but you will not,” I said, firming up my grip on my hammer.
Fong wasn’t ready to give up. “You haven’t seen what I have seen. There is no defeating them. Join us.”
I was tired of this and decided to respond with my hammer instead of words, leaping forward and swinging with everything I had. Against most men, even those Leveled up to Warrior, my Demigod speed and strength would outmatch them instantly. Fong, however, had been upgraded, too, dodging with supernatural speed that caught me by surprise. As he twisted away and my hammer caught only air, he countered with a slash that found a seam in my armor and punctured the flesh of my elbow, immediately disabling my left arm.
Luckily, I had another arm, and I wouldn’t make the same mistake again. We circled each other, each being cautious given the other’s prowess in battle. All around us, the battle continued to rage. I couldn’t wait much longer, or else I’d be surrounded by our enemies, who were killing the other tribe at will, both monster and Creed member alike.
I attacked, feinting a hard charge and then guessing left, hoping Fong would try to dodge in the same direction he had previously. He didn’t. He went right. Which was what I had expected, my double-feint paying off as my hammer hit him square in the chest, the powerful whump sending him flipping and twisting backwards. He landed hard on his back, which surely snapped his spine, and then came to rest, unmoving.
I may have killed the tribe leader, the one connected to the Morgoss, but I didn’t know whether the other Creed members were similarly connected or if they’d simply drank the Kool-aid Fong had offered them, buying into his plan to fight the other tribes rather than the Morgoss. Either way, I needed to stop them here and now.
Except for Silk. Somehow, she’d managed to avoid falling into the same trap as the others, either by strength of will or something else. Even now, she was fighting alongside Vrill, still astride Shadowflash.
I was about to charge back into battle when Fong moved.
I froze. It was impossible. I’d hit him with my goddess-powered hammer with everything I had. He’d landed with such impact it should’ve snapped him in two.
He stood up, glaring at me with such hatred I felt like his stare alone might cause me to catch fire.
Someone from the other tribe who was fleeing a hellhound found Fong in their direct path and she tried to strike him with a club, but he lashed out without looking, opening her throat. She stumbled to the ground, dead, and the hellhound fell upon her, lapping at the geyser of blood.
Fong stalked forward, eyes locked on mine, chaos and destruction in his stare.
“What do we do?” The question came from Vrill, who was now beside me with Silk and Shadowflash. The two women had carved out enough space to give us all a respite, but the enemy was still numerous. They’d finished their murderous job and were now turning, one by one, toward us—the last three standing. Maluk’ori spat and hissed. Bludgeons thumped their stone fists together. Hellhounds chomped at the bit, fire roiling around their open maws. The troll stomped in our direction, ground shaking beneath its trod. And the Creed members, they surrounded us, forming a full circle, three men deep.
In short, we were fucked.
“Uh, Vrill?” I said. “Any chance that dragon of yours is in the area?”
“Working on it,” Vrill said, her face laced with concentration. I was hoping her mental bond with Mrizandr was still working and that the flying lizard was within range.
“Silk,” I said. “You don’t have to ally with us. Stay with the Creed and live. You can try to escape later.”
She shook her head. “I cannot. I have watched as a group I once loved crossed over a line I swore I would never cross. I’ve survived by pretending, lying to myself and the others. I cannot do it any longer. I will either die today or live knowing I served a greater purpose.”
Unless Mrizandr showed up soon, it would be the former option, unfortunately.
Still, none of us would go down without a fight. I steeled myself as Fong approached, seemingly none the worse for wear despite the knockout blow he’d taken from my hammer. “Last chance, Ryder,” he said. “Join us and live.”
There was only one word that was appropriate in response. Never. But that was a cliché response I’d save for another time. Instead, I had two words that made me feel much better. “Fuck. You.” I flipped him the bird.
“Now you die,” he said.
“No,” Silk said. “You die.” With that, she held Valencia’s Locket forth in her outstretched hand, opening the tiny chest and allowing light to pour forth. The stream of light formed a column that rocketed outwards with an audible scream, an ear-shattering shout. As we all covered our ears, the light swarmed around Fong and the men and monsters who surrounded him. Their skin was eaten away, revealing their bones, both white and black. Their eyes burned away; their blood boiled. They screamed and shrieked. They died, bones clattering into the dust by the dozens.
And when, finally, the light winked out and the scream cut off and I dropped my hand from shielding my eyes and plugging my ears, one man remained standing in the direction the column of light had swarmed over:
Fong.
> Even he seemed shocked he’d been spared. His lips cracked open. “Thank you,” he said, and I sensed he was speaking to his masters, the Morgoss, who’d given him a measure of their power to spare him from the goddess power we’d all just witnessed.
Fong’s invincibility wasn’t the only problem we faced: Valencia’s Locket had wiped out a full quarter of the enemy, but that left plenty of monsters and Creed members alive. They repositioned, filling the void around Fong. Once more, we were surrounded.
I looked at Silk. “Again,” I said. “It’s our only chance.”
She nodded and opened the locket once more. Nothing happened. She closed it. Opened it. Nothing. “Shit,” I said. “It needs to recharge.”
Fong laughed. “Attack,” he said.
The remaining monsters moved first, salivating at the chance to get a taste of our blood. One of the hellhounds shot forth ahead of the pack, fire spewing from its mouth. I slammed my hammer down on the ground before it, causing a bright blast of goddess power to shoot along the ground, tripping the beast up. One of its legs turned black and fell off and it skidded toward us, fire spewing in all directions. Silk finished it off with a knife to the face.
The hellhound had been foolish, attacking unilaterally. The next wave of monsters—for it really was a wave—were smarter, keeping pace with each other, a mixed group of two hellhounds, three bludgeons, and two Maluk’ori. There was also the very large troll that did its damndest not to step on his buddies but still accidentally squashed one of the bludgeons, shattering the monster into a thousand stone pieces.
The troll was the x-factor, I knew. It could wipe the three of us out with a single swipe of its huge club, which had old rusty metal spikes protruding from it at odd angles. But it could also “accidentally” kill more of its allies. Its presence also created a buffer of sorts from the Creed members, who hung back and let the monsters do their dirty work. Knowing all of this, my Demigod mind cycled through our options, selecting the best one based on the probability of success. That probability, my upgraded brain deduced, was a lowly twelve percent. But twelve percent was better than zero percent, and I wasn’t the type to give up, at least not anymore. I was reminded briefly of the scene from Dumb and Dumber where Jim Carrey, aka Lloyd Christmas, is told he has a one in a million chance of winning over the girl of his dreams and his response is, “So you’re saying there’s a chance!”