Almost all at once, the demonic line broke. They turned and fled. A few mages shot blasts of energy after them, but many collapsed where they stood, utterly exhausted. For now, at least, they had won the day. Jez released Luntayary’s form, and exhaustion settled on him, dragging him into unconsciousness.
CHAPTER 19
Jez awoke to a sight he’d gotten far too accustomed to over the past couple of years. He was in bed in a sick house. An orange-robed healer stood over him. Her hands glowed as she struggled to repair his burned body. Every once in a while, her hands flickered green. Jez raised his head and looked around. He was in a private room. Nearby sat a beast mage. Undoubtedly, the gruff man had formed a contingent with the healer which explained the flickering light shrouding her hand. She opened her eyes and blinked at him.
“Oh, you’re awake.” She let out a breath. “What did you do? I’ve never seen anyone hurt like that.”
“Can I speak to Besis?” His throat felt raw, and he took a sip of water. It helped, though only a little.
She waved toward the door. “He’s in a room over there. He didn’t have as many wounds as you, but all of his were serious. He’s lucky to be alive.”
Jez sat up and his head swam. He looked through the door, trying to catch a glimpse of the protection master, but all he could see was a hall filled with bustling healers.
“What happened?”
“Some demon with spikes for arms ran him through. You really should lie down.”
Jez ignored the advice. “Will he be okay?”
“He just needs a couple of days of rest. You could do with some of that yourself.”
Jez shook his head, though the motion made him nauseous, and it took a few seconds for the room to stop spinning. “There’s no time. Let me speak to Balud.”
“The chancellor is busy seeing to the defense of the city.”
He tried to get out of bed, but seemingly out of nowhere, half a dozen students of healing rushed forward and held him down. Years of working with the sword had hardened his muscles, and the study of terra magic also tended to increase physical strength. Under ordinary circumstances, they would’ve struggled to restrain him, but the past several days had drained his strength, and they had little trouble keeping him in bed and forcing him to lie down. Finally, he stopped struggling.
“Look, he’ll want to know I’m awake. Can you just send someone to tell him?”
“That will not be necessary.”
Balud’s voice came from the door. The head healer sputtered for a second. Balud waved her off, and she bowed. She and the rest of the healers scurried out of the room. Balud smiled at him. “I’ve been checking in on you regularly.”
The room spun as Jez sat up. Balud scowled but didn’t stop him.
“How long was I out?” Jez asked.
“Just a few hours.” Balud sighed and sat down on a stool near Jez’s bed. “I don’t think we could’ve held off the demons without you.”
“Did Osmund tell you about the dragon?”
Balud nodded. “They’re looking for Marrowit’s cage. We have pyromages searching as well, but they can’t go very deep into the fire mountain.”
“How long do we have before the mountain explodes?”
“Two days.”
“Can we hold them off that long?”
Balud stood up and paced back and forth. Aside from Jez, there were no patients in the room, and his footsteps echoed. He paused and peered out of a window for several seconds before looking back to Jez. “It doesn’t look good. We’ve banished a lot of them over the past couple of days. The army isn’t half of what it was when they started up the mountain, but it’s still not enough. Unless we do something drastic, we won’t survive.”
“Has anyone seen Sharim?”
Balud nodded. “From what Besis has told me, he’s changed so much he doesn’t even look human anymore. I'm not sure anyone but you would recognize him as something other than a demon.”
“I guess it’s too much to hope for that we can take him out.”
“I’m afraid so. Do you have any other suggestions?”
Jez thought for a second before shaking his head. “Fighting Sharim is the only way I’ve ever beaten a demon army.”
“I was afraid of that. That doesn’t leave me with many options, and those I have are bad.”
“What are you going to do?”
For a second, it looked like Balud wouldn’t respond. Finally, he sighed. “You know what’s under the central spire?”
“The demon cages?”
“And other things. Objects of magic deemed too dangerous to allow out into the world.”
