“If we can take him, Warlord,” said Tamlin, a glitter in his gray eyes, “we can win the battle. We can reunify most of Owyllain with one stroke.”
“Then we shall take Justin!” roared Obhalzak. “Sound the charge! To me, my warriors! To me!”
His headmen raised war horns and blew long blasts, and a roar of bloodlust came from the gathered Mholorasti warriors. Warlord Obhalzak started running towards Justin’s banner, and the warriors of Mholorast followed him.
Ridmark took a deep breath and lifted Oathshield. His knees and shoulders and back ached, and sweat stung his eyes, and the cuts on his arms burned. But none of that mattered. Oathshield enhanced his stamina, keeping him on his feet, and more importantly, this was a chance to win the battle. If Ridmark and the others could defeat Justin, they might decide the course of the War of the Seven Swords then and there.
He looked back and saw Tamlin and Aegeus and Calem and Third waiting behind him.
“One more battle?” said Ridmark.
Aegeus grinned. “You call this a battle? Let’s go find a real fight!”
“As you say,” said Calem. Aegeus’s sense of humor only seemed to confuse him.
Third remained impassive, but Tamlin nodded, his face hard and eager.
Ridmark nodded back, and he ran after the Warlord as the Mholorasti orcs charged towards King Justin and the warlocks of Vhalorast.
Chapter 18: Fire & Earth
Kalussa had never been so tired in her life.
Dead men lay scattered on the ground around her, killed by the power of the Dark Arcanii. At least their deaths had been quick. The withering bolts of dark magic had reduced once-healthy men to emaciated shells of mummified skin and crumbling yellow bone in a single instant. A month ago, Kalussa would have been among the dead. All Arcanii learned spells of defense against dark magic, but against the Dark Arcanii, those spells were like using a shield of paper against a spear of bronze.
But the shields that the Staff of Blades created deflected the spells with ease, and Kalussa used the Staff’s power to protect her and Kyralion.
And in the moments between attacks, she fought back, hurling fire and crystalline death into the sky.
Kalussa was long past exhausted, her heartbeat thundering in her ears like the drums of the army, but one thing kept her on her feet and fighting.
They were winning.
At least, they were winning against the Dark Arcanii. Kalussa wasn’t sure how the rest of the battle was going, but from the way the hoplites were retreating towards King Hektor’s banner, she suspected it wasn’t going well. But that was beyond her control. The fight against the Dark Arcanii filled her attention, and Kalussa sent her will and her magic into the Staff of Blades.
They had killed at least half of the Dark Arcanii. Kalussa had torn them from the air with elemental fire and crystalline spheres. Her father had used the Sword of Fire to burn them to ashes. The Arcanius Knights attacked with volleys of lightning and spikes of ice.
But the Keeper of Andomhaim was the most effective of all.
Calliande stood with her staff wreathed in white fire, casting spell after spell. The Dark Arcanii had started converging on her, seeing her as the most dangerous threat, but she was equal to them. Her wards deflected their attacks, and she struck back with shafts of white fire that set them ablaze. Her spells burned away the dark magic empowering the winged creatures, and they plummeted to the ground.
Another Dark Arcanius dove towards Kalussa, and she forced her exhausted will through the Staff of Blades. The blue crystal at the end of the staff shivered, and she summoned another sheet of crystal from the ground. The glittering sheet appeared before her, and the blast of dark magic shattered against it. She started to fashion another attack, but Kyralion reacted first. He sent an arrow hurtling upward, and it punched through the creature’s wing. The Dark Arcanius jerked to the side, and it slowed enough that Kalussa had time to cast a spell. Her sphere of fire caught the creature in the face, and it shrieked, lost control of its remaining wing, and plummeted to the ground.
That made a mess.
Kalussa turned her attention to the next Dark Arcanius, forcing her exhausted mind and will into the Staff of Blades once more.
###
Urgency screamed through Calliande as she cast spell after spell, throwing blasts of white fire at the circling creatures and deflecting the lances of dark magic they hurled at her.
