by Dante King
“We were only, only acting on, on Bishop Nabu’s orders,” the frightened man immediately started stammering between groans, his eyes locked on Grave Oath’s razor-sharp tip. “He, he used these girls, these virgins, for blood sacrifices.”
“So, what does the slug do, cut these poor girls’ hearts out? And then what? What does he gain from this depraved fuckery?”
“Great… power,” rasped the man with the broken jaw from behind me. “Power… the likes of which you… could not begin… to comprehend.”
“I don’t give a goblin’s ass about Nabu’s twisted power. I’m gonna cut his heart out before the night is over. I’ll shove that black, rotten piece of diseased flesh right up his ass.”
A slow, strangled laugh gurgled out of the man’s throat, and, despite the pain he was in, he managed to glare at me through the gloom.
“You fool. You have no idea… of the pain that awaits you. You—”
Whatever he was saying was cut off very abruptly when his head popped like a ripe melon. I turned around to see Elyse standing over him, her mace buried in the pulpy mess of what was left of his head. An intense wrath was burning like a demon’s aura in her eyes.
“I always knew that Nabu was evil,” she said, “but I had no idea that he was this evil. And these slithering serpents, these disgusting servants of his... I cannot let them live. Not after what they’ve done to these poor innocents.”
She yanked her mace up and made a beeline for the next one. Suddenly, her free hand began to glow with a golden light, and before I could do anything to stop her, the golden rope of light blasted out of her hand. Instead of wrapping itself around the man, she shot the rope into his open mouth. He jerked and shuddered and tried to scream as it dove like a burrowing worm through his insides.
The man let out a blood-curdling howl, and I spun around just in time to see his wide-open mouth being freed. On the end of the glowing golden cord was the man’s still-beating heart. The bastard stared at it in shock for a few seconds as Elyse held it in front of his face, before his eyes rolled back in their sockets as death took him.
“They deserved death,” she said, “and they got it.”
“I, for one, enjoyed watching the cleric grow a spine,” Rami said with a cool smile. “Still, we have to keep our emotions under control from now on. Caution is required for what we’re attempting to achieve. Blood magic such as this can give a man great and terrible powers.”
“The Blood God is dead,” I said. “This must all be for show.”
“Dead like Xayon, Goddess of Wind is dead?”
“The Lord of Light killed all the other goddesses,” Elyse said. “This must be merely a vain attempt to serve a dead god.”
“I don’t think so,” Rami countered. “The Blood God must still live. You’re clearly ignorant of the different shapes of the divine.”
“We’re not here to talk about what gods are dead or alive, or what bloody shapes they’re made of,” I said. “We’re going to kill Nabu. Tonight. So, we need to get moving.”
“What we need to do is give these poor girls decent burials,” Elyse said, her rage rapidly fading as it gave way to sorrow and pity. “We can’t just leave them here like this.”
I gripped her arms in my hands and looked her deep in the eyes. “Listen to me, Elyse,” I said, my tone sympathetic but firm. “I know your heart is in the right place, but we simply don’t have time for that. Nabu and his Crusaders first. I promise you, once we’ve killed them, we’ll make sure these poor girls get a proper burial.”
She nodded silently.
“For the time being,” I continued, “you have to get your mind off what you’ve seen here. We need to be as focused as possible. Channel that anger so that you can crush Nabu’s skull like you did here. Hell, use your rope trick to tear out his heart, too. It would be my greatest pleasure to see you do that.”
She drew in a deep breath, and while anger and pain continued to dance in her eyes, she was doing her best to try to calm herself.
“You’re right. I’m sorry, I just… I couldn’t control myself.”
I considered raising the girls on the meathooks as skeletons. It could be a kind of poetic justice, but I figured Elyse might actually pulverize my skull if I tried it. So, I contented myself with producing skeletons from the two corpses of the hooded creeps. Bones burst from their flesh in an explosion of blood and viscera before they reassembled in the rough form of human bodies. My two new creations tilted their heads a little, and I half-wondered whether they were bowing to me. I chuckled as I ordered them to join the others.