Jez nodded. “Besis told me about that once. He said you had things like my sword.”
Balud pursed his lips. “We don’t like for adepts to create their own items. There’s too great a chance they’ll make a mistake, and you certainly shouldn’t have given your sword to a common soldier. Such things don’t belong in ordinary hands, but no. If I’m honest with you, your sword is a rather tame item. If the stories are to be believed, the things stored under the tower make your sword look like a toy.”
Jez blinked at him. “What do you mean ‘If the stories are to be believed?’ Don’t you know what’s down there?”
Balud shook his head. He rose and walked to the door. He stood in front of it for several seconds before looking over his shoulder at Jez. “Did you know the laws of the Academy forbid the master of secrets from ever becoming chancellor?”
“No. What does that have to do with anything?”
“When we first started storing items beneath the spire, it was determined that they were too dangerous for the chancellor to know what they were. It was thought the temptation to use them would be too great. Only the master of secrets knows what’s hidden there, and she may not access them without my permission. If I give the order, Rael will tell me, but there’s no going back once I cross that line.”
Jez’s throat had gone dry. “Is it that dangerous?”
Balud let out a long breath. “We’re about to find out.”
CHAPTER 20
The healers insisted Jez needed to be in bed for at least another few days before he was fully recovered, but Balud overruled them. The unfortunate truth was that Jez was too effective in combat to be allowed to stay away from it for very long.
He, along with Osmund, Lina, and half a dozen others, were gathered in a small room near the central spire. Rael, a tall woman whose hair had long ago gone gray, joined Chancellor Balud. Each wore a grim expression. The gathered students and mages, those most trusted by the masters, tried to make conversations, but their efforts were strained. They all knew why they were here. The two masters sat at a table with nearly a dozen assorted items. Jez could almost feel the gentle hum of power coursing through them. He told himself it was his imagination, but the way the other mages were acting made him wonder. An uneasy quiet settled on the room as Rael picked up a curved piece of bone three inches long. It might’ve been a claw, though Jez couldn’t imagine what kind of animal it would’ve come from.
“This is a Wellian Talon. If you use it in conjunction with a transformation, it’ll allow you to maintain a hybrid form.”
“Like the beast men,” Jez said.
Rael shook her head. “Not exactly. They took a hybrid form, but there was nothing preventing the altering of that form by external forces.”
“I don’t understand. Nothing was changing them back when I saw them.”
Rael hesitated but sighed and nodded. “They could be wounded. With a Wellian Talon, the magic will heal any wound almost instantly.”
One of the students Jez didn’t know let out a low whistle. “That would be useful. Why was that hidden away? It doesn’t seem dangerous at all.”
“Because it inflicts something very close to beast mind, and the magic also has a tendency to force a form on those wounded by the user.”
The beast mage wrinkled her brow and took an involuntary step back. �
�You mean it makes the hybrid form contagious?”
Balud winced, but Rael nodded. Her next words were barely above a whisper, and it was only due to the deathly silence that had fallen on the room that they were able to hear. “More than that, there’s no way to shut the magic off. Anyone that uses it, and anyone they infect, will be in that form permanently.”
The mage who had spoken before paled a little. “Suffering from beast mind forever?”
“Maybe the beast men could help,” Jez suggested.
Rael shrugged. “I have no idea. From what I understand, they mitigate the effects of beast mind by finding a form where the mind can find balance.” She hefted the talon. “This makes that kind of working impossible.”
She placed the Wellian Talon aside and picked up a black disc the size of her palm. It seemed to be made of obsidian and apparently had the power to call down fire from the sky. One item caused intense pain in everyone within a hundred yards, while another could destroy the mind of its target, leaving them an empty shell for the rest of their days. Rael wasn’t sure if those last two would work on demons. She went on explaining the uses of the other items. With each description, Jez’s eyes widened as the mages near him grew quieter. He’d never imagined that such items of destruction could exist, but when Rael was done, Osmund spoke up.