She had to deal with the Dark Arcanii as soon as possible. There were a thousand other places on the battlefield that needed her attention. The warlocks were raining attacks of dark magic down upon the hoplites, and she thought their lines were starting to buckle. For that matter, she didn’t think Earl Vimroghast’s jotunmiri were faring well against their pagan cousins, and they needed aid as well. Had the Mholorasti orcs held? Calliande didn’t know.
She didn’t know where Ridmark was, and her heart screamed for her to find him.
But she didn’t dare move, not yet. The Dark Arcanii were too powerful, and there were too many of them. If she abandoned King Hektor’s party, it was possible the remaining Dark Arcanii would wipe out Master Nicion’s Arcanius Knights and kill King Hektor himself. If the King of Aenesium fell, then all of this would have been for nothing, and Justin would win by default.
Calliande had to fight her way free of the Dark Arcanii before she could do anything else.
So, she fought as fiercely as she ever had in her life, for her husband, for her sons, for the friends he had made in this new land, to fulfill her oath as the Keeper of Andomhaim and the guardian of the realm against dark magic.
And she showed the Dark Arcanii just why the enemies of Andomhaim had feared the Keepers of old.
A pair of winged creatures dove towards her, casting spells. Calliande struck her staff against the ground, rebuilding her wards. A dome of white light rose above her, and the lances of blue fire that the creatures summoned shattered against the ward. They started to rise into the air again, their wings beating, but Calliande had no intention of letting any of them get away. She cast another spell, and a shaft of white fire stabbed from her staff and drilled through the Dark Arcanius on the left, blasting a crater through its chest and sending the creature spiraling to the ground. The second banked to the right, soaring around for another pass, and Calliande cast a spell of elemental ice, similar to the spell Aegeus often employed in battle.
It was far less effort than using the magic of the Well, but it proved just as effective. The spike of ice pinned the creature’s wings together. It shrieked and clawed at the air as it plummeted, and the crash landing finished it off.
Calliande cast another spell, this one of elemental air. A gale blew over the heads of the struggling Arcanius Knights. It slammed into a group of the Dark Arcanii, and the wind buffeted the creatures, their wings flapping as they tried to maintain their flight. The wind did little enough against them. Nonetheless, it slowed them down, and Nicion’s Arcanii attacked. Lightning and fire and ice slashed across the creatures, and King Hektor unleashed a cone of flame that killed five of them.
Just a little more, and Calliande would be free to turn her attention to the rest of the battle.
She fought on, the Sight rising within her as magical forces dueled and clashed overhead.
###
“Ah,” said Justin, his fingers tightening against the Sword of Earth’s hilt.
He had spent his life in war, had seen more battles than he could remember, both victories and defeats.
But this was going to be a victory.
The Vhalorasti orcs had not done well. Faced with the fury of their Mholorasti cousins, they had fallen back in disarray, and Justin saw some of them fleeing to the north. No doubt the useless fools were hastening back to the safety of Vhalorast’s walls. Without the High Warlock to keep them in the field, the Vhalorasti had crumpled beneath the attack. Justin hoped that Warlord Khazamek had gotten himself killed. Perhaps once the battle was over, he could install someone more competent as
the Warlord of Vhalorast.
Because this was going to be a victory.
Battles were decided by momentum, and the momentum was going Justin’s way. The Mholorasti orcs had broken the Vhalorasti warriors, but that didn’t matter. King Brasidas had kept Justin’s hoplites together, and they were forcing back Hektor’s soldiers, aided by the fury of the Vhalorasti warlocks. Even better, Justin’s pagan jotunmiri were hammering Hektor’s jotunmiri allies.
Any minute now, Hektor’s hoplites were going to break, and then his entire army would collapse. When that happened, Justin needed to find and kill Hektor as quickly as possible. Otherwise, the King of Aenesium would retreat to Castra Chaeldon and fortify there, and then fall back to Aenesium when Castra Chaeldon became untenable. Justin would face a long and brutal campaign through the hill country, and he could not afford that, not with the Confessor waiting in the wings like a hungry vulture and the Necromancer gathering a host of undead for his invasion to the south.