Elyse, Rami, and I hurried out of the room, leaving its grisly contents behind, and pushed on ahead through the dark corridors until we arrived at a narrow, spiral staircase leading upward.
“This will take us to the surface level of the cathedral,” Elyse informed us. All signs of anger were gone, and she spoke with ice-cold resolution. “From there, we can move around the outermost section, locking all the doors.”
We’d barred the outer gates that provided access to the cathedral grounds, but we still needed to lock the doors that would provide anyone from inside the grounds access to the cathedral proper.
“Then, we make our way to the inner sanctum,” she continued. “Nabu and his Resplendent Crusaders will be there.”
“Well, after everything I’ve seen tonight,” I said, “I’m more than ready to kick their asses. One question though: do you think the Crusaders know about Nabu’s blood sacrifices? Would they be in on it? Do you think they’ve gained magical powers?”
Elyse frowned. “I wish I knew.”
She went on to explain where we would find the doors we needed to bolt shut. I passed the information on to my skeletons, assigning a specific door to each of them.
“Meet back here in five minutes,” I said. “Then, we’ll get this party started.”
We split up, moving swiftly through the shadows of the enormous cathedral. If I hadn’t been in here with a mission to assassinate a bishop, I could easily have spent a good hour or two wandering around the place.
Vaulted ceilings soared hundreds of feet up from the ground, and many impressively lifelike marble statues of various saints were set in alcoves in the stone walls. Tall, intricate stained glass windows glowed colorfully as moonlight filtered through them. Polished brass and bronze fittings gleamed subtly in the gentle light. Thousands of candles were scattered through the enormous open space, arranged in groups of 50 or so set in steel pyramid frames. We had to dart silently from shadow to shadow to avoid being seen through the gaps that revealed the numerous rows of pews inside the cathedral.
Eventually, we all managed to get the doors locked and returned to our meeting point without anyone having being spotted.
“Now that we’ve got the place secured,” I said, “it’s time to attack. Elyse, which way to the inner sanctum?”
“Follow me.”
Chapter Thirteen
Instead of leading us through any more secret passages and back corridors, Elyse simply walked through the large open archway to our left and headed into the nave, among the pews.
The domed ceiling was formed by hundreds of stained glass windows, and multicolored light drizzled down from above, illuminating everything in rainbow tones. A massive organ with towering pipes rose up near the entrance to the inner sanctum, while ornate blessing fonts and intricately carved wooden pulpits stood near a white marble altar, fashioned like a castle with dozens of spiraling towers.
A few yards in front of the altar stood seven Resplendent Crusaders, their golden plate armor gleaming in the light of thousands of candles. They were tall, broad-shouldered men—natural-born warriors, trained in the art of combat from an early age, and indoctrinated in the single-mindedness of religious fanaticism from an even earlier age. They looked so alike that it was difficult to tell one from the other.
“Who goes there?” one boomed, his baritone voice resounding in sonorous echoes through the vast, empty
cathedral. “What cursed heretics dare to violate the sanctity of this space on the holiest of holy nights?”
These chumps sounded like they were as fun to be around as the paladin I’d killed the day I met Elyse. They certainly seemed to take themselves as seriously as he did.
“Oh, we’re just here for a meeting with Bishop Nabu,” I said calmly.
The Crusader who had spoken held up an accusatory finger, pointing at my skeletons. “You claim to be a friend of the bishop, heathen, yet you bring the foul products of necromancy into this hallowed place! Do not take us for fools!”
“You don’t have to shout. I’m not deaf, you know. And if you think these guys are bad, wait till you meet Fang.” I grinned as I flipped Grave Oath in my hand.
“The punishment for defiling a holy place is death. You heathens and the apostate whore will have your tainted souls cleansed by our blades!”