“That can’t possibly be all of it.”
Rael narrowed her eyes. “No, it isn’t. We’re not telling any one group what all the items can do. That knowledge belongs to me alone.” She eyed Balud, who looked like he was going to be sick. She returned her attention to Osmund. “And the chancellor. We wouldn’t have included any adepts at all, but in matters of combat against demons, the three of you are among the most experienced mages in the world.”
Osmund nodded, and Rael motioned to the table. The others were reticent, but the limaph stepped forward and picked up the obsidian disk. Balud cleared his throat, and Osmund looked up at him.
“From what I’m told, that’s extremely difficult to control. You could as easily incinerate yourself as your enemies.”
Osmund shrugged. “Ziary is resistant to fire. It makes more sense for me to take it than anyone else.”
Jez took an amulet capable of sending out waves of force through the earth. It could cause earthquakes if it was overused, so he would have to be careful. Lina examined each item, but in the end, she refused to take any. She wasn’t the only one. To everyone’s surprise, the mage who’d been so unnerved at the idea of suffering from beast mind was the one who ended up with the Wellian Talon. Jez kept expecting Osmund to joke around throughout the process, but the other boy remained deadly serious.
They filed out of the room and found a group of mages waiting outside. Jez paused as they entered. He glanced down at his amulet. In the wrong hands, this device could be used to devastate a city.
“What do you think they’ll get?” Osmund asked.
Jez shuddered. “I don’t even want to guess.”
CHAPTER 21
The attack came just before sunset. The demons raised a cloud of dust as they marched and were spotted long before they reached the caldera. The mages of the Academy watched their approach with grim silence. Jez and Osmund stood side by side as mages all around them flickered with power.
“They don’t look so dangerous from this far away, do they?” Osmund asked.
Jez sighed. “Not really.” He exerted a minor effort of will and shed his human form. “We should strike before they get close.”
Osmund nodded and shimmered into Ziary’s form. His sword blazed, though he kept it at his side. He held the obsidian disk in his hand. The mages standing with them went silent, and Jez could practically feel the fear rippling through them. He felt like he should say something to encourage them to hold or to urge them to be brave, but no words came to mind. He inclined his head toward the defenders, though only a single man returned the gesture. It shocked Jez to realized it was Jabur. Taking his cue from Jez and Osmund, the former bodyguard had also taken on his other form. Jez turned back toward the enemy without saying anything. He spread his wings, and he and Ziary took to the air.
The flying demons spotted them almost instantly, but both pharim and scion rushed at them with their swords forward. They each impaled a catoz. The bat demons screeched and went up in a puff of smoke. Their swords moved in a blur, cutting down demons left and right. An aura of red flame sprung to life around Ziary as he reached into his robe. Jez tucked his wings in and dove. A wave of heat washed over him, though he didn’t turn to see what working Osmund was using. As soon as Jez was close enough to the ground, he pulled out the amulet and sent a surge of terra magic into it.
The sound made thunder seem like a whisper. The stone at the demon army’s feet cracked and split apart, forming a fissure at least a hundred feet long and twenty wide. Demons roared as they fell into the magma at the base of the crack. Jez kept flying, going a quarter mile, with the earth constantly trembling beneath him. As soon as he was past the army, he turned around.
The flames surrounding Ziary had grown so bright Jez couldn’t look directly at him. Demons that came too close were reduced to a pile of ash. The fires grew even brighter as a cloud of darkness materialized above him, shimmering with red energy. It rumbled, but the sound wasn’t quite like thunder. There was an orange flash, and a ball of flame roared from the sky, crashing into the demon army before exploding. Again and again, fire rained down. It engulfed the flying demons without slowing. In a matter of seconds, they had eliminated a quarter of the demonic forces, but while the might’ve been enough to break a human army, the demon march continued on.