No, Justin had to end this battle as swiftly as possible, preserving as much of his own army and Hektor’s for the coming fight against the Confessor and the Necromancer. His Dark Arcanii were getting slaughtered, but they were keeping Hektor and the Keeper and Nicion occupied, and the creatures would keep them distracted for at least another few moments.
It was time to take a hand in the fighting himself.
Justin pointed the Sword of Earth and called upon its power.
The Sword glowed with green light, and Justin’s will shaped its magic. From this distance, he could not see much of its effect. The ground shivered beneath his boots, and a section of King Hektor’s hoplites disappeared.
The Sword had torn open the ground beneath them, and the earth had swallowed them, burying them alive.
It was a horrible way to die, but this was war. And the sooner Justin ended the battle and killed Hektor, the sooner he could lead a unified Owyllain against the Confessor and the Necromancer.
He hesitated, watching the battle, but there was no response from Hektor or the Keeper to his attack. Justin felt a tight smile go over his face.
Then and there, that decided the battle.
He would use the Sword to pull hundreds of hoplites into the earth. Between that and the warlocks’ dark magic, Hektor’s hoplites would not be able to hold, and…
“King Justin,” said Atreus.
Justin ignored him and pointed the Sword of Earth, focusing his will into the blade once more.
“King Justin!” said Atreus, panic filling his voice, and some of the warlocks started shouting.
Justin blinked and lowered the Sword, and saw Atreus and the warlocks pointing to the west, while his Ironcoats had drawn their blades. What were they worried about? The battle had moved far to the south, and…
A flicker of alarm went through him.
He might have made a mistake.
His hoplites had pushed Hektor’s soldiers south, even as the Mholorasti orcs had pushed the Vhalorasti warriors north. Come to think of it, the Mholorasti orcs had moved much farther north than he expected. Justin had thought they would have reformed and attacked his hoplites in the flank, but they hadn’t done that.
Instead, the Mholorasti orcs were charging at his banner.
It was a bold move. If they killed Justin, they would win the battle with a single stroke. Justin had not thought much of Warlord Obhalzak of Mholorast, but perhaps the boy was smarter than he had thought. Or bolder, perhaps.
Either way, it didn’t matter.
The Sword of Earth was stronger than the entire host of Mholorast.
“Lord King,” rasped one of the warlocks. “They will overrun us, and their numbers are far greater than those you have with you.”
“Aye,” said Justin, “but it does not matter. Leave the hoplites alone for a moment and turn your attention to the Mholorasti. I shall deal with them.”
The warlocks turned to obey his command, and Justin lifted the Sword of Earth.
###
Ridmark ran with the Mholorasti warriors towards Justin’s banner, drawing on Oathshield for speed and strength. Oathshield burned hotter in his right hand, reacting to the aura of dark magic around Justin’s banner.
There was a lot of dark magic.
King Justin only had about fifty or sixty men gathered beneath his banner. Some of them were older knights and Companions in bronze armor. About half were Ironcoats, and the rest were orcish warlocks in robes of ragged black leather, crimson fire and shadow twisting around their fingers as they cast spells. Ridmark doubted that any of the warlocks would be a match for the High Warlock, but their combined magic would be a formidable force.
And the Maledictus Urzhalar waited behind Justin, hands tucked into the sleeves of his robe.
The warlocks raised their hands and hurled shadow-lined spheres of crimson fire across the field. Ridmark raised Oathshield in guard, calling upon the soulblade’s power, and one of the spheres of dark magic shattered against his sword. Many of the Mholorasti orcs were not so fortunate. The dark magic ripped through them, turning orcish warriors in the prime of their strength into withered, crumbling corpses.
But the Mholorasti warriors continued howling their war cries, hundreds of them thundering towards King Justin’s banner.
###
“We must withdraw!” shouted Atreus, his bloodshot eyes wide with fear. “We must withdraw! We shall be overcome! We must…”
Justin ignored Atreus and watched the charging orcs, calculating the distance. There were two Arcanii among the Mholorasti – likely Sir Tamlin and Sir Aegeus. Dangerous in their own way, true, but no threat to him.