The Resplendent Crusaders moved as one, whipping their huge tower shields up in front of them while drawing their golden longswords from their scabbards. They all whispered a command in unison, and their tower shields began to glow with a golden light.
“What the fuck did they just do?” I whispered to Elyse.
“Their tower shields. They use them to blast out shock waves, knocking their enemies back and bowling them over.”
“You could have mentioned that earlier?”
They advanced in perfect synchronization, using a shield wall formation. The timed stomping of their heavy boots on the marble floor of the cathedral boomed out a deadly, droning rhythm.
“Now, infidels, this hallowed hall shall be purged of your presence.”
“You fellas need to lighten up a little.” I pulled out a throwing star with my left hand. “Maybe lose the corny dialog, or take those helmets off once in a while. I think you’ve been breathing in too much of your own air.”
They steadily advanced while I considered which holy bastard to skewer with my throwing star.
“It’s after midnight on the biggest party night in Erst,” I continued, “and you chumps are sitting around in here circle-jerking over who’s the holiest of them all. Come on, live a little… before you die a little!”
I flung the throwing star at the closest Resplendent Crusader, who was nearly 20 yards away from me at this point. At that distance, I could hit a target as small as a penny a hundred times in a row, and the target I’d just aimed for was the eye slit of the Crusader’s great helm, the only weakness I could spot in their full plate armor.
The star zipped through the air, its trajectory perfect. Had my target been any ordinary man, the projectile would have plunged into his eyeball before his brain had registered that I’d thrown it. These Resplendent Crusaders, however, were no ordinary men.
Quick as a flash, my target jerked his head to the side, reacting a mere millisecond after the throwing star left my hand. The projectile sent up a shower of sparks as it clanged against the lower cheek of his great helm, ricocheting harmlessly away before disappearing behind the altar.
“Your putrid trinkets are useless against the Lord of Light. Prostrate yourself before the altar of the True God, and he will absolve you of your sins. And we will grant you merciful deaths.”
“Isu fuck me to death,” I muttered. “Your theatrics are worse than mine.”
I stuck two fingers in my mouth and let out a piercing whistle. Immediately, a subtle rumble began throbbing beneath my feet and vibrating across the entire cathedral floor. The Crusaders must have felt it too, because their metronomic advance faltered.
A sound like the deep booming of a massive drum reverberated through the space. I looked over my shoulder at a large archway leading to the main stairs down to the cellars. There, I saw the silhouette of Fang charging toward us.
“Gentlemen,” I said calmly as the five-ton zombie lizard charged with a roar down the central aisle of the cathedral, “meet Fang.”
The Crusaders glanced at each other, clearly unprepared for my greatest creation’s arrival. An undead monster with glowing yellow-green eyes had probably been about the last thing they’d expected to see. I couldn’t blame them for freezing. Most men, even hardened warriors, would probably have turned and fled by now. Not these guys, though. They stood their ground and didn’t move even an inch. Instead, the one who seemed to be their captain, the one who had first yelled at us, bellowed out a sharp command.
“Horns of the ox formation! Skull, slay the beast! Right horn, take the undead warriors! Left horn, slaughter the heretics!”
Moving with impressive precision and fluidity, the Crusaders established a formation with a defensive square at the center and two attacking wings consisting of twin curved lines of warriors fanned out to either side.
“Attack!” roared the captain, who was in the wing closest to myself, Elyse, and Rami.
Fang didn’t give a shit about whatever fancy formation these guys were in, or about what armor, weapons, or shields they were using. He was an undead monstrosity covered in virtually impenetrable armor. With a roar that rattled the cathedral walls and almost blew out the stained glass windows, he barreled headlong into the enemy defensive square at top speed.
The Crusaders bellowed in unison, calling on the magic of their tower shields and blasting out a shockwave at Fang, but it hardly even slowed him down, let alone stopped him. He hit them like a giant-sized runaway colt. Crusaders were hurled high into the air, spinning and cartwheeling like ragdolls as the giant lizard decimated their formation.