Jez headed back toward the enemy, but the army was too close to the city to use his amulet again without costing his side just as many lives. Osmund obviously concluded the same thing because the rain of fire ceased. As Jez neared, he saw a creature that stood on two legs, but with the head of a lion, tearing into the demonic forces. Its claws ripped through the demons with a rage that was beyond savage. The creature was covered in yellow fur and wore what had once been green robes, but they had been torn as the body beneath them had rapidly expanded. In its left hand, it grasped the Wellian Talon.
Ziary came up next to him. Jez sighed. “I don’t even know her name.”
“Jania. We worked together to try to figure out the best way to combine beast and destruction. We were making progress.”
The lion woman leapt at a phobos, seemingly unaffected by the demon’s fear aura. Her jaws closed around the creature’s neck. Fire spurted from the wound and the demon fell. Jania roared and moved on to the next one. Several chezamuts scored hits against her, but powered by the Wellian Talon, she didn’t even slow, but instead continued to plow through them.
From other places along the battle lines, lightning and waves of force surged forward. Demons fell by the score, and Jez began to think they had a chance. Seemingly out of nowhere, half a dozen creatures at least six feet tall with deep purple skin stepped forward. They wore what looked to be robes made of shadows. As one, they lifted their hands.
A bolt of lightning streaked forward from a mage wielding a wand Rael had given her, but the air before the demons shimmered. As the lightning struck, it coalesced into a glowing blue ball. A second later, it shot back toward the mage who had created it.
She didn’t even have time to scream.
The lightning struck her, leaving only a blackened husk. The wand, a rod of yellow crystal a foot long, glowed and shattered. A wave of energy rushed outward, knocking down everyone within a dozen yards and leaving the air smelling of ozone and burning flesh. Those at the outer edge of the affected area groaned and struggled to get up, but the ones closest to the mage didn’t move.
Jez and Ziary landed near the burned-out body as the demons surged forward. They fought with magic and blade, cutting down any who came too close, but even the pair of them couldn’t take the place of all those who had fallen. Demons, a few at first, but then more, got past them and headed int
o the city. Cries sounding from nearby told Jez that this wasn’t the only place the demons had made it past the lines. The masters, along with several other mages and all the ordinary soldiers waited in the city, but they had been intended as the last line of defense. No one had expected the demons to break through so quickly.
One of the purple skinned demons, a hagine, came into view. Far more dangerous than all but the most powerful battle demons, these creatures were the sorcerers of the abyss. It looked like a withered old woman with a long pointed nose. Its yellow eyes were slitted like a snake’s and gray hair going down to its waist writhed in a way that made Jez feel like he was going to be sick.
“I’m going to go after it,” Jez said as he cut down a bull-headed demon. “Can you handle yourself here?”
Ziary’s blade lopped off the head of a thing that looked like a cross between a bird and a spider. “Go.”
Jez rushed forward, cutting through the demons that stood in his way. The sorcerer locked eyes on him and lifted a hand. A wave of darkness shot at Jez, but he held his sword forward. The weapon impacted the otherworldly working, and the shadows split around Jez. He swung his blade in a wide arc, expecting to cleave the demon in two, but its form rippled, and suddenly, it was three feet back from where it had been. Jez’s blade sliced through empty air.
The demon raised a hand, and a sphere of incandescent energy shot toward Jez. He flapped his wings and rose into the air, but the ball turned upward and hit him in the leg. A thin film expanded from the point of impact. He tried to shake it off, but it kept growing. After a second, it had encompassed one leg and had started spreading to the other, draining all feeling from the affected limbs. Jez’s blood went cold. It was just like the working he’d developed to bind a pharim. His fingers danced in an elaborate pattern, but he had never considered countering the working. He was strong, but it was the same way a thunderstorm was strong. Though centuries of wind and rain could wear down a mountain, one storm was insufficient to the task. His magic slammed against the demonic working and evaporated.
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