White fire caught his eye. Justin spotted a man in blue armor, a gray cloak hanging from his shoulders, a sword wreathed with white flame in his right hand. That had to be the Shield Knight. No doubt that explained why the Mholorasti orcs had done so well against the Vhalorasti.
“Beware, lord King,” said Urzhalar, his rumbling voice cutting off Atreus’s frantic panic. “The Shield Knight is a potent foe. Khurazalin and Sir Archaelon both learned that the hard way.”
“Fear not,” said Justin, ignoring Atreus’s continued pleading.
He raised the Sword of Earth, calling on its power. The blade blazed with green light, and the radiance leaped from the Sword and sank into the ground.
###
Green light burned before Ridmark’s eyes, and he spotted Justin Cyros striding before the Ironcoats and the warlocks, Urzhalar trailing behind him. The Sword of Earth was glowing in Justin’s armored hands, and the green light burst from the Sword and stabbed into the ground. For an instant, nothing happened, and then a massive crack of green light appeared on the ground, stretching away to the north and the south as far as he could see.
The earth shook beneath his boots, and the green crack began to get wider, a dark void appearing in its center.
It was a chasm. Justin was using the Sword to rip open a chasm in the earth.
“Hold!” shouted Obhalzak. Most of his warriors managed to halt in time, but a half-dozen stopped too late and fell over the edge of the chasm, screaming as they plummeted into the shadows.
Ridmark kept running. He drew on Oathshield’s strength and leaped, all the sword’s power fueling his jump. The power of the leap carried him over the widening chasm, and he cleared its far edge by about half an inch.
But he had his footing beneath him, and he charged at Justin Cyros.
Ridmark sprinted forward, drawing Oathshield back for a strike. Justin did not retreat, but brought the Sword of Earth up in a parry, catching Ridmark’s slash with a clang of metal. Ridmark attacked three times in rapid succession, Oathshield’s white fire struggling against the green glow of the Sword of Earth, but Justin deflected every blow.
Then Justin took three quick steps back, and Urzhalar and two of the warlocks cast spells.
Ridmark snapped up Oathshield in guard, calling on the sword to protect him from dark magic. Both the warlocks and the Maledictus hurled killi
ng blasts of dark magic at Ridmark, knocking him back. Justin leveled the Sword and pointed it at Ridmark, and a sphere of brilliant emerald light leaped from the weapon. Likely that was the power that turned living victims to dead statues, the power that Justin had used to kill Tamlin’s mother. Ridmark swung Oathshield and intercepted the sphere, shattering it to green sparks.
But Urzhalar and the warlocks began casting another spell, and a half-dozen Ironcoats rushed towards Ridmark, raising swords and hammers.
###
Tamlin skidded to a stop, just barely keeping himself from plunging over the edge of the chasm. Not all of the orcish warriors were as lucky, and some of them plummeted over the new-made cliff and into the darkness. To judge from the crunching noises Tamlin heard an instant later, it was at least two hundred feet to the bottom of the chasm.
At least the orcish warriors would have had quick deaths.
Tamlin caught his balance and looked around. Aegeus, Calem, and Third were nearby. About twenty yards to the north Tamlin saw Obhalzak and his headmen. The orcish warlord bellowed orders, and the warriors ran to the north, intending to circle around the chasm and attack Justin’s men. How far did the chasm extend? A half-mile? How long would Lord Ridmark have to fight Justin and his followers without any aid?
No one, not even the Shield Knight, could last that long against that many powerful enemies.
“Lady Third,” said Tamlin. “Can you transport yourself across the chasm?”
“I cannot,” said Third. “I am too close to Sir Calem and King Justin. I need to get far enough away from the Swords to use my power.”
With that, she turned and started running south. No doubt she intended to get far enough south that she could transport herself across the chasm.
“We’d better go with Obhalzak,” said Aegeus. “I…”
Something white blurred past Tamlin, and Calem leaped across the chasm.
It was at least fifteen yards wide, but Calem soared over it, the wraithcloak snapping behind him. He landed on the far edge and charged into the Ironcoats, the Sword of Air flashing left and right as he struck.
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