To my left, my skeletons charged silently at the enemy right horn, led by Sarge with his golden greatsword. Immediately ahead of us, the left horn, commanded by their captain, surged forward. Their tower shields were locked together, with their longswords poking out over the top, forming an impenetrable wall of spiky steel.
I shifted into a combat stance. “Elyse, your rope trick. Go for their ankles and trip a few of them up so that we can break this formation. Rami—”
Rami, however, had already sprung into action. With a sai in each hand, she was bounding from pew to pew, building up speed with incredible agility, veering in a rapid arc toward the end of the enemy horn. I figured she was going to try to get behind them and attack from the rear, forcing them to break formation. How she was going to get over that wall of jagged steel, though, I had no idea.
As she reached top speed at the end of her arc, she launched into a triple somersault, flying high over the heads of the outermost Crusaders, who couldn’t reach her with their longsword lunges. After spinning in the air, she landed behind the outermost warrior and stabbed a sai through a tiny gap in his leg armor and skewered his knee. She backflipped away just as he responded with a lightning-fast backhanded slash that missed her by a hair’s breadth.
I had no time to keep watching Rami though, because the captain and his men were almost upon me. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Sarge dueling with a Crusader, and behind him, Fang had one of them in his jaws. The giant lizard bit down hard, and there was a sickening crunch as the man’s ribs all splintered at once. But even then, the Crusader continued to fight, trying to stab at Fang’s eyes. With a flick of his huge head, Fang tossed the dying warrior through a stained glass window, and it shattered in a shower of colored glass fragments.
To my left, Elyse whipped out one of her golden light ropes and wrapped it around a Crusader’s ankle. She yanked on it, ripping the man’s leg out from under him and slamming him to the ground.
“Show me what you’ve got, holy boy,” I snarled as the captain and another Crusader attacked me simultaneously.
“Judgment is nigh, unbeliever!”
The captain feinted with a stab of his longsword, but his actual attack came a half-second later, a sweeping slash of his razor-edged tower shield. The goal of this attack was to remove my head from my shoulders, and perhaps if the captain had been facing a lesser fighter, he would have achieved it. But I had picked up on the subtle cues and micro-movements.
Ducking under the slas
hing shield was hard enough, but another Crusader made it all the more difficult by aiming a slash at my legs. I jumped in the nick of time, narrowly avoiding becoming 10 inches shorter.
I wasted no time in counter-attacking. In mid-air, I drew a throwing star and hurled it at the captain, once again aiming for the eye slit of his great helm. This time, as fast as his reflexes were, there was no way he could avoid it. A split-second after the star left my hand, it was buried in his left eyeball. By the time my feet hit the ground, I already had another throwing star in my hand.
The captain staggered back, growling wordlessly as the necrotic magic started its destructive work on his ruined eyeball. He uttered a last scream as his soul entered my dagger before I focused all of my attention on the other Crusader.
He lifted his shield and lunged for me, and I stepped aside. As he withdrew his sword and raised his shield again, I detected a small gap in his armor between his gauntlets and the bottom of his wrist bracers.
I darted in low with an angled lunge of my dagger, aiming at getting around his shield and skewering his hand. He saw it coming and yanked his shield arm out of the way while springing back and aiming a downward slash of his longsword at my head. I dived to the side and avoided a cut that would have split me in two.
I turned the dive into a roll, blocking a vicious slash from the Crusader’s tower shield and used the momentum to spring to my feet. The shield’s bladed edge hovered a mere inch from my face, held at bay only by Grave Oath in my right hand. The Crusader and I held this position for a few moments, each pushing against the other with all our might.
I overcame him, shoved him back, and didn’t waste a single moment in pressing home my attack. As he stumbled back, I darted forward and feinted for a high stab at his eye slit over his shield. As he was raising his shield to counter-attack, I dropped rapidly down in mid-attack and slid under his shield. Before he could react, I hooked my ankles through his, and with a swift twist of my legs, I pulled him down. He hit the ground with a crash.